Spare Parts - What FIRST Had to Say

[Raul]

I called the FIRST rules & engineering support line. I spoke to Charlie and asked him to clarify some points about spares for me. I explained to him that there is a lot of anguish on this forum about the interpretation of the spare parts ruling.

Here are my questions and his answers:
Q: Do we have to ship our spares along with our robot to the drayage area.
A: No, you can bring exact duplicate pre-manufactured spares to the event with you.

Q: Are we allowed to make exact duplicate spare parts after a regional, at home, if a part broke that is not off the shelf?
A: Yes, we are only concerned about not allowing design modifications off-site.

Q: OK, but how much time after the regional do we get. Is it like in past years where we were given until Tuesday.
A: [he was then a little hesitant and unsure of the answer to how much time we are allowed]

I again emphasized the confusion on the forums and asked him to please clearly state these rulings in a Team Update. He said they will try.

[Kris Verdeyen]

The day is saved and all is right with the world. Like so many after school specials, the ending of this saga is "it was all just a big misunderstanding". We can bring additional parts to the competitions. Hooray!

[Wayne Doenges]

This is going to a big relief to allot of teams, both veterans and rookies alike.
We will probably be bringing our second robot to the regionals so we can rob parts off it as we need them. Hopefully we won't need them

Wayne Doenges

[Raul]

Please do not rejoice too much yet, until we see the official ruling clarified on a Team Update. I just would hate to get people's hopes up too high and then FIRST changes their mind as they contemplate the decision to post in the update.

[Ken Leung]

I won't be so sure about these answers being the final ruling... I have a strange feeling that not all FIRST staffs have the same thoughts about this. I think the decision will be made by the top FIRST people.

You can already see in the Yahoo! group that not all FRC engineers think the same when they answer questions, which explain some contradiction between answers. There could be miscommunication between the staffs.

When I answer questions on the board, I realized that the manual sometimes doesn't have the precise answer I am looking for... And when I brought up the questions to another FRC engineer, sometimes they aren't entirely clear about the answer themselves, and have to get some answers from somewhere else.

It's been sometime since they were off to get some answers... They are probably having a meeting right now discussing about making spare parts and replacement parts after 6 week¡K

Just wait for a team update come out, or some sort of ¡§final ruling¡¨ on the Yahoo! Board.

[FRCOps]

I have to report that the conversation reported here with Charlie was not the final word on this, nor, unfortunately, should it have been taken as an official policy and posted here.

The good news is that we have been debating a better approach to this for some time now internally and we will be sending out an official notice on Monday.

I'd ask the community here not to kill us with posts or phone calls either before or after we post the notice.

[Mike Soukup]

Originally posted by FRCOps
The good news is that we have been debating a better approach to this for some time now internally and we will be sending out an official notice on Monday.

I'd ask the community here not to kill us with posts or phone calls either before or after we post the notice.

I know you said to not bombard you guys with questions, but I'm not real good at following directions It's Tuesday, where's the official notice?

Mike

[FRCOps]

See team update #6 on parts fabrication.

[WernerNYK]

ugh.....so I guess we must ship all spare parts with the robot now....gahhh

A) From team update 6 and message 767, You will have to ship all
the spare parts after the 6 weeks build period, to make sure teams
stop building after the time limit. For the first regional your
team attend, you may not bring any spart parts you build after 6-
weeks. So, Extra supplies mean hand tools, raw material, fasteners,
and other things you need in the Pit area.

After the first regional, however, you may bring to the next
competition the spare/new parts you manufactured between right after
regional and the Wednesday midnight following that weekend (about 4
days) along with the extra supplies.

-FIRST KL

[Bill Gold]

A) From team update 6 and message 767, You will have to ship all the spare parts after the 6 weeks build period, to make sure teams stop building after the time limit. For the first regional your team attend, you may not bring any spart parts you build after 6-weeks. So, Extra supplies mean hand tools, raw material, fasteners, and other things you need in the Pit area.

After the first regional, however, you may bring to the next competition the spare/new parts you manufactured between right after regional and the Wednesday midnight following that weekend (about 4 days) along with the extra supplies.

-FIRST KL

I read this also... then I went and read all of Update #6, and message 767. I couldn't find anything that says that you must ship spare parts made during the "6 weeks" to the first event your team attends. As far as I can see, this is the first time that shipping of spare parts made during the 6-week build has been talked about.

Does this mean that teams aren't allowed to make practice robots (since practice robot components could possibly be used as spare parts)? Any ideas people?