Duct tape

[Jaxom]

Originally Posted by EricH

A couple of comments on this:

1) Duct tape (or gaffers' tape) is legal, for repairs at least.

Gaffer's tape is legal for repairs; it is cloth. Duct (or Duck) tape isn't cloth, and therefore not legal. Our LRI had huge rolls of blue, red, and white gaffer's tape ready for use; hopefully your LRI does the same.

Originally Posted by EricH

2) If you're using it for numbers, and the numbers come off, someone really needs to talk to you--risk of non-compliance with G26.

We had a number of rookies at GKC that didn't have good numbers. White gaffer's tape with a layer of clear packing tape was allowed, but the teams all got a nice conversation with the inspectors about what they need to do next year. Coming in with numbers constructed out of tape won't be one of the options....

Originally Posted by EricH

3) If you had it at inspection, the inspectors, NOT the refs, could have told you whether or not it was illegal. (Just ask--most inspectors won't bite you for asking if something is or is not illegal.)

As I keep telling teams, we inspectors are the nice guys. It's the refs that are evil and are out to get them.

Originally Posted by EricH

4) Just because the refs don't say anything doesn't mean it's legal. It may in fact mean that they don't care about that particular infraction, if there is one. But at your next event, the refs might have a little more time to care... and now you're not legal.

Yep. I always see a lot of bumper violations that never get called. Giving the refs the benefit of the doubt, I'm assuming that they have more important fouls to look for. But pretty much every tournament I've inspected I've seen refs ask us to look at one or more robots & confirm that they're legal; such requests have included bumpers. And there was at least one bumper violation called at GKC (and remember, G20 calls for the robot to be disabled). So maybe they do care.