'Regolith' Concern?

[coldfusion1279]

Disclaimer: I am only looking for more information in this thread.


Anyway, so we have all been playing a bit on the 'regolith' surface. We ran our robot on it, checking the frictional forces. The surface was easily either burned or disintegrated when the wheels would 'spin-out'.

We smelled something funky, burning plastic smell, no big deal right?... I hope not...

I have to say that the smell reminded me a lot like the smell of styrene. The panels are some sort of glass fiber composite. The 'Glasliner FRP' is a polyester resin composite. Polyester resins can be dispersed in styrene before curing (haven't looked into it yet).

I am concerned because styrene is not exactly a very safe material. You can read an MSDS if you would like to know a little more information on styrene.

Styrene has a very pungent aroma, detectable by our senses in ppm, so just smelling it is not necessarily dangerous.

I am wondering if any research has been done on the matter or if anyone else knows a lot about the 'regolith' material. Have I misdiagnosed the aroma? Not only was there a smell, but a fine particulate as a result of the friction.

I doubt FIRST would allow any harmful materials to be used in competition. They also mentioned that these two materials are used to simulate driving on the moon, i.e. I assume that these materials have been tested under conditions like in the competition prior to this years game.

Please respond in this thread or in PM if you are knowledgable in this area. Like I said, there may not have been any styrene involved at all, burning plastic can have all kinds of weird smells. Thanks.

Good Luck teams, the game looks like fun.