Bag & Tag

[Mr. Van]

I thought I'd post this in a new thread since the question has come up on several different threads.

I just got off of the phone with one of the Regional Directors. He said that the decision was just made (~1.5 hrs ago) that all events except the Championship will be Bag & Tag events.

Hope this info helps people with their decision making...

- Mr. Van
Coach, Robodox

[RoboMom]

For those new to BAT, NEMO has a white paper developed last year with hints to help.
http://www.firstnemo.org/PDF/bag_and...ps_nov2010.pdf

[Jimmy Nichols]

I can confirm from our planning meeting today.

[O'Sancheski]

This will be very interesting for teams that go far away regionals or out of the country.

[DonRotolo]

One year we got shipping for a crate donated by a local company. Cost them about $400 each way, by LTL truck. We had a company near the destination donate 16 square feet of their loading dock to accept the delivery, and rented a van to haul everything to the venue.

Teams CAN ship things if necessary - even robots.

On the other hand, renting a large van (like a Sprinter) worked really well for us in Virginia last year. Almost 30 MPG, and enough room to fit everything, with room to spare for 2 more teams easily. Less than $800, round trip including fuel.

[Cory]

Cutting Shepard out of the equation is fantastic for us. If we ever have a need to ship to a regional we can take advantage of drastically cheaper shipping options and ship to a local team we're friends with.

This might be more stress for other teams who do not regularly ship things, but overall is probably a net plus.

[dodar]

EVERY regional is B&T?

[Meredith Novak]

Originally Posted by dodar

EVERY regional is B&T?

Yes.

[dodar]

So does that mean we dont get shipping at all anymore? Because like our team, our crate becomes our pit at the regional and we ship alot of our tools and spirit stuff with the robot.

[Aren_Hill]

Originally Posted by dodar

So does that mean we dont get shipping at all anymore? Because like our team, our crate becomes our pit at the regional and we ship alot of our tools and spirit stuff with the robot.

Everything you bring has gotta come with you through the doors, unless you qualify for an exemption

[sanddrag]

Originally Posted by Mr. Van

He said that the decision was just made (~1.5 hrs ago)

I knew about this last Saturday, and apparently others did before me. It would have been nice if they at least alluded to it at the conclusion of last season. We just built a new fancy crate...

[Jon Stratis]

Well, given how much shipping costs, it's not that big of a surprise. 10 years ago, it wasn't so bad to get all the shipping donated. With the huge growth of the program, though, it starts to become a problem. This way, FIRST can direct the shipping donation towards teams that really need it (have to travel a long way for competition, travel to champs, etc), while everyone else can handle things themselves. Honestly, I was happy last year when Minneapolis went to bag and tag - It seemed ridiculous to cost FIRST so much in shipping the previous years when we could load the robot in the back of a truck and drive it 20 mins to the venue.

[Trent B]

Originally Posted by eagle33199

Well, given how much shipping costs, it's not that big of a surprise. 10 years ago, it wasn't so bad to get all the shipping donated. With the huge growth of the program, though, it starts to become a problem. This way, FIRST can direct the shipping donation towards teams that really need it (have to travel a long way for competition, travel to champs, etc), while everyone else can handle things themselves. Honestly, I was happy last year when Minneapolis went to bag and tag - It seemed ridiculous to cost FIRST so much in shipping the previous years when we could load the robot in the back of a truck and drive it 20 mins to the venue.

I fully agree on the Minneapolis stand point, I was really happy that we werent having to ship a 150-200 lb crate 10 miles... Granted storage can be a pain in some situations but the actual loading process was not bad at all.

[waialua359]

Originally Posted by dodar

So does that mean we dont get shipping at all anymore? Because like our team, our crate becomes our pit at the regional and we ship alot of our tools and spirit stuff with the robot.

This is the case with us as well.
We dont drive to regionals for obvious reasons.

Our crate becomes our pit...................well, at least it used to.

[Jimmy Nichols]

Originally Posted by sanddrag

I knew about this last Saturday, and apparently others did before me. It would have been nice if they at least alluded to it at the conclusion of last season. We just built a new fancy crate...

You may have known that they were talking about it but according to our RD who we met with yesterday, the final decision was not made until about 3:00pm yesterday during a telecoference call with all the RD's. Until then it could have still been mixed like last year.

I agree, they should have let us all know sooner.