Question about carts

[techhelpbb]

Originally Posted by EricH

**Unsafe should be considered to be illegal, per the rules. Also note that this approach follows the same approach as the rest of the rules--if an item/action is not prohibited, it is permitted.

Define 'unsafe'?

The robot carts do not have an Earth ground...is that unsafe? Some would say yes if there's an inverter.

A top terminal battery could easily have something fall on the terminals...does that make it unsafe all the time? Some might say yes.

If the battery is not maintenance free is it more or less safe? Some could argue this point.

So the risk you take here is that your idea of 'safe' is not someone else's idea of 'safe'.

As far as something that is not explicitly denied being permitted within a FIRST venue:
A safety inspector can undo that in a blink of an eye.
I've seen it often enough not to take it for granted.

In point of fact if we entrust the safety people with the call on that you might get a different result from venue to venue.
I doubt you'd like to have a cart that is legal until say Championship then you have to take it apart.

The best way to 'settle' this is to get an official statement from FIRST.
Not from me or another volunteer.
Then you can point to the simple to ask question and say: I respectfully disagree.

After all this is FIRST's brand at stake here.
Also please recognize that FIRST trains several volunteer roles.
It would be to FIRST's benefit to provide training that suits the actual job requirement.
If FIRST is going to allow other large batteries in use at the venues they should know to update their training.
FIRST might even need to include a hazmat clean up kit in their spare parts kit.

Also there may be legality issues in some jurisdictions about certain kinds of batteries in certain quantity within a highly populated structure like a venue. Though, off hand, I can't think of any in New Jersey.