[FRC Blog] Radio Silence

[Billfred]

Originally Posted by Alan Anderson

If your robot's wiring doesn't have problems that make your radio reboot during a match, the boot time isn't a factor during a match.

If the radio does lose power in the middle of a match, the boot time is certainly going to be annoying, but it is not the problem you need to be working on.

I'm not worried about my robot's wiring. (We did crap out once in Orlando, but no radio is going to withstand the ethernet cable coming out.)

I am, however, worried about my partners' wiring. You know, the partner whose bumpers are tacked together on hopes and dreams and the number is painted on with finger paint? To get everything legal took them so much time that there wasn't time left for robust. And let's be real, inspecting and fixing wiring with matches every few minutes is not feasible. And when I really need them to get their butts onto the batter for this capture, a little safety margin wouldn't be too bad a thing!

Edit because that was a little snarky: We can also work this from the inspiration end. A robot that's dead on the field is highly unlikely to be inspiring. (Not impossible, but unlikely.) And it's those teams on the margins that might be the hardest to retain.