WHAT TO DO WITH LAST YEAR'S FLOOR?!

[Steve Compton]

This thread is to hopefully 'mine' the wisdom of the game committees. We've got 28 sheets of last year's floor, and some ideas about using it for other projects. We don't however, want to commit it to use if there's any chance it'll show back up in the upcoming game. I doubt that would happen, but looking for insight!

[Stephen of REX]

Well in my humble opinion, I think that there will not be a regolith floor next year, not a chance. But I think that the same material may be used on ramps or some other field object. So I would keep a bit around.

[Chris is me]

I highly doubt you'll get an answer from the GDC but I'd probably say it's safe to use them for projects and whatnot, if you can think of any.

[sgreco]

I would tend to doubt that they'll use regolith again.

My team gave ours away to a local team midway through the buildseason, so we don't have to find anything to do with the extra. Before we gave it away, we were considering printing out big team signs and using the regolith as a backing to keep them from ripping. I think it could make nice sidings for a refridgerator too

We actually almost used it for side paneling this year on our robot, but used lexan instead so we could actually see into the robot.

It's good matrial because of how flexible it is.

[Beth Sweet]

Build a shower so that robo-people don't have to go home at all during build season?

[Akash Rastogi]

I thought everyone just waxed it, put it down on the floor, and walked slides around in their socks


..Guess we're doing it wrong.

[Chris is me]

Was never slippery enough. I wanted to get some of those slippy curling shoe pad things and slide around with those.

Keep in mind the stuff's pretty prone to snapping.

[fuzzy1718]

they make pretty good dry erased boards if you attach them to a wall

[JaneYoung]

Originally Posted by fuzzy1718

they make pretty good dry erased boards if you attach them to a wall

There could be some clever ways to incorporate some of the flooring into a pit set-up, using the regolith as an information center.

[Joe Ross]

Put it on the walls where you build the robot.

[Katie_UPS]

I really like the idea of making white boards out of them, although my team doesn't own any. :/

[Molten]

White boards: a nerds best friend.

I am lucky enough to work in a math center where the entire walls are white boards, and there are whiteboards going throughout the room, and there are markers every 6 feet. That is paradise. Just needs a free mountain dew machine and I'm set.

[Tetraman]

It's pretty much a good assumption that it won't return to the game scene for a long time. Cause it's really the wheels that cause the slipperyness, not the floor. And with normal wheels the regolith wouldn't have the same slide effect, so I don't see the regolith return unless the wheels do.

They will probably throw it out. Or convert it into whiteboards and use it for the refs next year for scoring. haha.

[DonRotolo]

Is the stuff recyclable? I'd hate to see it in a landfill.

[Roger]

Someone took a couple of sheets home to use to slide his garden shed across his backyard. We may use a couple more sheets in the shop behind our bridgeport, but that may take a few years to do. We may finish the bathrooms in our team's building with it, but that may involve more work and politics than just glueing it to the wall.

FRP (fiberglass reinforced plastic) panels are made for walls that need to be sanitary and easy to clean, such as commercial kitchens and bathrooms. It is specified a lot for restaurants as it is cheap, and easy to cut and install -- cheaper than quarry tile or other materials, I mean. While the sheets aren't made for flooring*, they are made for cleaning and after washing down the used sheets they can be used for a wall finish. While I wouldn't reuse the regolith for a first-class sanitary area like a school kitchen, for home use for walls or ceilings in the laundry room say would be good.

The construction company I work for uses it for a pizza chain we building in the Boston region. The one we're finishing now had stacks of FRP sheets that could have supplied a dozen fields! You can see it next year as it's just down the block from where the Boston regional competition is at the Agganis arena. Good pizza, too!

Don -- I googled "FRP recycling" and the first couple of hits had some recycling methods. I suspect that scraps are now landfilled unless there is a trash hauler nearby that can do the recycling.

*Witness the judge at one competition that walked across the field in high heels, with a field crew later taping all the tiny holes!