Batteries Carried Into Competitions

[Tristan Lall]

Originally Posted by dbeck103

According to rule R11 it states: The 12V battery and its associated half of the Anderson cable quick
connect/disconnect pair (including no more than 12 inches of cable per leg, the
associated cable lugs, connecting bolts, and insulating electrical tape). By creating this rule FIRST has already determined that the battery and its associated quick disconnect are one piece and it has not been fabricated. Therefore their ruling on the Q and A is in contradiction of this rule and should be rescinded.

While I'm usually one of the ones talking about contradictions and the like, this isn't one of them. Just mentioning that the battery and its leads are excepted doesn't make them an indivisible assembly for the purposes of all of the rules.

Actually, the GDC's ruling is correct, based on the established definitions in the rules. The problem is that never have these definitions been applied to the batteries in this manner. That may have been due to a collective oversight, or may have been a natural extension of the special treatment that the batteries have long received (exemptions from weight, special conditions on use, etc.). Either way, it comes as a surprise to most.

There's also the issue of whether the GDC's answer is a good policy in general. I don't think it is. Many teams don't want to be burdened with rules that don't have much utility; some ignore the rules, some comply, unhappily. I think that some flexibility (issued in an update) would be advantageous, because it would be a sign that the GDC was willing to work toward a solution that benefits the participants collectively, while still maintaining the primacy of the rules.

On the other hand, it was suggested to me that by changing the rule at this point, FIRST would be disadvantaging the teams that complied properly in the first place. I'm normally a strong proponent of this rationale (precisely because teams will often ignore rules that they figure they can get away with) but I'm wondering, with the apparent scope of this confusion, whether there's more value in adjusting the rules for leniency, and bringing the rules in line with past practice (despite the fact that that practice may not have been technically legal in the past).