POLL: Six Week Build Season

[JVN]

I think we've seen some fantastic discussion in the Six Week Build Season thread that Mr. Bill started: http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...hreadid=139373

I like data. I thought a poll as a supplement to that thread would be nice.

What do you think? Should we change the nature of the Build Season?

[Peyton Yeung]

I'm not seeing a poll option.

[techhelpbb]

You should create an option for 'Study the problem further'.

Cause my vote for 'Tools down after a certain date' ignores that I'd still like teams to have FRC style robots of some sort to learn with year round.

[AGPapa]

I voted "keep it just like it is" but I'd support having more unbag time (~6hrs every week) as was suggested here.

[MrForbes]

I wonder how representative this poll could be among all teams? My guess is that teams that build a practice bot now will be over represented...just because the teams that put in a lot of extra time doing stuff like that, also happen to put in extra time on CD.

[EricLeifermann]

I put it at least 40+ hours a week kickoff through championships, probably still will if bag day was to be taken away.

The true benefit I see to getting rid of bag/pause build day is the cost savings to my team. We will no longer need to build 2 robots, HUGE cost savings to a team with the resources we have, our sponsors would definitely love us more as we wouldn't be begging as much for quick turn around and such as well.

The added benefit should be an increase in competitiveness as now every team will have a practice robot. A well driven "lower-tier" robot will beat a poorly driven "upper-tier" robot ever single time. I cannot count how many times I have seen this posted in these forums "the thing that pushed our team over the edge was when we started building a practice bot"

There are lots of things that go into the elite teams being elite but the single greatest thing that those teams have is stick time. You look at the teams that are on Einstein nearly every year and the one thing they will all have in common is at least 3X more drive time than other teams.

[EricDrost]

The third option is not enforceable.

Originally Posted by AGPapa

I voted "keep it just like it is" but I'd support having more unbag time (~6hrs every week) as was suggested here.

I voted remove all restrictions, but giving 6hr/week unbag would be a good compromise. Especially so for those poor regional teams who get NO unbag time.

[JVN]

Originally Posted by EricDrost

The third option is not enforceable.

The third option is just as enforceable as many other rules we have within this competition. There are myriad ways to cheat, but the ethos of the competition keep people in bounds.

FRC relies on the honor system already.

[EricDrost]

Originally Posted by JVN

The third option is just as enforceable as many other rules we have within this competition. There are myriad ways to cheat, but the ethos of the competition keep people in bounds.

FRC relies on the honor system already.

Sure, but it creates a huge gray area.

Is CAD part of "tools down"? Is it illegal to design a COTS mechanism to bring to an event to assemble there?

What about driver practice? I think it's reasonable to assume that practicing driving base with an old robot is okay, but what about modifying your 2008 mechanism to practice operating your 2014 robot?

Unless you deincentivize winning (#2Champz), teams are going to toe the line as closely as they can, which would be against the spirit of creating a rule like this.


Aside from the gray area, this also removes what I think is one of the best teaching opportunities for teams (which, John, I'm sure you'll agree with). Practice robots and unbag are one of the best times to learn from your mistakes and iterate.

[Bob Steele]

Originally Posted by EricDrost

The third option is not enforceable.



I voted remove all restrictions, but giving 6hr/week unbag would be a good compromise. Especially so for those poor regional teams who get NO unbag time.

Let's not forget that the reason that District teams get unbag time at all is because they don't get the Thursday of a regional to work on their robot. District teams only get unbag time the week before the district event that they are participating in.

I would be in favor of allowing all teams to get unbag time each week with the District teams getting extra time before each event to compensate for the extra day that teams participating in Regionals get on Thursdays.

[Kevin Leonard]

Originally Posted by Bob Steele

I would be in favor of allowing all teams to get unbag time each week with the District teams getting extra time before each event to compensate for the extra day that teams participating in Regionals get on Thursdays.

+1

[KrazyCarl92]

Originally Posted by AGPapa

I voted "keep it just like it is" but I'd support having more unbag time (~6hrs every week) as was suggested here.

If this were to be the case, we could keep the playing field level for teams who have to ship their robots to competitions by allowing them to displace their unbag hours from the weeks their robot will be shipping to earlier (or later) weeks in the season.

[GreyingJay]

No fourth option "Increase build season from 6 weeks to 8 weeks"?

[Cory]

Originally Posted by GreyingJay

No fourth option "Increase build season from 6 weeks to 8 weeks"?

That isn't an option. You cannot shift the competition season to the right 2 weeks and you cannot shift kickoff to the left 2 weeks.

[waialua359]

Originally Posted by GreyingJay

No fourth option "Increase build season from 6 weeks to 8 weeks"?

If build season doesnt move back to Winter Break in December, then your suggestion might as well be part of the getting rid of the 6 week build season.
According to the schedule, Week 1/2 and Week 1 events would be playing already.