Extra practice robot???

[Shaun Coon]

So my mentor wants to have a second robot built but only for teaching our new driver how to drive and i feel that it is uneccesary. it will be last years frame but i feel that it is going to be a hassle to wire it again because someone ripped it apart and this years robot is basically done. does anyone have any suggestions????

[lemiant]

Do you want to be as competitive as possible at your regional? Tons of teams do what you are describing. If you want to be the best you can, you should do everything you can to improve your team, this includes building a practice bot! If you don't care don't bother.

[EricH]

Rewire it. It's been pointed out that you get maybe an hour of drive time over the season with your competition robot; a practice robot can give you that in under a day if it's working. This can translate to a large advantage on the field over a team without a practice robot. Plus, you could use it as a programming testbed, for a while at any rate.

Now, because it's probably not an identical twin, the advantage will be less--but it'll still be there.

Listen to your mentor. Rewire the robot--it shouldn't take that long.

(Anybody wanting to discuss legality, ethicality, or morality of a practice robot... there's another thread for that.)

[Jon Stratis]

Originally Posted by Shaun Coon

So my mentor wants to have a second robot built but only for teaching our new driver how to drive and i feel that it is uneccesary. it will be last years frame but i feel that it is going to be a hassle to wire it again because someone ripped it apart and this years robot is basically done. does anyone have any suggestions????

If this years robot is done, what are you going to do for the next two weeks of the build season, PLUS any time between bagging the robot and your first competition? getting your old robot up and running again gives you and your team more engineering experience, and gives your drivers more practice, as others have already pointed out.

[Shaun Coon]

ok thanks i willl do that if it will be that much better thats all thanks.

[pandamonium]

my response depends on your robot and design approach. While last year experienced drivers were very important to a teams success this year might be different. Do you plan on manually lining up to score or using an automated process? Dumper vs. Shooter...

[Greg Leighton]

So you're saying you don't want a practice bot? I guess some people don't like ice cream but its still shocking when you hear it...

But seriously, a practice bot is almost always a good thing especially when your team is capable of doing it. I'm sure your mentor is looking out for the teams best interest, I would listen to him/her.

[Shaun Coon]

Well its a good thing i dont like ice cream then !!! And auto line up and shooter

[nitneylion452]

Originally Posted by Greg Leighton

So you're saying you don't want a practice bot? I guess some people don't like ice cream but its still shocking when you hear it...

It's not that people don't like it, they're just lactose intolerant.