Rules - to follow or not to follow, that is the question

[IKE]

<R15> Teams shall display their team number on the BUMPERS in four
locations at approximately 90-degree intervals around the perimeter of the ROBOT. The numerals must be at least 4 inches high, at least in ¾-inch stroke width and in a contrasting color from its background. Team Numbers must be clearly visible from a distance of not less than 100 feet, so that judges, referees, and announcers can easily identify competing ROBOTS.

So, we used "2" colors for our numbers. We spent a great deal of time looking at fonts and and different color schemes in order to make sure the numbers "popped" and were able to be clearly distinguishable from 100 feet. We also wanted them to match our team fonts and imagery. In order to get the font we wanted with the outline on proper character height without it curling over the edges and loosing readability, we cheated. The yellow portion of the font was 5/8" thick in spots. The black outline reaches the 3/4" width in most places. Even with this thinner font, our numbers were quite legible from the top of the stand at the championship. Other teams that followed the letter of the rule and used "a color" namely black on dark navy or dark red, were often nearly illegible from around 20 feet. As a scout, I would like to thank the teams that broke the rules and added a white outline to their black numbers. That was a huge help. Some "legal" bumpers were almost as bad as trying to read numbers on the FIRST screens (seriouly FIRST, you couldn't pick a worse font for distinguishing 2s, 3s, 5s, 6s, 8s, and 9s. Even the 1s&7s are almost impossible to distinguish).

We felt the "intent" of this rule was to have easy to read numbers and thus we were OK with "cheating". We did have a yellow paint pen on hand just in case we were asked told we were not in compliance. Hopefully the inspection crews at the off-season events are OK with this.

P.S. Print your numbers to scale on Red and Blue background, and then pace off at least 30 steps. If you can't read them, then you really should fix them.