S03 and turrets

[geeknerd99]

During a bit of downtime as we were awaiting some more wood to continue construction of our practice field, I noticed something in S03 that might seriously be a problem. One prototype design that we are seriously considering is basically a box that rests upon a turret on top of another box of the same length and width. The firing mechanism is fully contained within the top box, and the top box would be able to rotate approximately 360 degrees, allowing us to fire at the center goal regardless of the orientation of the rest of the robot.

Then, we found S03.

S03 states that while the mechanism must remain inside the robot, it also must stay within its original starting box. We don't have any issues with containing the firing mechanism, but we did realize one thing that might cost us greatly: any use of a turret would be limited to minute adjustments in firing angle before a section of the firing mechanism would exit the starting size envelope.

At least, this is our impression under the rules. We understand that other sections of the robot may leave this bounding box as long as it is not part of the firing mechanism. It seems to us that the use of a turret either means an extremely small launcher (degrading accuracy) or minute adjustments to forward fire (contradicting the point of a turret).

S01 is quoted in S03, and deals with the safety issues of having a firing mechanism. I understand fully that a turret could potentially be misaligned and start firing into the crowd, but so could a non-turreted robot that was pointed the wrong way. I personally do not see what is so dangerous about having a robot with a turret.

Rambling aside, the big question is: Does S03 allow for the use of 360-degree turrets that break the original starting box, but still remain fully shielded and within the robot? Or is S03 considered supreme law with no exceptions?

[EricH]

The way I see it, it's a bit fuzzy. You have a rotating turret. If you can downsize it to fit at any angle, great. If not....
I'd ask Q&A about this, then post a response here.

[Kevin Sevcik]

Doesn't this mean your firing mechanism can have a 28" x 28" footprint? Do you really need the extra 10 inches from front to back of your robot? Anyways, I too would read the rule that rotating any part out of the machine is a violation. Point being, anything outside the starting envelope is fair game for other robots. having a spinning wheel of death as fair game, whether contained in the robot or not, seems like a bad idea.

[Lil' Lavery]

Your probably gonna have to downsize it to fit any variable angle during its path.