Car Wash

[Ian W.]

For those of you on Long Island, in the relative vicinity of Smithtown, and you happen to need your car washed, team 810 is holding a car wash today. True, it's not the best day for one, but anything is better than nothing. We'll be on the corner of Plymouth Ave. (i think it's avenue) and Rte. 25, in the Mobile station (they're nice guys, let our school do lots of car washes there). Not sure how much we're charging, but i'm never informed of these things.

So, if you need to get your car washed (or you just want to be nice), drop down, support team 810!

<post hypnotic suggestion>You want to get your car washed by team 810</post hypnotic suggestion>

[purplehaze357]

i wish we could wash our cars...but we cant...stupid stupid drought...have fun guys

[Ian W.]

well, back from the car wash. i'm dissappointed though, no one from CD showed up (except for Michael, but he doesn't count cause his part of the team ). oh well, after a bit of time, the weather cleared up, and we had a pretty good time. i think we made upwards of $300, not the most money, but hey, not bad for washing cars.

also, we here on long island are in a drought warning, as of yesterday i think. but, we have 300+ years of water in the aqufier, so there's no restrictions, yet.

[Rob Ribaudo]

The carwash went pretty well, and I liked it. We need to get alittle more organized next time though. And we also have to have a better form of advertising then having people at the sidewalks calling for cars to come in. Oh well, next time we shall do better.

[Ian W.]

heh, i think meg did a good job--oh wait, we got more cars when she didn't stand out on the sidewalk, that's right.

[Rob Ribaudo]

We seemed to get a good amount of cars when my mom was in that costum. Maybe we should have had her stay in it the whole time she was there...
Mrs. Champy said that at our next car wash we might have our school's chearleaders there. That might make use more noticeable and more peole might stop by. Also maybe we could bring our Robot there to show off to people or maybe at least a video (on T.V. or a computer) of our robot at compotitions. That would get more people to famillier about FIRST. That would be a good idea for any other teams who want to have a car wash.

[DaBruteForceGuy]

i seem to remember no cars while u'r mom was in the costume?

[Ian W.]

Yes, about the video...

I've heard references to "malt boxes" at the competitions, in which people can plug their VCR's into, to record the event, as seen by the projector screen. now, this would be the perfect for displaying at a car wash (or any other fundraiser), and i'l like to know a bit more about these "malt boxes". also, if anyone has done this before, approx. how much tape does one need to record the entire event (or at least all day friday and saturday)? i know it's probably more than i would ever need, but my school has video editing equipment, so instead of just recording when my teams up, it's easier to record constantly, and then just edit the parts we want onto another tape, which we could show at fundrasiers. i know this idea isn't original, but i haven't been able to find any other responses on it, so doesn't hurt to ask again.

[Rick]

our team had a carwash today and made around $800. what gets people to come back is how we wash the cars. after washing the cars we towel dry them. we also wash the cars indoors. just a few ideas to get you guys more cash.

[DaBruteForceGuy]

Yeah we towel dry them too but we don't wash them indoors hmmm...
good idea!

[Ian W.]

where do you do it indoors? we went to a local gas station, and they have a nice spot on the corner of two rather busy streets. we never really got as many cars as i'd like, but we made a little money.

[Rick]

Originally posted by Ian W.
where do you do it indoors?

we wash them inside of a huge garage that has drains in it. i think it was designed to be a car washing area we can wash up to 6 cars at a time. plus we get to use it for free.

[Ian W.]

you guys suck that'd be cool to have a nice big garage to do car washes in. oh well, at least we have a gas station. nice thing about a gas station, the cars are already off the road. you just need to get them over to you.

[Rob Ribaudo]

I know of the perfect place that has a big garage and has drians in it. The only problem though is that it is at a Car Wash station and that may defeat the purpose of use having a car wash. Unless they let us use the entire car wash for free...

It could be a day off for everyone who works there and we use the place instead of them. That would be an intresting idea, but only if it was possible. Maybe someone ese has an idea of that could make all of this actually work. Oh well.

[mpking]

Originally posted by Ian W.
Yes, about the video...

I've heard references to "malt boxes" at the competitions, in which people can plug their VCR's into, to record the event, as seen by the projector screen. now, this would be the perfect for displaying at a car wash (or any other fundraiser),

I have done this twice at New Jersey. You walk up to the Audio Visual guys, and ask for the Media feed.

As for Video tape, I used up two tapes on SP mode (2 hour per tape)

I would stop and start the tape many times, and sometimes I would let it run.

I never attempted to do this at nationals, since I didn't feel like trying to get a VCR down to flordia.