Need for Inspections Rules Changes

[Pjohn1959]

Originally Posted by Cory

I feel like the problem is rarely that there are not enough inspectors. Normally there's a whole bunch sitting around with their hands in their pockets because teams refuse to start inspection until 5 or 6 PM Thursday night.

From my experience inspecting it takes the head inspector being very insistent with teams that they NEED to start the process early, even if they aren't even close to being done. There's always some things that can be checked off while assembly/repairs/changes are being done.

Totally agreed. With all 3 of the contests that I inspected last year, we took the pro-active approach and went to the teams to at least start the inspection process. If we had waited for them to come to us, there was a good chance that we wouldn't have finished them by Thursday.

I do like the idea of having the inspection form somewhat filled out before they arrive on Thursday. At least that would give them a good start to the inspection process.

[Billfred]

Originally Posted by Tristan Lall

Another way to mitigate the issues with teams who need more time before their first match is to formally sanction the idea of letting a team temporarily disable an illegal component, rather than totally removing it. (This sometimes comes up as a solution for teams that have illegal motors installed, but can't get them off without missing a match; strictly speaking, it's still illegal, but there's not too much harm in letting them disable it and fix it properly during the first evening in the pits.) By giving formal guidance on the degree of leeway permitted here, it will encourage that as an option for inspectors, because they can be sure that everyone is aware that this is a FIRST-sanctioned resolution, rather than an ad hoc decision (that might not have been permitted at another event).

I like this idea--I've seen multiple teams over the years who've had one problem that held them back (even inspected a couple). Let's try to see if it could work...

Redateam has an illegal pneumatics system powering their arm, but otherwise makes weight, size, and all of the other rules. (I do believe that weight and size must be absolute.) Redateam's inspector can issue a decision I'll dub a Pass-But. The Pass-But entails one or more stipulations on items that must be disabled on the robot, either by disconnected wires or tubing, a physical lockout, or some other method satisfactory to the inspector. These teams, what must be disabled, and how they must be disabled (to enable easy checking) would be noted at the inspection desk alongside the current inspection board.

Once qualification rounds begin, one (or two, if you want to divide by alliances) inspector is posted fieldside with a list of teams operating under a Pass-But. This inspector's job is to ensure that teams in the queue are satisfying the conditions of their Pass-But. For Redateam, that's ensuring they have disconnected power to their pneumatics system before they take the field, both to ensure Redateam is playing by the rules and to make sure they didn't just forget while working on their robot. (We do, after all, want Redateam working on the system between matches to clear the Pass-But.)

Now, the question of enforcement on the field is a trickier one. Clearly, a team that uses a feature that is supposed to be disabled under a Pass-But would be out of compliance with the rules. G16 seems to have the closest parallel this year:

Originally Posted by G16

<G16>ROBOT Size -Each ROBOT shall not exceed the maximum weight or volume specified in Rule <R11>. The Head Referee may call for an inspector's recertification of the ROBOT size and weight prior to the start of any MATCH. ROBOTS determined to be in violation prior to the start of a MATCH will be prohibited from participating in the MATCH. Any
ROBOT determined to be in violation during a MATCH will be assigned a PENALTY and will receive a YELLOW CARD (see Rule <S04>).

If the violation resulted in a material change in the match's outcome (e.g. going from having the arm spontaneously operate out in the middle of the field to having it miraculously operate to block an opposing arm from scoring its doohickey), I'd have no qualms upping the penalty to a plain red card.

I do believe it's doable and could get a lot of teams out of a bind until they can sort out their (relatively) smaller issues. Thoughts?

[David Brinza]

I've inspected in many regional events (especially in week 1 or 2) where virtually no robots were ready for inspection after un-crating, maybe a handful were inspected by noon, and late Thurs afternoon/evening became a panic for many teams. Inspectors would practically beg teams to undergo partial inspection (especially size and weight) as early as possible. Last year, early surveys of bumpers by inspectors frequently caught problems in time for teams to make fixes before Friday. On Thursday afternoon, inspectors are somtimes provided a list of teams in the first 5-6 matches, just to make sure these teams will be ready to play on Friday morning.

My point is that changing how inspection rules or how they are done won't "wave a magic wand" to correct the real problem: many teams just aren't ready for inspection on Thursday. If qual matches are going to start on Thursday, then unless some paradigm shift occurs, there will be some non-compliant robots scheduled for matches. If teams put robots on the field that have not been fully inspected and are later found to be non-compliant, should they be DQ'd for those matches?

[sanddrag]

As an inspector for several years, I can say problem is rarely ever the inspectors, the process, or the rules. The issue can be solved by the teams in the following four ways.

1. - FOLLOW THE RULES! ALL OF THEM! And DO NOT build it exactly to (or over) the size dimensions.

2. - FINISH THE ROBOT IN BUILD SEASON. This includes bumpers, wiring, and team numbers.

3. - CHECK YOUR OWN ROBOT FOR COMPLIANCE. Anything the inspectors point out, your team should already know about and be working on fixing. I should not have to say "where are your team numbers, or where is your BOM?" and have you reply "Oh we need those?"

4. - Make passing inspection an early-Thursday priority.

The problem is though, as long as the teams are allowed to work on their robots on Thursday, they will, and they'll never learn to finish it before the event.

[Bomberofdoom]

Originally Posted by sanddrag

As an inspector for several years, I can say problem is rarely ever the inspectors, the process, or the rules. The issue can be solved by the teams in the following four ways.

1. - FOLLOW THE RULES! ALL OF THEM! And DO NOT build it exactly to (or over) the size dimensions.

2. - FINISH THE ROBOT IN BUILD SEASON. This includes bumpers, wiring, and team numbers.

3. - CHECK YOUR OWN ROBOT FOR COMPLIANCE. Anything the inspectors point out, your team should already know about and be working on fixing. I should not have to say "where are your team numbers, or where is your BOM?" and have you reply "Oh we need those?"

4. - Make passing inspection an early-Thursday priority.

The problem is though, as long as the teams are allowed to work on their robots on Thursday, they will, and they'll never learn to finish it before the event.

Easier said than done. Especially for rookie teams. That is also why veteran teams are encouraged to seek rookie teams nearby them (and vice versa, the rookies looking for the veterans) and to support them, even by helping their designs in making sure they don't go oversize in their dimensions.

[Don Wright]

Here's an idea...

Each team must assign a team mentor as the official inspector for that team.

The inspection sheet will have three columns after each checklist item...
Column 1 - For that team's inspector initials
Column 2 - For the team inspector of the team to the right of them in the pit
Column 3 - For the team inspector of the team to the left of them in the pit

(Obviously end of pit lane teams have to go to the next lane over to get their inspectors, but I hope the idea is obvious).

Other than size and weight, you now have three independent inspectors inspecting each robot. In order to compete, you have to have the checklist checked and signed by each inspector plus the weight and height checked.

I.e. pit lanes are like this:
Lane 1: 217, 67, 469, 1114, 830
Lane 2: 330, 27, 222, 1625, 111
...
Last Lane: 65, 71, 171

67's robot is inspected by the inspector from 217, 67, 469
830's robot is inspected by the inspector from 1114, 830, 330
171's robot is inspected by the inspector from 71, 171, 217
217's robot is inspected by the inspector from 171, 217, 67

Lead inspection teams are there to rule over disputes (i.e. the inspectors from the three teams can't agree on whether an item meets the inspection criteria)... Or if something really happens to another team's inspector and they can't inspect another teams robot in time (emergency situation)...

[Al Skierkiewicz]

I am glad many of you are recognizing the problems faced by inspectors each year. Before any decisions are made in this area, we need to address several items of prime importance.
Each student should have the best experience they can have for that weekend. To accomplish that goal from the standpoint of the robot and inspectors the following needs to take place.
1. Regardless of the number of matches played, every match should contain a full complement of robots.
2. Every robot that plays needs to have no doubt as to it's compliance with the rules for every match, else wise doubt and conjecture creep into the minds of the participants.
3. Inspectors need to be known as fair and above reproach in order to accomplish #2.
It is for these reasons that robot inspections have been done all these years, by volunteers who are supervised by a trained lead. Sometimes those are team mentors like myself and sometime they are professionals who do not have a team but want to volunteer. But we do not inspect our own team's robot and I recommend to those other inspectors, we do not inspect close friends either in order to accomplish #2 above. (unfortunately for me that list grow larger every year.)
What makes it difficult for inspectors, even experienced ones, are the variations in robot design and implementation. Additionally, team dynamics and mentor participation play into this process as well.
Although many of the ideas presented are worthy of investigation, readers need to realize that there is a vast difference in the culture of our teams based on regions. Some regions are proud to be inspected by noon and others are just as proud to be inspected last thing on Thursday or early Friday. Some teams have one mentor and five students and others have 30 mentors and 60 students. One team may have several teams to turn to for help while others know very few. Some regionals contain highly motivated and supplied teams while others have what they can pack in the car or pick up locally and that usually means no power tools, no spares and no hardware. Ask your friendly neighborhood inspector how many times they have inspected a team that was too big for the box by more than a 1/4 inch. Those teams have a lot of work to do in order to become compliant. I hear some snickers out there, but all of us have stories like this one. I had a team last year that was two inches over size in each direction. They were a poor team with no engineering mentors, just involved parents. They had been using a borrowed tape measure with two inches cut off without knowing it. Even experienced teams fall into a year where the entire mentor staff changes. When that occurs, the team is like a rookie. I wish I had a nickel for every team that thought the chassis was precut to the right size.
Until we address these types of issues to make every team confidant that we have a level playing field, until we insure every student, and especially rookies, have a quality experience, we are merely making our own lives easier and not improving anything.
Please continue to make suggestions, inspectors are reading your posts.

[martin417]

One of the issues that I have noticed that slows the inspection process is uninformed inspectors. Our team always carefully combs through the rules and makes every effort to understand the letter and intent of each rule. If we have any question as to the legality of a feature or design, we always ask on the Q&A. Yet, the inspectors often find something that they don't like. This requires that the process come to a complete halt while the head inspector is summoned to make a ruling (the ruling has always been in our favor). A prime example this year was follower wheels for traction control. Our robot used Vex omni wheels in contact with the floor to drive encoders to get true velocity information. This configuration was thoroughly hashed out in the Q&A and the exact configuration we used was described as being legal. The inspector interpreted the rules as saying nothing could touch the floor except the rover wheels (this happened at more than one event). So, at one event, even though we were first in line for inspection Thursday morning, we couldn't get signed off until late Thursday evening because the head inpector was busy.

I realize that the Q&A are not rules, and do not make or change rules, but the inspectors should be familiar with all of the Q&A so that everyone is on the same page about rule interpretation.

(Edit) I want to be sure to say that this post is not an indictment of inspectors! These volunteers do a difficult job in a tough environment, and, in general, do it well. I am just suggesting that they could do a little reading prior to the event to become familiar with rule discussions and interpretations that have already taken place.

[Andy Brockway]

Originally Posted by EricH

I would also propose that team mentors volunteer to be inspectors, if possible. More inspectors=more inspections at the same time=less time to get everyone through (theoretically)...........

The one problem with all suggestions for a volunteer from each team is for the teams that have few mentors.

I actively recruit mentors but at this time I have only two plus me. I am the only one that could act as the Volunteer Inspector and perform the job such that the complaints that many have about inspectors will not reflect on my team.

But how do I do this and run my team. My students expect that we compete. I would love to help with inspections, I have helped several rookie and veteran teams both before ship and at Regionals, but time is short on Thursdays.

[johnr]

I know Michigan had this http://www.firstinmichigan.org/filem...%20Rev%20D.pdf but i don't know what happened once the teams got to the districts. Perhaps someone could expand on this?

[RMiller]

Originally Posted by Andy Brockway

The one problem with all suggestions for a volunteer from each team is for the teams that have few mentors.

I actively recruit mentors but at this time I have only two plus me. I am the only one that could act as the Volunteer Inspector and perform the job such that the complaints that many have about inspectors will not reflect on my team.

But how do I do this and run my team. My students expect that we compete. I would love to help with inspections, I have helped several rookie and veteran teams both before ship and at Regionals, but time is short on Thursdays.

Exactly, at my team's regional on Thursday, we had two mentors. One of the mentors would not have had enough technical experience to be able to help inspect. So, I was the only one regularly in the pits. It would seem rather difficult for a team to lose 100% of their technical mentors for the day.

[Bob Steele]

i think that something our team will initiate this year is a complete pre-inspection at our pre-ship event. We will build a sizing box and we already have a scale. We tried to do this last year and caught several problems from many of the rookie and veteran teams.... and helped them correct them. It was actually a lot of fun working with them...
Some teams (veteran ones..) balked at the inspection findings... so we just let them find out for themselves... the service was totally voluntary...

Some type of pre-ship inspection service should be offered by veteran teams in their areas. We plan on taking ours "on the road" and using inspectors from our team and other teams that these same teams will be seeing at our local regional. Besides being good for teams.... this could also enhance the ability for an inspection team to come together before Thursday at the event.

I think the "burden" in helping these rookie teams should be shouldered by the veteran teams...it is imperative this year that teams get to the events pretty much "ready to play".

We can help this by being in more contact with rookie and teams with less resources than we have.

I hope many veteran teams will take up this challenge....


Good luck to everyone and thank everyone for their comments regarding my initial comments and proposals....
keep them coming...

GO FIRST

[Jon236]

Excellent idea......if Mike Betts is reading this, maybe we could do this in CT? The Ticks would be glad to help!

[dtengineering]

It might not hurt to require teams to post submit photos of their robots in advance of the event. Close ups of the motor, control board, bumpers, wheels, etc.

They could be submitted directly to FIRST, and kept confidential amongst event inspectors, or they could be posted publicly. I know that several teams who posted photos or plans on CD last year got a lot of helpful advice on issues that might present tech inspection problems and were able to make changes.

In any case, this way inspectors could figure out which teams are going to need the most attention and support in advance of the event. They could even e-mail the team for clarification and the team... if needed... could manufacture up to 40 lbs of replacements (if the witholding limit is still in place this year.)

In fact the photos could be required by the Friday before ship... putting a deadline in place that might help teams plan to finish up before ship date.

But probably the #1 way to speed things up would be to include a spring scale in the KoP, so that teams can hang their robot from the rafters and get a pretty good idea of what it weighs before it is boxed or bagged.

But the number one, most important, thing to make this work is to try to integrate teams into the FIRST community so that they can get help with ideas and issues early in the build period. I know we've been trying to do that for years, and it's really hard with remote teams, but we might just have to try even harder this year.


Jason

[Mike Martus]

As the Lead Inspector for Michigan I found the training in Manchester very needed. Contained within this thread are many very good Ideas. What is of supreme importance is this:

.... Well trained set of inspectors
.... appropriate tools to do the job (we had many templates to measure bumpers)
.... a REQUIREMENT for all teams to do a PRE_Inspection prior to shipping the robot... teams that did not have pre-inspection done were delayed in the inspection process
.... A strong emphasis upon meeting the set time constraints of inspections

Whatever changes come about, the main objective(s) of the inspection MUST be kept to the highest standards......
SAFETY is always highest
Meeting standards set by FIRST
Insuring that all teams can compete in a fair event following ALL rules as applied by the GDC

Typically in a 3 day event teams waste the morning and few inspections get done. In a shortened event (Like MI Events) the sense of urgency sparks the teams to get it done... like NOW!

Our inspectors were busy but in most cases were able to meet the objective of ALL Robots ready and inspected prior to the first match. Thanks to great teams and great inspectors we in Michigan were able to rise to the task and get the job done with a strong level of quality.