Robot Collaboration

[Karthik]

Congratulations on pioneering an amazing new way of approaching our competition. I have a feeling that a few years from now your two teams will be the answer to a FIRST trivia question. "Which two teams were the first to build the same robot?" Next year I'm sure many other teams will follow suit.

[ChrisH]

Originally Posted by Karthik

Congratulations on pioneering an amazing new way of approaching our competition. I have a feeling that a few years from now your two teams will be the answer to a FIRST trivia question. "Which two teams were the first to build the same robot?" Next year I'm sure many other teams will follow suit.

Too late. The answer is 254 and I think 253, the Bay City Bombers (who no longer exist) in 1999 at the first Sillicon Valley Regional. So this is not new territory for the Cheesy Poofs, just the distance has changed. BTW it should be noted that 60 and 254 won't be at the same competition until Nationals.

[Solace]

is it different? yes. but is it cheating? no, I think its perfectly acceptable. If the friendship between two teams allows them to build a better robot through a partnership that lets everyone play to their strengths, then that is exactly the kind of interaction that FIRST should encourage. the two teams are still building the parts for two robots, just in a more specialized way. as has been said, this IS the way that things happen in real life, and I don't think that it should be disallowed out of some antiquated need to preserve competition. My team has a long-standing friendship with Rage (173), and although we don't go to the extent of building the robot together, I understand the benefits of a close friendship between teams and believe that under no circumstances should it be discouraged.

[Scott Ritchie]

Boy this is a rough one. On one hand I love the working together and the camaraderie that has been formed here. I like the sharing of ideas and the fact that not only one team agreed on an idea but two, Wow.

On the other hand I like the fact that we made something that is unique to our team and when we are looked at by our friends and foes we try to make them say "I would have never thought of that". I don't see where this adds to the challenge of developing a concept except in a communication type of way. Part of our teams mission is to uninvent the cookie cutter and I think your teams have made a better cookie cutter. Is that good or bad I have no idea.

This type of thing is what I think makes FIRST an incredible competition field. Since I haven't checked could you build a robot from the white papers on this forum? If you could then what’s the problem of two teams going together. I think this idea will spark the most criticism from us Midwesterners since we are the more competition driven group. This whole debate has a very funny Republican / Democrat tone to it if you read it with a slight slant.

[ngreen]

Originally Posted by Jason Kixmiller

I agree that FIRST is intended to help spread and increase engineering knowledge, but the idea of two established teams sharing an identical design seems to have skewed the concept. I feel personally that FIRST should be about each individual team sharing the work load and the joys and the pains that come along with engineering and manufacturing its own unique design. While the idea of developing partnerships and friendships among colleagues and potential opponents is novel and advantageous, I feel that the fabrication, design, and communication that occurs as a single team creates and competes with its own robot cannot and should not be replaced.

This is partially my reasoning on it.

Giving each other design tips is great. Designing two identical robots where on team produces double of one part and the other team build the other is part is where it crosses the line for me.

I love to see the innovation that each team has separately.

I could see this happening nationwide in order to make everyone more efficient and competitve. Can you imagine going to a regional where there are 50 teams but only 25 robots, just doubled? Especially since FIRST has been trying to get more media coverage to bring more people in. Can you imagine what someone might think watching this event where they watch identical robots competing with identical strategies? I would think it was dull and unimaginative.

I've already touched on this subject of sort when talking about with holding secrets, not that secrets should be withheld but in that FIRST is awesome because the robots are unique.

We should make one plan for every robot and everyone can make the same robot that does everything and is in the limit of the rules and this would give rookies a level playing field. The whole competition could be based on the best strategy.

I think collaboration is great, mass production goes against what FIRST is about. I urge other teams not to repeat this in the coming years. Build partnerships but don't build each other robot. My econ teacher has went over how trading is good for everyone, but in this case I think it hurts FIRST.

Next year I would urge both 60 and 254 to use each other as sounding boards for design ideas and use each other for machining capabilities. But don't split the workload on one robot design and then just double it. But that is only my opinion. I'd like to hear what everyone think about this one.

Yeah Scott, I can see that one. We are competition-driven in Kansas.

And Joe, Please don't let any collaboration of this nature happen with delphi teams. I'm already starting to get scared. Many teams won't have the resources to compete effectively if team with resources enough begin to collaborate and double their resources. I could see some pretty powerful hard to beat collaboration happening.

As a future note, may I ask that any future collaborators only collaborate with teams that go to a different regional. <edit out>You could build complimenting robots that you make a deal that if one make the top eight the other makes the alliance and they work perfectly together. Hey, I should do that. </edit out>

[Redhead Jokes]

Originally Posted by Ken Leung

I want to congratulate not just on your fine work on this year's robot, but also your courage to leap to a newer level not many people in FIRST have thought of. "we understand that we can learn from each other and put both teams' experience to create a better program for our students."

Ditto.

And thanks to 60 for warmly and generously sharing their plans from a past robot arm with us this year. There were new members on our team that didn't believe 60 would say yes to our request. My husband and I, of course, were confident they would. They did with bells on. It helped open some team members' eyes about the possilibities of coopetition between teams.

[Dorsk65]

Thanks for working with another team, I really support this. Our team was planning on either working with another team or having their students become a part of ours, but the plans fell through for one reason or another. Doing this is really displaying the spirit of FIRST, so keep up the good work.

And now for the rest of the message: That is one sweet robot. I can't wait to see it work (Could we get some video?). So here's to you Team 254 and Team 60, that is a very nice job. I just want to know how the big arm thingy works, cause all I can see right now just shows that it's probably very crazy.

PS:Nice shop, I wish our team would, dare I say it, organize...

[Shawn60]

Time spent making parts for each team - 6 weeks
Cost for materials to make parts for each team - doubled
Time spent redesigning the robot so each team is satified - 2 weeks
Buidling better peopel and creating stonger realationships -PRICELESS

As to all of the questions that have arrisen - GREAT!!! YEs!!!

As I tell my students

"There are no easy answers... only complicated and never ending questions."

Shawn

[Collin Fultz]

if this collaboration is the greatest thing since sliced bread then why even have the robot COMPETITION at all? shouldn't we all just get together and try to come up with one really great robot idea that is simply awesome? wouldn't that just be the greatest? no. competition makes America what it is. competition between teams, companies, democrats, republicans, liberals, conservatives...without competition nothing ever really gets better. without competition healthcare doesn't get faster and cheaper, cars don't get better gas mileage, and things progress much more slowly than before. I hope...no, I PRAY...that Cyber Blue never, never, never NEVER goes to this idea. Cooperation is one thing, so is helping a team at a competition, or mentoring them, or posting a white paper, or showing pictures, or this or that... but the bottom line is building two identicle robots is not the same as these things and therefore should not be compared to them...come on

[Matt Adams]

Could someone please address how rule 5.3.2.2 would apply to this situation? Joel brought up this concern earlier... I haven't seen a response from either team. I'm just curious about the billing rate that's appropriate.

461 has always used $50 / hr for any CNC work we've had done, but I don't know a fair rate for a typical machinist.

I'm just curious how this will all pan out... it'll be interesting to say the least. I'm not nearly as concerned about having two identical designs as I am about the whole idea of, "I'll build two of this and you build two of that, and we'll switch." It's much faster to build 2 of 1 part than 1 of 2 parts.

I know at Purdue, discussions over homework assignments is encouraged. However, writting out problem #1 twice, and having a friend write out problem #2 twice, followed by a switch of assignements doesn't fully teach either party the material in the problem they didn't do. In my mind, this homework example parallels this collaboration somewhat close.

However, I'm a little divided to be honest. It seems like this is taking something a bit too far. What that "something" is... I can't place my finger on... so apon the fence I sit, watching it unravel.

Good luck to everybody!

Matt

[Joel Glidden]

It's not just the machining time. The real biggie is the design work. What do you think it would cost on the open market to hire an engineering firm to design an arm that satisfies all of the applicable constraints and fulfils all of the applicable functional requirements? I doubt it could be done for less than $3500, and that's just to get it designed!

That having been said, I have no problem with this concept as long as the financials are straight. Any team can hire outside engineering and machining. That's exactly what's happened here w/ 60 and 254. They just happened to negotiate a really outstanding price. The $3500 limit keeps it fair.

[Venkatesh]

Teams 60 and 254 collaborating? Amazing idea, whoever thought up that idea deserves much kudos.

Seriously, if I happen to be at a regional where either (or both) teams 60 and 254 are, I will give everybody on those team one cookie. (or a prize of equal value)

This is an excellent idea, and if FIRST indicates it is happy with partnerships like this, I hope to see more of these in the future. The idea that two teams, who compete with each other, are willing to help each other not only with little bits of ideas and advice, but by forming a full-fledged alliance, is excellent. This should be plastered somewhere in an introduction video.

So anyway, what do you guys on 60 and 254 think of Oreos?

[Joe Johnson]

Originally Posted by Joel Glidden

It's not just the machining time. The real biggie is the design work. What do you think it would cost on the open market to hire an engineering firm to design an arm that satisfies all of the applicable constraints and fulfils all of the applicable functional requirements? I doubt it could be done for less than $3500, and that's just to get it designed!

That having been said, I have no problem with this concept as long as the financials are straight. Any team can hire outside engineering and machining. That's exactly what's happened here w/ 60 and 254. They just happened to negotiate a really outstanding price. The $3500 limit keeps it fair.

The difference is that the rules don't specifically call out requirement for accounting for engineering or design done by non-team members while they DO specifically require that non-team labor in making parts be counted against the $3500 limit.

The way I read the rules, there is no way that $3500 limit does not apply. BUT... ...is this the spirit of the rule? I don't think the rules were intended to prevent this type of labor sharing among teams.

As a practical matter, there is zero chance that FIRST is going to disqualify either team 60 or team 254... ...so for 2004 at least this practice is going to be allowed.

I think that FIRST is going to get an earful in the off season about this, especially if Kingman and Cheesy Poofs keep up that habit they have of winning regionals and placing high at the Championships.

Deciding what the rules should be next year is going to put Dean's statements about FIRST being for engineers not lawyers to the test...


Joe J.

[Krystine T.]

I would just like to bring up one point...the build load did not decrease.

Yes it is true that we only made 1/2 of the robot ...but we made 4 robots... After school, work, and homeowrk, team 60 and 254 put in alot of very long nights. Every part that was made took quadruple the amount of time. Often it took hours or even days for that matter to finish a certan part...and several times we had to go back to the drawing board and re-design new mechanisms.
I hope that everyone realizes that there is more then one way to go about building robots. The students on team 60 and 254 have learned 4 times over the difficulties and challenges that robotics teams face.
I have realized the importance of communication. The students on our teams will walk away with a new lesson in life. They will walk away knowing that they will face challenges greater then themsleves, and they will know that working on a team will bring up new challenges and new ideas, and give them knowledge that they never thought possible

[Jessica Boucher]

Quick question: Why 4, when you only needed 2?