Bumpers here to stay?

[BBnum3]

I really liked the bumpers this year and I hope they come back next year. I think that a lot of "ramming" with bumpers would cause less damage than a little "ramming" without them. My team used them as we were a defensive robot and they worked out nicely. They also help to absorb some of the shock caused by collisions.

Originally Posted by Billfred

Some of the rules about bumpers were
annoying to me. If they were to allow some angled cuts (no obvious wedges, though), and also authorize a one-noodle version of the bumper for those times when you want more clearance, I could stand to see them return.

From what I saw with my team, angled cuts weren't illegal, that is if we're talking about the same kind of angled cuts. You can see on this picture of the robot that the back 1/4 of our bumper is only one noodle. We did this so we could get on the ramp at the end. I'm glad that we didn't have to change this because the open space in the back of our bumper didn't really affect contact outside of the bumper zone. I hope that next year angled cuts are allowed, too, because it doesn't really change game play if they are disallowed.