is fiberglass legal to use on a first robot?

[mechanicalbrain]

Originally Posted by Gdeaver

As this thread is showing composites is a deep subject. That is why I suggest that any teams that are interested in using composites should do the research and testing now. There is allot to learn and the build season is too short to perfect composite methods unless your team has a someone with experience. Every year I have mentor I have work a composite structure in some where on the bot to give the students an exposure to this important technology. I would like more teams to work this in to their robot too. A good start would be to take a 1' by 1' piece of 1/4" birch plywood and laminate 1 layer of 6 oz s glass on both sides and do some testing to see what this simple process does to the plywood. I can post some sites to help. If they like the results they can go from there. Get some fiber in your robot's diet.

Yeah now's the time to research. However I know that if you want to do a large portion of your robot in a composite be for warned that its expensive so: do your research before hand, talk to manufacturers for advice (even if you have people who have experience or have it yourself nobody knows more then the manufacturer), be safe (some of this stuff has the potential to be very nasty), and if possible get sponsorship (a cost estimate of a frame can easily exceed $1,000 and thats at wholesale!)