OCCRA Teams - where do you build?

[greencactus3]

Originally Posted by Phil 33

So, here's my questions for you OCCRA teams out there:
1. In what type of facility do you build your OCCRA robot? In a shop, a classroom, a student's house etc.?

i dont think this reply will help you at all, but i will answer your qs.
so, we started out with a decent amount of people, but by the first matches, we only had enough people to fill ONE hand of fingers... so we were much to busy to try to recruit anyone. BUT since we built the robot in the hallway of our school,(classrooms have carpeting and janitors dont like aluminum shavings all over the carpet... the halls are tiled), we seem to have many new kids interested for this year.. hopefully they will remain interested..
and, since our school is too lazy to allow us to work on the robot after school, i brought it home into my garage almost everyday. that is mainly where we built it. since occra doesnt allow 'precision tools', the only tools i brought from school was basically the normal pliers, files, hacksaws, and bolts/nuts... rolls of duct tape, sharpies, and one chopsaw. thats all we used... so making a FIRST robot in my garage would be difficult, but the OCCRA one was relativly easy..

2. To the best of your knowledge, would building an OCCRA robot in an art room or science lab be in violation of any city, county, state or federal health or safety regulations?

well, for health, i would make sure i have decent ventilation.. ESPECIALLY when letting a newbie solder... make sure they dont have plastic they seem to want to melt....
and a fire extinguisher.. a MUST... we never needed it during OCCRA season, but we have relied on it once...
and as i have mentioned earlier, aluminum shavings.... they are a pain to get from the carpet, and also very dangerous as they may be sharp and WILL hurt when you fall on them.. and of course, oil is never a good idea to spray on the floor...
and janitors seem to dislike having rubber burnout marks all over the hallways too. when testing on tile, wrap electrical tape or duct tape around the tires... it helps... but it wont help you learn how to drive the thing
other than that, NEVER test a robot with glitches in front of the assistant principle just because you want to give him what he deserves...