YMTC: Can teams start cutting metal for 2005?

[Natchez]

Everyone,

My sincere apologies if I offended anyone as I lobbed a new idea into the mix. Al, if you thought I was questioning anyone's honor or integrity above, I promise you that I was not. Ken, you are correct about proposing new rules elsewhere and I, without "having the last word", will immediately get back on the subject.

Lucien gets back on track

After reviewing the robot rules from 2004, it seems to me that it would be legal by the letter AND spirit of the rules to have parts made for your team just as long as they are duplicates of off-the-shelf products. FIRST seems to have been worried about teams having parts going into last season that are different (custom) from what other teams can acquire through a supplier. Below are the rules that directly apply but reading through the rules reveals FIRST's intent.

<R68> Additional Parts must be generally available from suppliers such that any other FIRST team, if it so desires, may also obtain them at the same price.

<R09> Teams must fabricate and/or assemble all custom parts and assembled mechanisms on the robot by the 2004 team after the start of the Kick-off. Mechanisms from previous year’s robots may not be used, however, individual off-the-shelf components from previous year’s robots may be re-used to save the cost of re-purchase of these parts IF they meet ALL of the 2004 Additional Parts and Materials Rules.

<2004 Part Use Flowchart> Is part off-the-shelf or custom made by the team after the start of the 2004 Kickoff? (See Robot Section) YES==>part can go on 'bot ... NO==>part can not go on 'bot

For example, the 2004 rules allow for a bearing manufacturer (or a machine shop) to give a team a truck load of "standard" bearings without making them available to other teams. Because teams can buy the bearings at McMaster or Sears, the team was allowed to use these bearings but the team had to cost the bearings (charge the bearings that they use on their robot against their $3,500 limit) at the same cost as vendors that could supply the bearings to other teams (Sears or McMaster).

To extrapolate to more advanced mechanisms, the 2004 rules would allow for the construction of an AM transmission by a local shop as long as it is available to other teams through another source; in this case, Andy-Mark.

I realize that this is not a popular outcome and I personally hope this will not be the result of the 2005 rules analysis. What is discouraging is that most of us think that having a machine shop build AM transmissions before the season would be a violation of the 2004 rules when in reality, it would be perfectly legal within the letter and spirit of the '04 rules. CONGRATULATIONS to those who MADE THE RIGHT CALL!!!

[Hieb]

Whack! Whack! I think we've been beating this dead horse long enough for my taste, so with a few final comments I think I'll leave this thread behind.

First, the original question was can we cut metal before Christmas, and to that I'll stick by my previous post--cutting for storage --> OK, cutting for 2005 robot parts --> not OK.

As for the modification to the original question (perhaps the original intent of the question):

Originally Posted by Natchez

Teams must fabricate and/or assemble all custom parts and assembled mechanisms on the robot by the 2004 team after the start of the Kick-off.

This rule does not apply, in my opinion, because the parts in question are not custom.

Originally Posted by Natchez

So, by the rules, I don't see why 8888 can not use the transmissions. Moreover, if 8888 built the transmissions themselves, I contend that it would be more of a learning experience for the students than if they bought them from AM.

While it may not be a custom part (which could probably be debated as well), it does seem to me to be an assembled mechanism. If it was fabricated and assembled completely by the machine shops, I might be persuaded to believe that it didn't violate the letter of the law (that would still require a lot of persuading), but if 8888 then took the fabricated parts and assembled them it would either violate the rule by assembling parts prior to the kickoff or by not being an off-the-shelf part.

[Steve W]

Originally Posted by Natchez

Everyone,


For example, the 2004 rules allow for a bearing manufacturer (or a machine shop) to give a team a truck load of "standard" bearings without making them available to other teams. Because teams can buy the bearings at McMaster or Sears, the team was allowed to use these bearings but the team had to cost the bearings (charge the bearings that they use on their robot against their $3,500 limit) at the same cost as vendors that could supply the bearings to other teams (Sears or McMaster).

To extrapolate to more advanced mechanisms, the 2004 rules would allow for the construction of an AM transmission by a local shop as long as it is available to other teams through another source; in this case, Andy-Mark.

I realize that this is not a popular outcome and I personally hope this will not be the result of the 2005 rules analysis. What is discouraging is that most of us think that having a machine shop build AM transmissions before the season would be a violation of the 2004 rules when in reality, it would be perfectly legal within the letter and spirit of the '04 rules. CONGRATULATIONS to those who MADE THE RIGHT CALL!!!

I am sorry but you are dead wrong. Maybe you have a problem understanding what OFF THE SHELF means. That is not something that you get when you give plans to someone and have them build it for you. It means you call a company like AndyMark, order an assembly and they ship it from OFF THE SHELF. You can double talk yourself to death but the fact still remains, OFF THE SHELF means that a company has manufactured and placed in stock a number of these items for sale to anyone who asks. That does not mean a company builds to spec and then ships to you.

Your holier than thou attitude has made me really upset.Trying to justify what you either do or want to do. The fact is that the people that made the right call are the majority of people, that read the rules and said that it is wrong. There are those that said that it is OK to cut metal for stock as long as it is not cut to exact sizes for the robot. They are correct because there was no cutting or fabrication for the robot. Remember that self justification does not make one right.

This will be my last post on this subject I promise.

[Natchez]

Originally Posted by Steve W

Your holier than thou attitude has made me really upset. Trying to justify what you either do or want to do.

Steve, please do not be upset with me nor Team 118. Our team has never made, nor do we wish to make, parts outside of the 6 week period. As a matter of fact, it is part of our philosophy not to even procure non-common parts until kickoff. Yes, we do stock standard aluminum, sprockets, chain, and such but we feel that it is part of the students' learning process to decide exactly what you need and procure the parts. UPS Blue loves us

Honestly, we really don't have much time in the off-season to think about the next year's robot. We spend two weeks learning the FLL competition and then mentor teams; we mentored over 15 teams this year. We then host, in early December, one of the largest FLL State Tournaments. Also in the fall, we help with the BEST (www.BESTinc.org) kickoff, practice day, and the competition along with mentoring a few middle school teams. We also design and implement the EARLY (www.EARLYrobotics.org) Fall Challenge and host the Houston EARLY Fall Tournament. And in the spring, we do engineering outreach during the build period as well as outside of it. We help with the Texas Botball (www.Botball.org) kickoff workshop in January and host the Texas Botball Tournament in March. Also during the build period, we design and implement the EARLY Spring Challenge and then host the Houston EARLY Spring Tournament soon after the FRC Championships. Our mentors are also very active on the FRC Lone Star Regional Committee and the Houston Robotics Committee, which assisted over 10 FRC teams this year with funding.

So, please let me assure you that gracious professionalism is alive and well on team 118, the Robonauts. Below are some comments that I received just last week from an FLL Coach:

"You and all the volunteers (mostly Robonauts) did a wonderful job. This was an amazing day and my son is still beaming. ... They (Robonauts) have no way of knowing the influence they have been on my son. He has followed this team for 3 years. He even has the Robonaut sign one of the team members gave him 2 years ago hanging in his room. This team influenced him to get into the First Lego League. He has wanted to compete since he was 9. At that time, Battlebots was his favorite show and all he wanted to do was build something big and destructive. One of the Robonauts talked to him about the importance of being Constructive in Robot design. He has not watched the BattleBots shows since. The Robonauts team is certainly made up of a group of young adults that make their families, schools, and communities proud. I know that these teams do not get the recognition that the sports team do, but they do deserve it. Please pass on to the team that they are doing things greater than they could even imagine. They are being positive roll models, and that is hard to find these days."

I'll call it quits on a positive note and get onto authoring another YMTC,
Lucien

[Schneidie]

No, it seems wrong because it is fabricating a part that may be used for the robot before the season begins. By rule, that's cheating.

[Billfred]

Originally Posted by Schneidie

No, it seems wrong because it is fabricating a part that may be used for the robot before the season begins. By rule, that's cheating.

Holy thread revival, Batman!

(Remember, folks, check the date of the last post. If it's been since the start of the last season, it's probably a dead or settled topic.)

[spamified88]

Though I did respond "No" to the poll, it wouldn't help anyway, right? Because no one is exactly sure of what the game would call for, right? So why bother waisting time and effort if you don't know if it's a sure thing?

[bbehnke]

i think you could but it wouldnt be wise to do so because u dont know wat kind of robot you want to play the game