30 lbs allowance

[Al Skierkiewicz]

Originally Posted by gsollie

At Bayou Regional, there was no concern for the 30 pounds. It seems you could have brought any part of the robot. No one seemed to care.

You may not have noticed someone watching, but what if they were? A well known and respected First veteran once told me, "I know when something looks to be about 30 pounds so I will just hang out at the door if you need me." You are supposed to act as if "my" grandmother were watching. She was a little, old, Italian lady that knew the difference between right and wrong and could point it out without hesitation.

[Bob Steele]

Originally Posted by team 3311

We took some pieces off and apart now and we have ~27lbs. We will have to do at lot in Thursday but thats propably the same for every team.

We will be at the Oregon Regional
Let us know how we can help you. We can help you fabricate whatever you need...we have the tools in the pit to do most everything.

Just come to the 1983 Pit (Skunkworks) and we can help!!!

[IndySam]

FIRST really depends on the honor system to make sure rules are obeyed. There is no way every rule can be policed. There are so many ways you could cheat and nobody would be ever be able to tell.

So you start by breaking one little rule but where does it stop? Today you carry in five extra pounds but if you stay on that path will it be long before you're re-winding motors or clocking pressure gauges?

More importantly what are you teaching and what kind of behavior are you inspiring?

[team 3311]

Originally Posted by Bob Steele

We will be at the Oregon Regional
Let us know how we can help you. We can help you fabricate whatever you need...we have the tools in the pit to do most everything.

Just come to the 1983 Pit (Skunkworks) and we can help!!!

Thank you. I think we are good for now, but you never know what happens in the matches.
You can also always come to us, but I don't think that we got anything that you don't have.
But you could still come over to say hello ;-)

[team 3311]

I just looked on the pit-map. You are right across the hall, so just next to us.
I'll deffinitly come over to say hello ;-)

[Hawiian Cadder]

wait, i have a question.

due to it binding, our lift has been eating fisher prices, so we have about 9 spares in case we cant work out where the problem is, and how to fix it quickly. do these fisher prices count towards the weight? and do they if we modify the gear on the end (we are concerned there will not be a press at competition, and we have a custom jig to put them on.

question 2

we fabricate parts that can be bought cots, because we can do it cheaper. are the fabricated parts part of the 30 lbs?

[Tristan Lall]

Originally Posted by Hawiian Cadder

due to it binding, our lift has been eating fisher prices, so we have about 9 spares in case we cant work out where the problem is, and how to fix it quickly. do these fisher prices count towards the weight? and do they if we modify the gear on the end (we are concerned there will not be a press at competition, and we have a custom jig to put them on.

If you buy them with the gear, and bring them in unchanged, they do not count because they are not fabricated. If you buy them and modify the gears beforehand, they're fabricated. Fabricated parts count toward the withholding allowance weight.

Also, where did you find 9 legal Fisher-Price motors? (They're a new design this year, and have been relatively hard to buy until very recently. Old F-Ps are all illegal for 2011.)

Originally Posted by Hawiian Cadder

we fabricate parts that can be bought cots, because we can do it cheaper. are the fabricated parts part of the 30 lbs?

Yes, they count towards the withholding allowance limit if you carry them into the event.

[team 3311]

Got to Portland now.
They first asked us for the weight. We said it is close to the 30lbs we had to get it weighted in.

28.3 lbs^^
Good luck to everybody here in Portland!

[Bob Steele]

Originally Posted by Tristan Lall

Also, where did you find 9 legal Fisher-Price motors? (They're a new design this year, and have been relatively hard to buy until very recently. Old F-Ps are all illegal for 2011.)

Yes, they count towards the withholding allowance limit if you carry them into the event.

Andy Mark now has correct 2011 FP motors for sale. They come with no pinion gear so you can count them as COTS... if you took one and took off the pinion gear you SHOULD count that as part of withholding technically because they have been modified.. These have no pinion gear so definitely COTS.

http://www.andymark.com/ProductDetai...ctCode=am-0821

They provide great service!!

[Aren Siekmeier]

At North Star they have been sticklers about weighing withholding allowances if they have any reason to believe its over (perhaps because of the number of posts here in the first day of the thread). One thing that really bit a lot of us is bumpers. We somehow totally overlooked that they weren't except from the 30 lbs (R33), so we didn't bag them with the robot. Several teams were rebuilding some if not all of their bumpers today.

Now don't get me wrong, I think it's very important that we all stay within the rules on this one. It is, after all, a rule. However, I am very strongly of the opinion that it needs to change. It seems to me that not exempting the bumpers severely penalizes teams going to bag and tag events. Unless they can fit them in their withholding allowance (unlikely, with 2 sets weighing 20-30 lbs), they must bag them, which is really not very convenient. You can only put one set on the robot at a time, which still complicates getting the bagged robot through doorways, and the loose bumpers need to be secured.

And it just makes sense that they shouldn't be included in the withholding allowance. They are not included in robot weight, and are an incredibly standard item by definition, let alone a required one. And they are hardly a functional part of a robot. What edge is attained by completing these after ship day (which we didn't do, but obviously that's what the rule is after).

I'm probably just feeling this way because we had to rebuild two of ours and witnessed first hand a team spending a good chunk of the day rebuilding most of theirs. Of course, this is because of a rules oversight by us, not because of the rule itself.

[Al Skierkiewicz]

Originally Posted by compwiztobe

They are not included in robot weight, and are an incredibly standard item by definition, let alone a required one. And they are hardly a functional part of a robot.

Ah, but they are. They are simply weighed separately for convenience. Teams who held out their bumpers last year were able to bring them in because of the 65 pound withholding allowance of last year only. This was due to the severe weather most of the country encountered that limited build time. This year we returned to the 30 pounds and that caught many teams who did not ship their bumpers last year.

[Vikesrock]

Originally Posted by Al Skierkiewicz

Ah, but they are. They are simply weighed separately for convenience. Teams who held out their bumpers last year were able to bring them in because of the 65 pound withholding allowance of last year only. This was due to the severe weather most of the country encountered that limited build time. This year we returned to the 30 pounds and that caught many teams who did not ship their bumpers last year.

Al,

The thing is 2175 did ship their bumpers last year, in their crate. This year the two Minneapolis regionals changed over to Bag-and-Tag. As Aren said, it is in the rules and the team is not blaming anyone but themselves over it (this is what happens when I move across the country, the robot gets better and the rules knowledge gets worse ).

What I would like to see is FIRST allowing and encouraging bumpers to be bagged in a second, separate bag. It eliminates the difficulty of bagging them with the robot, but maintains the "done at ship date" aspect.

[Alan Anderson]

Originally Posted by Vikesrock

What I would like to see is FIRST allowing and encouraging bumpers to be bagged in a second, separate bag.

It's already allowed. The practice of using multiple bags was discussed here by a couple of teams.

[Vikesrock]

Originally Posted by Alan Anderson

It's already allowed. The practice of using multiple bags was discussed here by a couple of teams.

Allowed, but discouraged if I remember correctly.

I stand corrected, after looking around further, it looks like FIRST did encourage this during one of the conference calls.