Al's Annual Inspection Thread

[Andrew Schreiber]

Originally Posted by Jon Stratis

Have you ever seen a fool-proof mechanism or sensor on a FIRST robot? I know I haven't... It would take quite a bit for a team to convince me that whatever system they have in place to prevent a dry fire isn't going to break at some point during the competition and allow the system to dry fire anyways. We've all seen some crazy stuff happen to a robot that no one expected...

Next thing you'll be asking me to demonstrate that my gearbox properly constrains parts if I break my gears...

We'll have a system in place to bypass any safety systems we end up with.


I'd hoped to clarify under what circumstances dry firing will be needed. I just don't like being told "oh, it depends on how your inspector feels" because I'd like to think that all robots are inspected equally and fairly and an inspector can't cause undue wear and tear on a mechanism/stress on a team merely because they feel like it.