pic: Deflating the tube (the easy way)

[HUNT397]

OK i might be a little off topic but I really missed this man at the Detroit Regional. Teams were getting rough. Some rules were either ignored or over looked but hitting outside the bumper zone occurred breaking arms on multiple teams. I know if Ron was present teams would have been warned alot earlier about how rough they were playing. Hope whatever reason he was not there for this year does not happen again next year.

[Dan Petrovic]

The head ref at Boilermaker cut a ton of keepers. He wouldn't even bother trying to get a keeper out of a claw. He ran right out with scissors and cut it up.

Not even a knife! He did use a knife later on, though.

[jgannon]

Originally Posted by Andy B

I was not at this regional, so I cannot speak as if I know the entire reasons for cutting the innertubes, but from what I understand, it seems that the innertubes were cut because it was easier to do that than to take them off the spider legs or out of robot's manipulators. If that is the case, I must say I am astonished to see FIRST do something like that. If it was done out of laziness, as it seems it was, I am astonished that first would allow that to happen. It only adds to the partially true sterotype that Americans are lazy which completely goes against FIRST's goals.

Yes, keepers have been cut because it's easier to take them away from robots that way. No, it's not because the refs are lazy. During week 1, refs were wrestling them away from the robots. 375 sustained some damage to their gripper at NJ because of this interaction, and I'm sure they weren't the only ones who were at least uneasy with the idea of an outsider tugging on their robot. It's a little overdramatic, but it seems like a much better solution than hardlining on the disqualification for late keepers. Let the teams play.

[Swan217]

I was personally not a big fan of euthenizing defenseless tubes, even in a scoring position. If I saw a team with a keeper, I went up to them and asked if we'd be able to yank the tube from their grippers, instead of stabbing first and asking questions later.

[BorisTheBlade]

well here is something to think about would you rather have the head ref cut a keeper that was not scored but could be scored or leave it to be accidentaly scored late and get your team disqualified for scoring a late keeper.

[Joohoo]

another instance where i saw the refs cutting a keeper was to extract the tube w/o moving the robot.

[TrippyMohan]

After going to Boilermaker regional and Great Lakes Regional, I found different refs had their own styles. The guys at boilermaker calmly cut into the tubes with scissors, making it easy to repair them. Ron, on the other hand, repeatedly stabbed the tubes with a knife, scaring drive teams.

[[527]phil]

Well if they cut them you can probably get one as a souvenir, thats if their not planning on patching those bad boys up and reusing them

[Kati_Kat]

deflated tubes do make for wonderful skirts. I own one in each color myself.