Q&A is open, and something that I expected to see as one of the very first questions hasn’t yet been asked.
This year’s FTC game committee ruled that using a V-shaped guide to center an extension on the poles when trying to score a cone is considered “grasping” the pole and thus illegal (along with anything else that has two points of contact). Will this same definition be applied to FRC?
Could someone who’s able to post questions please ask this?
(FTC ruling see FIRST FTC Q&A System Q49)
They can’t be opposed to it just because it has 2 points of contact, the wording makes it seem like they are concerned with you catching on it or getting it wedged in your mechanism. The final sentence states that you can demonstrate that it doesn’t grasp the pole whatsoever to the head referee
They specifically defined “grasping” as having 2 points of contact. “A Junction pole fully engaged in a “V” shaped apparatus has two points of contact. This is an example of illegal grasping of Game Elements per rule G25.” This resulted in a LOT of discussion/controversy/rebuilding in FTC-land and some distressing penalty calls. I’d like to see that settled early for FRC, so we don’t have that controversy/rebuilding mess.
The bit about demonstrating that it doesn’t grasp means demonstrating that it never has more than one point of contact at a time.
what about fully engaged, does that just mean contacting? I just can’t believe that they would outlaw something this basic, touching a pole with 2 points of contact…
The definition of grasping, in absence of a FIRST-specified one, comes from the dictionary: “to sieze and hold firmly”. If a person pushing the manipulator gently away would cause it to be no longer held1, then it was not held firmly.
Moreover, rulings on the rules in FTC have essentially no authority on the rulings of FRC. It is unfortunate that their interpretation of grasping leads to nuisance penalties, but at present FRC is safe from that debacle.
That said, it probably is worth a Q&A question to try to determine for certain.
1It is conceivable that a narrow-angled V, lined with rubber traction, could run at high speed at the cone node and become stuck; this would undoubtably be grasping.
You might be able to look at the verbiage in the 2011 game manual regarding the minibot poles and their contact interactions with robots, then use that to inform any noted caveats in a Q&A question. A v-type alignment jig was used by pretty much every good minibot team.
Someone asked, now we just have to wait for answer.
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