What is the Average pit size of a pit in competition? I’m working on a pit design and I searched for the size already and there are mixed dimensions: 8x8, 9x9 , 10x10. Which size should I model the Pit?
Most events will have 10x10 pits. If you’re in a district event or a regional with a smaller venue, the pit size may be reduced. Email the event corrdinator if you want to know for sure.
Yes. 
The goal is a 10x10 pit. That’s not always possible at some venues because there’s just not enough space. You should try to make your pit assembly so it can be varied based on what you find when you get there.
Some veterans might be able to tell you what to expect at specific venues.
I know for the Hatboro-Horsham district competition, we had a team come with a 10x10x10 pit. They did not fit in the assigned spot because of a light fixture that blocked their 10 foot tall display. Luckily, we had space elsewhere and they were moved to a place with a higher ceiling. Lesson of the story is that 10x10 may be the floor space of the pit, but you should also check ceiling height.
It looks like you’re signed up for Central Valley Regional and Silicon Valley Regional, perhaps someone with more knowledge of those regionals could give you an idea of what to expect?
Plan ahead and make your pit adaptable to anything from 8x8 to 10x10. You never know what an event may give you.
Most events are 10X10 but last year at OKC they gave us 15X10 (IT WAS SUPER NICE!)
Been to both. I would expect 10x10 at Central Valley if they set everything up the same way as last year. I don’t remember exactly what the pit size was at Silicon Valley but I know the floor space isn’t too big and they have a lot of teams competing there. I would say expect 9x9 for both and see if we get surprised by 10x10. I know it hasn’t been less than 9x9 at either event, at least not recently.
Is there a list anywhere of which events are what size? I always hear people warn about sub 10x10 pits, but I’ve never been to an event where that was the case.
As an FYI. If you have an empty spot next to your pit, DO NOT expand your pit into it. They will burn you for some awards.
Also sometimes at events they have rules about how you set up the pits. At FLR one year they would not allow teams to have tents over their pits. I have never seen that occur at other events. I think it was the safety adviser’s call.
[citation needed]
I’ve never heard of this happening. Nor is it in the criteria for any judged awards. Safety Award MAYBE but that’s the only one I don’t know well enough to argue about.
At this point, it’s more the case at district events, or regionals with small venues. If you only go to regionals in big arenas or convention centers, you won’t run into this problem. Once events start scaling down to college or high school gyms, there usually isn’t enough room for teams while keeping the pit at the traditional size. 9x9 is what we’ve found at most of our events. We had an 8x9 once, but that wasn’t what was taped out on the floor for us - our neighbors had set up their 10x10 pit walls already and had encroached into our space. (Not cool!)
I’m a definite fan of adjustable pit sizes - or even better, don’t build some crazy big structure. 1923 has one (gifted from another team that was folding), and it’s definitely been too big & clunky for some of our district events. We are looking at redesigning for this year, keeping the idea of a back-wall to hang banners, but we’re trashing the 10x10x8 cube we’ve had - it just doesn’t make sense for us anymore with smaller events & venues.
Nobody likes it when a team pushes the edges of their pit into yours. Not only is it unsafe, but it’s just not fair. It’s the FRC-pit equivalent of the people on the subway who put their bags on the seat next to them when someone else clearly wants to sit down. Whatever you plan out for your pit, don’t be that team.
Edit::
Safety, for sure. I know at one of our events we had a ‘take a pin!’/brochure stand outside of our pit by about 3 inches, and the Safety Advisors wouldn’t leave our space until we scooted it inside of the taped line. (Not sure how 3 extra people refusing to leave our pit made it any safer, but…)
We got a frowny face on the next morning’s form for it. 
That happened at Greater KC as well, where my team was told they could not set up the tent the school uses when they’re at events. I believe reason was that “it blocks the fire sprinklers in the event that there is a fire in our pit.” I guess I can believe that reasoning, though I imagine the 2 fire extinguishers we had should have sufficed.
Here’s Logic…
And WAY the heck over here ---------------------------------> What Venue is Liable For
See all that space in between? We can’t be in that space because the Venue could get its butt sued. Once I started thinking about it from the perspective of “what would a lawyer do”* I stopped getting annoyed by things that seemingly make no sense.
- No offense meant to lawyers, what I really mean is “what would an ambulance chasing good for nothing leech do” but that doesn’t flow as nicely. Not all lawyers are that, most are good folks.
Pretty sure getting a frowny face from a safety advisor means you’re doing it right.
Libby got the name right. You should too. They’re Safety Advisors, not inspectors. They don’t exactly have the authority some of them seem to claim.
If one of the green-shirted folk tells you to do something that doesn’t make sense, try to comply without compromising real safety, and then ask him or her to join you in a conversation about it with the Lead Safety Advisor. (The alternative is to laugh and say “You have no power here. Begone before someone drops a robot on you!” And then suggest the conference.)
What happens when the person [strike]telling[/strike] ordering you to do something that doesn’t make sense is the Lead Safety Advisor?
That’s happened to us, too.
Off-the-thread-topic, but: I’m looking at this from two hats - a mentor, and a Volunteer Coordinator.
No matter how much I try on the VC end, I still see a few SA’s being way out of control and ridiculous. I’ve seen a Safety Advisor yell at kids at the event I was working. Yell. I told him to calm down or I’d ask him to go home. There is no reason for any volunteer to yell at kids. Your job is to be there and make the event experience the best possible for the students…it’s not about you. That’s always my reminder to volunteers, every morning. And yet, it still happens. I’m not even sure how to fix it anymore.
As a mentor? Hey, maybe stop yelling at my kids. What you’re asking doesn’t make any sense. Let’s talk about this calmly instead of you standing in our pit in ‘protest’ until we fix your issue.
Back-On-Topic-Point being - keep everything inside of your 8x8 (or 9x9 or 10x10 if you’re lucky) box, and hopefully you won’t have to deal with that.
I’ve been told that judges will often confer with other volunteers at the event to ensure that judged awards will go to teams who are deserving in all aspects of the competition. Teams need to listen to the green shirted volunteers, be gracious, professional and graciously professional about it.
This happens to us at least once a year and it is absolutely infuriating. I guess we just didn’t have enough baking soda for our non-spillable batteries or something.