One of the students on our team was told that the Red Dragon (team 1270) was the first robot to ever get disqualified on the Einstein field. Is this true, or has anyone ever been disqualified before?
I didn’t see any in 05 and 06.
I don’t remember 04.
By “on Einstien” I assume you mean during the (National) Championship finals. Before 2003, robots played Qualification matches on Einstein. I’m pretty sure our 2002 robot MOEhawk was DQed on Einstein considering it was DQed 8 times during that year and had the first and last DQs that year.
Yes, I mean during the (National) Championship finals. I want to find out if we made history as the first team to ever get DQed in the final rounds.
Wow, 8 times – That must be a record!
8 TIMES?!?!? what for?
I think it was at least 8 times across 3 comps (it could have been more but probably not a record anyway, think of all the 2006 incursion DQs). MOEHawk is infamous around our area, but never did anything malicious or damaged another robot (it was often on the receiving end of punishment). It employed a similar strategy to Beatty and Sparky (384) in that it attempted to grab and control all 3 goals. Our variation on the strategy was we would drive forward (very fast, it was only used for a couple seconds) deploy our 14 wingspan grab all 3 goals push them into our zone and anchor down with (file card) brakes. If successful the rest of the match was devoted to opponents beating on the MOEhawk-3 goal system.
The 8(+) DQs were all for carpet damage or entanglement. The “first DQ of 2002” was at Week 1 VCU for carpet damage. The “last DQ of 2002” was our last qualifier on Newton for entanglement. I think we had more DQs than other loses in qualifiers. We took the DQs in good humor and I personally add them as achievements (most, first, last DQs) to many Legend of MOEhawk stories to younger members. A DQ in qualifiers really didn’t mean much to us (neither did the rankings) because FIRST’s 2002 qualifying ranking system had no wins or losses, the winner got 3 times the losers score and the loser got their score (lowest score was thrown out of the average). Many matches we won resulted in 0 points anyway (sometimes opponents purposely scored 0). For fun, here are explanations/arguments about the carpet damage and entanglement DQs.
There was carpet damage in nearly every match we played. I claim that MOEhawk never damaged the carpet more than our opponents and we never actually significantly damaged the carpet. The lone exception was when our driver accidentally ran the wheels while the anchor were down, that DQ was well deserved.
As for the rest of the DQs, ponder these questions: Where is the carpet damage coming from? and How could MOEhawk damage the carpet without moving?
We stopped moving our drive train in the first 5 sec (an generally never moved again) while our opponents are pushing and spinning wheels the whole match. File cards also do not damage the rug, they either sit down in the carpet or scrub harmlessly across the top. However, with that much metal (file card anchors and “filed washer” omni wheels) on the carpet I can understand how it was perceived that way and we got DQed. The metal traction device rule would make all these devices illegal next year.
The entanglement was reserved for when an opponents attempted to drive over the wings (had to be a good climber to start) and got stuck halfway (no one ever made it 
).
We almost got a Newton Semifinal match up with Beatty and I startedthis thread about it. Basically a blown RC fuse (that I fixed before the match, but our alliance had already “declared” 2 robots) prevented us going out to face the GM Alliance (I remember 68, 67 and another GM team) in the third match for a chance at the eventual championship winners. What would have happened in a Beatty vs MOEhawk showdown? A fitting end might have been for the file card shuffle drive versus the file card anchors struggle to rip the carpet and result in a DQ.
Another interesting note about MOEhawk is the “MOE Mauler Award”. The weight reduced wings would spectacularly break due to constant beatings. We expected this from day 1 since our 3 goal strategy dictates this (and we would often win despite a break since we still had the other 2 goals). After VCU, we decided to start giving out the mangled robot piece to the team that graciously mauled the wing the best. By the offseason, this became a sought after award. I know 84, 433, 303 and 25 all have won. We had some epic elimination battles with 25 during the offseason (often during the finals). 25 always prevailed (they won all 4 offseason comps) as the the Silver Scorpion with the first version of their now famous drive train proved a perfect foil. This was the same offseason as the Sticknapping (also by Team 25) so it was an interesting and fun offseason (most fun offseason I’ve had). It also marks the start of a friendly rivalry between our teams (other posts here and here).
Wow, that was a long rant (I took breaks) over a simple question. 2002 was my Senior year in HS, I guess I’m getting old with my “stories”. [/Waxes Nostalgic]