FIRST Technical Difficulties at Rutgers

[aka Scott White]

No, I'm not talking about the poor performance of our robot, that was all mechanical (our bearings kept popping out of their seats, but we changed the design and fixed it so it can't break at nationals), I am talking about how we were screwed out of 30 QPs in our first round and how some other teams were had the same thing happen to them.

In our first round (the only one in which our robot didn't break down and die), we were paired up with team 11, Mt. Olive. We grabbed one goal and towed it to our goal zone, while 11 filled up a goal with balls. Seeing that were we were winning heavily with about 45 seconds to go, we headed for the other alliance's home zone. With about four feet to go, our robot stopped moving, the light went out, and the "Disabled" light went on on our controller. Somehow, our controller was now in the state that it was before the match started. It remained so until the match ended. We asked several officials what would be done about this, but recieved no answer. The same thing happened in a later match to another team playing from the same side we were, except I think both teams were disabled. Nothing was done about this, either. At one point, we were ready to start our match, they counted down "3,2,1...go!" and then nothing happened for a few minutes. "More technical difficulties" we were told.

I have two questions: Did anyone at rutgers or anywhere else experience anything like this, and
Where can we get replacement batteries, one of ours has a dead cell.