More Build Time?

[Cory]

Unless anyone is planning on working 24/7 for 6 weeks, the extra three hours are utterly worthless.

[Bill Moore]

Originally Posted by Bill_Hancoc

I was looking at the countdowns today and noticed the kickoff is quickly approaching and will be here before i know it. Since the kickoff is broadcast worldwide within milliseconds of dean telling us about the object of the game, is it true that the west coasters will have 4 hours more time to build than the east coast?

This is the wrong fact to focus on. The true fact of focus should be the size of a team. If one team has 12 members, and another team has 36 members, over 6 weeks, the first team has 2/3 less labor hours than the second. Three hours at kickoff doesn't make a difference!!! It's all those extra work-hours that large teams have just due to their size that is the real problem. You should demand that FIRST reduce the size of the teams.

Once we get the time issue under control, we can go for weaning the organization off these big business and government hand-outs. That way, all teams have identical financial portfolios as well.

[mechanicalbrain]

Originally Posted by Bill Moore

This is the wrong fact to focus on. The true fact of focus should be the size of a team. If one team has 12 members, and another team has 36 members, over 6 weeks, the first team has 2/3 less labor hours than the second. Three hours at kickoff doesn't make a difference!!! It's all those extra work-hours that large teams have just due to their size that is the real problem. You should demand that FIRST reduce the size of the teams.

Once we get the time issue under control, we can go for weaning the organization off these big business and government hand-outs. That way, all teams have identical financial portfolios as well.

HEH you would think that wouldn't you. Actually size has absolutely nothing to do with your work ability. It's all about organization and resources. Our team has 79 kids. Thats right 79 kids (and about 10 mentors not to mention we require all the parents of the kids to participate) last I checked. Theoretically we should be able to build a horde of robots. OK now picture 79 kids and most of them want to build drive trains, not happening. You start having to assign people jobs and leadership becomes uber important because if kids have nothing to do they sit around and talk, this has a magnet effect on surrounding kids. Also consider that all we have access to is a wood shop. Its very hard to do work and this year we've been forced to take a modular approach to the robot where each group builds one thing and has four weeks then at the end we combine our projects into a single robot. We've found our size makes us unwieldy and it's much easier to manage smaller groups. My point is that yes a large team can do everything they want and do it well.... provided that they are very organized and have access to the tools. The one nice thing we've found about being big is that if you require kids to fundraise a certain amount of money, $100 say, you can virtually pay for a good section of the robot... assuming you can get the majority of the kids to fundraise.

[EricH]

"It's all about the math"--Mark Leon

You guys are all saying that it's three hours difference, but you need to do the math. West Coast teams have their build start three hours earlier than East coast teams. However, West Coast teams ship three hours later than East Coast teams. So, the West Coast has six hours more build time than the East Coast. But I don't see anyone complaining about the Midwest (two extra hours) or mountains (four extra hours). AK and HI have more time (in theory) than anyone else, and Israel and the UK have less (also in theory).

Moving on...

When you look at the big picture, who always has better robots? Mostly the Midwest and East. So the West Coast teams have the extra time, but they may not make the best use of it, while most of you guys in the Midwest make good use of your time. IT'S NOT ABOUT HOW MUCH TIME YOU HAVE, BUT HOW YOU USE IT.

[RoboMom]

[quote=mechanicalbrain]HEH you would think that wouldn't you. Actually size has absolutely nothing to do with your work ability. It's all about organization and resources. Our team has 79 kids. Thats right 79 kids (and about 10 mentors not to mention we require all the parents of the kids to participate) last I checked. [quote]

Wow! You might suggest that at least one of those 79++ mentors/parents join NEMO.

[Rich Kressly]

Wait you're all wrong. I have the formula that REALLY matters.

ADC per BD + GCI/(M+S) - FRC# = GTN

Where
ADC = Avg. Donuts Consumed
BD = Build Day
GCI = Gallons of Caffeine Intake
M = Mentors
S = Students
FRC# = team number
GTN = Grand Total of Nothingness

Oh my gosh, run for the gates! Not all teams have exactly the same resources, time, people, or motivation!!! Oh man FIRST is the only organization on the planet like this!!!! How terrible!!!!!

OK, I'm going to look for a surgeon to remove this tongue from my cheek.

[sdexp]

I'm quite sure that the time spent by the Wast-coasters to even interpret what Mr. Lavery has said is the compensation to East-coasters for their 4 hours less time.

[IraJason]

Originally Posted by Rich Kressly

Wait you're all wrong. I have the formula that REALLY matters.

ADC per BD + GCI/(M+S) - FRC# = GTN

Where
ADC = Avg. Donuts Consumed
BD = Build Day
GCI = Gallons of Caffeine Intake
M = Mentors
S = Students
FRC# = team number
GTN = Grand Total of Nothingness

Oh my gosh, run for the gates! Not all teams have exactly the same resources, time, people, or motivation!!! Oh man FIRST is the only organization on the planet like this!!!! How terrible!!!!!

OK, I'm going to look for a surgeon to remove this tongue from my cheek.

Does that mean that I ate an entire dozen of donuts everyday for a week and drank the whole 2 liter bottle of coke for no reason? Why didn't you tell me this before I went into a sugar induced coma?

[Stuart]

why do I see this ending in 2 robots being poof-balled down before their time?

[Schneidie]

Originally Posted by Bill_Hancoc

I was looking at the countdowns today and noticed the kickoff is quickly approaching and will be here before i know it. Since the kickoff is broadcast worldwide within milliseconds of dean telling us about the object of the game, is it true that the west coasters will have 4 hours more time to build than the east coast?

Yes, the west coasters have more time. It's not fair, and that's life.

[mizscience]

lol, what a random, but valid point.