blog; Motor Controller Options for 2015

[Tristan Lall]

Originally Posted by donkehote

Again, as Ether pointed out, thermal paste IS NOT GLUE. Glue is an adhesive, thermal paste is not.

Webster defines glue as : a substance used to stick things tightly together
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/glue
Even if you change glue to adhesive, thermal paste is not there to retain anything. It usually has a very weak bond, and often never sets, remaining a very thick liquid/gel.

Velcro is attached by adhesive or glue, but is legal. Please stop beating the dead horse and move on. I know at least a few teams will have the thermal paste on these speed controllers, if its explicitly allowed or not. It would be almost impossible for a robot inspector to see the thermal paste in place anyway. Im sure as soon as the Q&A opens, there will be more than one person who asks this. No need to keep dragging up the same ridiculous argument.

The caution about thermal paste is due to a plausible analogy between substances, rather than a mere dictionary definition. Like glue, it doesn't fall off the surface, so some phenomenon must be holding it there; is that adhesion significantly different from the adhesion provided by glue? If so, why, and how will you convince the officials of that?

If it's an argument of magnitude of adhesion, would you have the officials permit weak glue as well? If it's an argument of function, would you have the officials permit glue whose adhesion is redundant due to additional fasteners? If it's because thermal paste doesn't set, would that make uncured glue legal? If it's because thermal paste is pretty much inert and can't chemically harm anything, would mostly-inert glue (like mucilage) be allowed? Or if it's a combination of these factors, how should they be weighted when making a determination?

As for Velcro, isn't it (usually) covered by exception G in R64? Its legality is not a very strong argument for thermal paste.

Best to let the Q&A sort it out, but by all means let FIRST know now that you anticipate it being an issue during the season.