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Originally Posted by ChrisH
Personally I think that robots should be weighed every time they enter the competition area. Just put a scale at the robot entrance to the arena. Before you can enter, one of the crew must verify that you meet weight. It would certainly stop complaints that "so and so put an entire new arm on after they weighed in".
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While it wasn't taken to this extent, at the West Michigan regional this year, each robot that was chosen for the elimination rounds had to weigh in again. A sticker was placed on the battery they used for this weigh-in, and that battery was the one that had to be used for their first match in the elims. This helped with the issue of different battery weights in some ways (you could choose which battery to weigh with), but it also hurt you if you tried to use a lighter battery that you didn't normally use for competition.
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Originally Posted by miketwalker
One thing I would like to throw into the mix though as a thought, over the past 3 years I have noticed every year that the scales vary so much from competition to competition. In 2002, for example... at the local regional we weighed 129 pounds, yet when we got to Epcot for nationals... we were weighing in at 134.
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Our team has had the same experiences, as most if not every team has. In 2001, for one example, at Great Lakes we weighed 118.5, at West Michigan we weighed 117, and at EPCOT we weighed 123.5! That's a huge difference to try to plan for. I'm in agreement with all the people who think we should weigh in without the battery and drop the weight limit to another number.
Here's a suggestion...what if, for a year or two, we changed the robot specs back to what they were in 1992? The robots were small but could still be presented with challenges that they could complete successfully. I'm not familiar with the rules and the specs from the early years, but I'm sure that parts exist that we could use. It would provide a very different challenge than what we're used to now, with the 10-foot tall bars, different zones in which to score, and ramps. Just a thought.
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2017-??: Team 33 -- The Killer Bees
2001-2016: Team 67 -- The Heroes of Tomorrow
1997: FLL Pilot Program
**Controls and Electrical Systems for who knows how many years now**