pic: Robot Bumpers

[Scott Hill]

Oh boy. Hi dlavery, Scott Hill here. With all due respect and appreciation, I can't find "corners must be protected on both sides" anywhere in the Competition Manual, the Team Updates, or in the answers in Q&A. If precise language is important anywhere it is important here. Would you do me a huge favor and review the thread "is this corner considered protected" and point out any flaws in my attempted logical analysis of this issue?

If you would it would be greatly appreciated.

Sincerely,

Scott Hill

[MrForbes]

Scott, did you read the first reply in this thread? it has a link to a Q&A question which has an answer by the GDC that says just that.

[T3_1565]

Yeah, this bumper stuff is getting to be very frustrating.

From the way the rule was written I understood it as "We don't want any part of the robot exposed because of the high speed ramming that will occur, so bumpers must be on every corner to ensure there is little damage caused to the field and other robots". This is understandable.

I do not see how ANY part of the robot shown above could make contact with another robot (that is also following the bumper rules) or the field in a way that "the bumpers must make contact first" would not apply. Yes, corner A and B are not covered on both sides of the corner, but at the same time, it is impossible to reach the uncovered side of those corners.

It seems almost like things went a little overboard when making these rules, We might as well just build our robot out of pool noodle wrapped bars, or wrap the whole robot in bubblewrap, with the way this keeps going.
2cents.

PS. to follow what seems to be what the GDC wants, I would also suggest putting bumpers on the inside corners of D and E, as both sides of those corners will also need to be protected.

EDIT: I hope that inspector manual comes out soon, so we can build our robot lol

[dlavery]

Originally Posted by Scott Hill

Would you do me a huge favor and review the thread "is this corner considered protected" and point out any flaws in my attempted logical analysis of this issue?

If you would it would be greatly appreciated.

No. For the simple reason that ALL discussions and debates here are meaningless. They carry no official weight at all. If you want a determination on the legality of bumper configurations, do what has been suggested (multiple times, both publicly and via PM) and submit a particular, specific question to the FRC Q&A forums. Get your real answers there.

[Aren_Hill]

Originally Posted by dlavery

No. For the simple reason that ALL discussions and debates here are meaningless. They carry no official weight at all. If you want a determination on the legality of bumper configurations, do what has been suggested (multiple times, both publicly and via PM) and submit a particular, specific question to the FRC Q&A forums. Get your real answers there.

he's tried twice....

http://forums.usfirst.org/showthread.php?t=11361

http://forums.usfirst.org/showthread.php?t=11204

no useful answer

[Matt C]

Originally Posted by Aren_Hill

he's tried twice....

http://forums.usfirst.org/showthread.php?t=11361

http://forums.usfirst.org/showthread.php?t=11204

no useful answer

The better question to ask would indicate the exact configuration intended to be used, with illustration, and ask if it is legal per the rules.

A picture is worth 1000 words.
Without a completely clear indication of what the design is, (no ambiguity as appears on the second question posted) it would appear hard to give a definitive answer without opening up the door for discrepant designs based on that answer (to an ambiguous question).

I'm sure they would get a useful answer if they provided the illustration to the GDC that they provided to us.

[jgraber]

Originally Posted by dlavery

and submit a particular, specific question to the FRC Q&A forums. Get your real answers there.

Except that specific examples are discouraged at Q&A, they want only rules clarification rather than pre-inspection.
I'm exploring theoretical ways to use the bumper frame as 18 lbs of robot frame stiffener. There is no limit on how far inside the robot perimeter that the bumper side of the interlocking brackets can protrude, right? Only a 1" limit on how far outside the robot perimeter for bumper hard parts.
So a 28x38 piece of plywood the shape of the robot frame, with holes for wheels, etc, with bumper plywood mounted to the edges, is all considered bumper mounting hw, and as long the whole thing with foam and fabric and bolts weighs less than 18 lbs, its legal, and could be used to stiffen the frame of the robot. Sound good? To remove the bumpers, pull all the bolts, drop the bumper floor, and lift/drive the robot out of it. Has anyone weighed a 28x38" full perimeter bumper yet, to see how generous 18lbs is?

[Jared Russell]

Anyone else have a head ache?

[T3_1565]

lol... you have no idea... I'm trying to keep track of all this stuff for my team (they are focused on other things besides bumpers right now.. lol) and hopefully our design doesn't end up breaking some bumper rule (as of right now it doesn't but who knows?)

[Collin Fultz]

Originally Posted by jgraber

I'm exploring theoretical ways to use the bumper frame as 18 lbs of robot frame stiffener. There is no limit on how far inside the robot perimeter that the bumper side of the interlocking brackets can protrude, right? Only a 1" limit on how far outside the robot perimeter for bumper hard parts.

Except that R08-L says "The BUMPERS must be fixed to the BUMPER PERIMETER."