Q&A164

FIRST General Forum
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Posted by Joe Johnson at 2/7/2001 6:14 AM EST

Engineer on team #47, Chief Delphi, from Pontiac Central High School and Delphi Automotive Systems.

Again, I am going to live by the rules that FIRST has put out, but Q&A164 seems unreasonable.

Essentially, stock parts from prior years are useless. I realize that FIRST is trying to level the playing field but this seems a silly waste of money.

Other thoughts.

Joe J.

Q164. We have parts for the robot, such as bearings from previous years that are
in the Small Parts Catalog. May we list these with a cost from the catalog
as parts used on the robot? Would we have to order the parts even
though we have them on hand?

A164. You should purchase parts you wish to use on this year’s robot from
Small Parts. The reason for using the catalog is to insure that all teams
have a “level playing field” with regard to selection of parts as well as lead
time in securing parts.

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Posted by Ken Leung at 2/7/2001 6:44 AM EST

Student on team #192, Gunn Robotics Team, from Henry M. Gunn Senior High School.

In Reply to: Q&A164
Posted by Joe Johnson on 2/7/2001 6:14 AM EST:

This rule does seems quite unreasonable… But if you think about it, it kind of teach teams more about managing money and resources even more efficiently. Every team now learns to not spend too much money on spare parts and hope to reuse them in later years.

And if you look at the market of computer components, it kind of have a similar situation on the people, except in the computers market people have to keep buying new components because the older version simply go obsolete so fast that the people need to keep up. And that’s just life. People just seem to work harder so they can buy newer stuff and be happy about the fact that they are keeping up.

Well, I still understand that there is no reason to buy new parts from year to year in this competition. But the reason behind this rule is still consistent with the spirit of FIRST. The more I think about this, the more goodness is coming from this rule.

For rookie teams, they don’t have to worry about much because it’s their first time buying the stocks. They learn to spend money more wisely. And whatever extra parts they have they can end up selling them to other teams who needs them. This is a pretty nice way to make sure people don’t waste any parts. Teams now won’t buy too much from small parts, but instead they will buy the extras from other team, thus reducing the demand on Small Parts and make SPI’s life easier. In addition, same thing apply to teams who decide not to continue in the competition. They can sell the parts the year so when other teams buy them, it will be purchasing parts in the current year.

For veteran teams, I guess FIRST just want to make sure veteran teams don’t have left over money because they don’t need to buy more from small parts. It is kind of unfair that if one year a veteran team receives much more funds then they need for that year, they get to be rich and don’t have to worry about money for a while, while other teams have to struggle through every year trying to find sponsors.

I can understand FIRST’s standpoint about this. In the spirit of the competition, FIRST will rather be stricter about rules then to let older teams have an advantage over rookie teams.

Then again unfairness always happens in the business world, and the stronger fittest simply survive. But I suppose FIRST would like to create an easier environment for other teams to really have a good learning experience about engineering and technology while not having to worry about business just yet.

I guess I don’t have much complains about this.

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Posted by Joe Johnson at 2/7/2001 7:19 AM EST

Engineer on team #47, Chief Delphi, from Pontiac Central High School and Delphi Automotive Systems.

In Reply to: it seems fair…
Posted by Ken Leung on 2/7/2001 6:44 AM EST:

There are 100’s of things that make this competition unfair for rookie teams.

While it is hard to object to leveling the playing field in this area or that area, the field is never going to be even close to level. More importantly, the main areas of unfairness come from sources that FIRST has nothing to say about and does not wish to make fair.

To me this rule is much like a person who gets X-rayed every day watching TV from a peep hole in a lead wall because TV’s emit radiation! Yeah it is true that this person may be getting a lower dose of radiation than by watching the TV directly but, in terms of risk abatement, it would be better to skip an X-ray once in a while and forget about TV habits altogether.

Again, rules are rules, and we will do our best to follow them, but… …this one does seem a bit silly, especially on the grounds of “leveling the playing field.”

Joe J.

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Posted by Bill Beatty at 2/7/2001 10:42 AM EST

Other on team #71, Team Hammond, from Team Hammond.

In Reply to: Noise on the signal
Posted by Joe Johnson on 2/7/2001 7:19 AM EST:

I wonder what Small Part’s return policy is?

The veteran teams always will have an advantage, regardless of the SPI purchase rules. Now a rookie team cannot order as freely for experimentation required because of less past experience. In a world where time is usually the most valuable commodity, I would think that First would try and help preserve it.

Mr. Bill

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Posted by Jim Meyer at 2/7/2001 12:13 PM EST

Engineer on team #67, HOT Team, from Huron Valley Schools and GM Milford Proving Ground.

In Reply to: it seems fair…
Posted by Ken Leung on 2/7/2001 6:44 AM EST:

I don’t see at all how this will “level the playing field”, we will most likely just order a pile of stuff we think we might need so it is on hand when we need it.

Warning - Start of Rant…

The only person I see this helping is the owner of SPI. The fact that he has strong influences with the FIRST community doesn’t help any either. Does anyone else smell something fishy here? I had this suspicion that some decisions by FIRST seem to benefit SPI more than the teams. I got this suspicion when they took gears and sprockets off the additional hardware list, but I didn’t want to say anything. Once I saw this new take on the rule I couldn’t hold it in any longer.

Has anyone ever pondered why we don’t use a large company like McMaster-Carr who wouldn’t be drained of supplies so easily and is much easier to deal with? Not even to mention availability of parts, cost and delivery time. SPI still gives us tax and shipping headaches because of the way GM requires us to purchase materials.

Maybe now is the best time to start divisions based on funding so they can take away some of these ridiculous rules.

End of Rant…

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Posted by Chris Orimoto at 2/7/2001 12:32 PM EST

Student on team #368, Kika Mana, from McKinley High School and Nasa Ames/Hawaiian Electric/Weinberg Foundation.

In Reply to: It seems fair???
Posted by Jim Meyer on 2/7/2001 12:13 PM EST:

Yes, I do agree that SPI is profitting more from FIRST than FIRST teams are from SPI. I also think that there should be some “alternative” to buying parts from SPI. Hey man, they have to ship thier stuff from Florida, across the ENTIRE United States, and then HALFWAY across the Pacific Ocean just before it gets to us. A company with “sub-offices” around the nation would be beneficial.

Just my personal thoughts…

Chris, #368

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Posted by Raul at 2/8/2001 9:11 AM EST

Engineer on team #111, Wildstang, from Rolling Meadows & Wheeling HS and Motorola.

In Reply to: It seems fair???
Posted by Jim Meyer on 2/7/2001 12:13 PM EST:

Jim,

I agree and I cannot contain my opinion any longer either.

Here is a typical scenario for us: We get the kit and rules, look at the additional HW list and SPI catalog and start ordering parts right away so we do not run into the later stock crunch.

The problem is that we inventory many parts in bins and those bins may contain the same parts that we bought last year. Dog gone it, they are identical!!! Now that we got this update of the rules, am I expected to go back and figure which ones are form last year and which ones are from this year??

This rule makes me angry (the little devil on my right shoulder is beating up on the little angel on my right :-). I am trying to follow the rules as best I can and I feel guilty if I don’t. So I have to apologize in advance to the FIRST community if I cannot sort through my parts and be totally legit.

I guess I may just have to tell the inspectors that I am not actually sure if all my Small Parts are purchases from this year. My excuse to them will be that the rule came out late, I had mixed my parts and was not able to sort identical parts. Then they can choose to disqualify us if the wish. They may suggest we replace the potential suspected parts or they may agree with me that the rule is silly.

And, I am afraid to ask if the same rule applies to spares. Are we allowed to use the kit parts from last year (seat motors, window motors, etc.) as spares to repair broken parts?

I don’t know what the motivation for this rule is. You will have a hard time convincing me that it has anything to do with making it fairer for the rookies.

OK, I got that out of my system - back to work.

Raul

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Posted by Ken Leung at 2/8/2001 1:37 PM EST

Student on team #192, Gunn Robotics Team, from Henry M. Gunn Senior High School.

In Reply to: Silliest Rule Ever by FIRST!!
Posted by Raul on 2/8/2001 9:11 AM EST:

Ah… finally someone said what I want to say long time ago when I first read update 6.

When I first read about this update, I wondered how many teams are actually going to follow this rule… FIRST is finally pulling the limit now. And then suddenly I thought of our storage system where we categorize every little small stuff (ranging from bolts to sprocket to screw, etc.) I suddenly remember I just finished sorting out our orders from small parts into those boxes, and realized it’s going to be a pain-in-the-@$$ sorting them out again, not to mention impossible…

A while ago I asked the question about buying from places other then small parts, and the whole discussion of “Too Legalistic Vs. Too Cavalier” started. And so I thought ¡§Maybe I will post about how good the rule is to see if anyone is actually supporting it.¡¨ I wanted to see how far could gracious professionalism bring the teams into following rules. And so that¡¦s what I did. I admit I kind of made up the part about selling left over stocks and how that will preserve parts for Small Parts, but the part about how rookies don¡¦t have left over stocks from previous year was truthful.

Now that I hear lots of people rejecting this rule update my goal is accomplished. It seems kind of weird that no rookie team responded about this, but I guess that doesn¡¦t really matter. What matters is that so far no one thinks this update is going to help leveling the playing field out there, and that there are no real method of doing such things in this competition.

-So what do all these mean?
I don¡¦t really know… But I can tell that lots of veteran teams are not happy about this.
-Does this say that most teams out there don¡¦t want a leveled playing field because it¡¦s too hard to make that work?
Maybe that¡¦s what people think, it certainly sounds like it¡K
-Is it too hard to make that work because people don¡¦t want changes in the competition?
I cannot judge what people thinks base on their opinion¡K
-Is a leveled playing field necessary?
After looking at people¡¦s opinion it seems it¡¦s a waste of time trying to do such thing, plus the business world is not a leveled playing field anyway¡K
-Do high school students really need to face this unleveled competition as they are trying to learn from all these?
Maybe it might be too much to ask them to face such tough competition this early in their lives¡K But then again how many high school students are actually facing the challenge instead of engineers doing that for them?
-Is it so wrong of FIRST to make this update?
Maybe FIRST did went a bit too far, but maybe not¡K
-Are there at least some good reasons behind this update?
I think so¡K

So I guess you all see this following question coming: How many of you plan to completely follow this rule and are actually going to take out the old stocks and replace them with new ones?

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Posted by soap108 at 2/8/2001 1:58 PM EST

Engineer on team #108, SigmaC@T, from Dillard & Taravella HS and Motorola.

In Reply to: Silliest Rule Ever by FIRST!!
Posted by Raul on 2/8/2001 9:11 AM EST:

Valid arguements on both sides of the issue.
When I first read Update #6, I also thought, “Hmmmm…buy stock in SPI…”

Not that you don’t or aren’t, but remember- its getting the students interested in S&T that’s “First”, building a better robot is “Second”, and winning is “Third”.

Must buy-in to the ‘spirit’ of the co-opertition, not ‘spirit’ of competition.

p.s. Some rookies end up being very good. Also due to the institution of ‘alliances,’ (rookie) teams can build a robot that does one thing, get picked as an ally, and win an event. That tells me I must focus my energy on training students about good engineering practices/processes, and not win-win-win. SigmaC@T has used this theme with much success: (about 5 students interned at Motorola that summer, mainly due to How we mentored them) “Learning, not Winning.”

p.p.s. I do like the concept of divisions based on $ponsership, but doubt it will ever happen…Rookie division vs. Veteran division seems more real to me…I feel this year’s EPCOT is a testing ground for how FIRST divides teams into divisions in the future, both at Nationals and at the reginoals leading into it. “March Madness” will have a new meaning in the future.

just my 108 cents,
Kenny ;~)

your thoughts?

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Posted by Gary Bonner at 2/9/2001 12:25 PM EST

Other on team #433, Firebirds, from Mount Saint Joseph Academy and SCT Corp., FMC Corp…

In Reply to: Re: Silliest Rule Ever by FIRST!!
Posted by soap108 on 2/8/2001 1:58 PM EST:

I don’t think that divisions based on sponsorship are a good idea, for a couple of reasons. First, just like athletics, the newer, less experienced teams benefit by competing with the more experienced teams. The purpose of FIRST is to stimulate high school student’s interest in science and technology, not to win a competition. And we should be attempting to reach as many students as possible.

Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, as more and more schools start participating, the available sources of funding will get used up. The cooperation on the playing field will be replaced in the off season by competition for sponsors (another situation in which experienced teams have an advantage). Sure this is happening already, but things will get worse as more schools join. And if the economy is slowing, as the news reports seem to indicate, the availability of sponsorship money will decrease. Keeping in mind the objective of FIRST, how is the limited pool sponsorship money best spent?

While I don’t think that this rule really does anything to level the playing field (in fact it makes us waste money), I don’t think that the solution is divisions based on financing.

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Posted by Jim Meyer at 2/9/2001 2:08 PM EST

Engineer on team #67, HOT Team, from Huron Valley Schools and GM Milford Proving Ground.

In Reply to: Re: Silliest Rule Ever by FIRST!!
Posted by Gary Bonner on 2/9/2001 12:25 PM EST:

:I don’t think that divisions based on sponsorship are a good idea, for a couple of reasons

I don’t either. All I was trying to say is it seems like a better way to level the playing field rather than introducing these crazy rules.

:The cooperation on the playing field will be replaced in the off season by competition for sponsors

I don’t think you need a big sponsor like GM to have a top knotch team. I think Team Hammond is a perfect example of this. To loosely quote Joe J. “How many Beaty Machine and Manufacturing’s are there out there?”

Just my 2 cents (not sure if I can afford to throw in a nickel like some? :-)~)

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Posted by Ken Wilson at 2/7/2001 3:50 PM EST

Engineer on team #248, FEMEX, from Philadelphia Girls High and PECO Energy Company.

In Reply to: Q&A164
Posted by Joe Johnson on 2/7/2001 6:14 AM EST:

You can level the bridge but not the playing field. There are too many factors - engineering expertise/support, $pon$or$hip and experience to name a few. The generous help that all teams offer to one another is a good equalizer. Needless expenditure is not.

kenny - 248

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