legality of bolt and screw heads breaking plane of chassis meeting bumpers

[Daniel_LaFleur]

Originally Posted by artdutra04

Rules and laws are just contracts between people, and when we find them to be misguided, we continue to follow them but heavily lobby for their repeal (hopefully with the pen and not the sword). Right now, I can't see any logical reason why a bolt head that sticks out a quarter inch past the FRAME PERIMETER (but remains inside NORMAL CONFIGURATION) is illegal except for "because the GDC said so". I never accept "because we said so" as a valid reason, because it reeks of arrogance on the part of the person or entity making the rule and only seeks to downplay the intelligence of those to which the rule is given.

We're smart people. If the GDC gave us a logical reason why bolt heads couldn't extend past the barrier, then most rational people here, myself included, would accept it and move on. Until then, I think this is a pretty dumb rule.

If this was the real world, and a client specified that no bolts could stick out, I'd personally ask why. For all I know it could just be that the boss of said client's company thinks flat head bolts look nicer than socket head bolts, but would compromise with button head bolts in order to save the costs of countersinking lots of bolts. When engineers know why specs are the way they are, they can better design systems to meet the genuine intent of the client, as opposed to the what the client thinks they want/need.

Art,

First off, I don't like the ruling anymore than the next guy, but ...

Asking your customer for the reasoning behind a spec is all well and good (and actually very wise), but posting on a unofficial, public forum that their specifications are "stupid" is niether proactive nor wise. This is neither the proper forum, nor the proper way to get an appropriate answer ... hence my "whine" comment.

Also, when asking for the reasoning, you might want to consider "because we said so" as a valid answer, lest your customer take his multi-billion dollar buisiness elsewhere. You see there may be many possible reasons why they cannot disclose information to you (IP issues?). Consider this just a design constraint.

All in all, you might consider just putting your efforts into making sure that those who didn't follow the letter of the rule still get on the field, rather than bash those who put the design constraint in place.