Is there any special specifications we must have on out safety glasses?
Also How many people are allowed in the pit at one time?
All help appreciated
Safety glasses specs: ANSI approved, non-tinted (other than rose, amber, or blue). Regular glasses don’t count UNLESS they are ANSI approved with side shields. (Section 3.3.3)
People in the pits: no limit, but try to minimize overflow into the aisle/neighboring pits. Remember, this space is 10’ by 10’, and has a table in it. If you have too many people for you, send some to the stands to scout.
To answer your question, the safety glasses you use must be ANSI approved and can only be in certain hues (no darkly shaded glasses). There is no ‘maximum’ number of people in your pit area, but keep in mind:
- If there are too many people hanging around, it may mean that the folks working on the robot do not have enough room.
- Large numbers of people crowding around your pit area causes traffic backup near your area, and can block the aisles.
- If someone can’t get back to your area, you may miss important messages from queuers or other teams.
- If a Safety Judge walks by your pit and it’s crowded with people, they may take note of that if you’re up for the award.
- Volunteers from the event and FIRST Staff may ask you to thin out the number of folks in your pit area if they deem it hazardous.
For reference, our team has three drivers and four pit crew members, along with one coach and one pit boss. The pit boss and pit crew remain in the pit area at all teams, and the coach and drivers only leave for matches. The rest of our team makes an area in the stands for us to camp out and regards that area as ‘home base’ instead of taking up space in the pit.
I recommend reading Section 3 of this year’s game manual - At The Events. This really details everything you’re looking for. In addition, you may want to check out the FIRST Safety Manual at www.usfirst.org/community/frc/content.aspx?id=470.
Best wishes this season!
I also assume that there are no mirrored safety glasses either. I see teams with those…
are we allowed mirror or no?
Section 3 -At The Events clearly states that the only acceptable hues are rose, blue, and amber.
No, but I still saw teams with them last year when they were not allowed.
Straight from the first safety manual.
Wear ANSI-approved non-shaded safety glasses. NEW: Rose, Blue, Amber tints
are FIRST approved, but reflective lenses are not.
Just because people use them doesn’t mean they are legal. I believe it also varies a bit from event to event, with VCU having made its own rules last year, I think it was along the lines of if I can’t see the whites of your eyes, they aint allowed.
Chris
Remember that your team is assigned an (approximately) 10’ x 10’ area - into which must fit everything, including team members. Just as your robot and equipment cannot spill out, neither can your team humans.
That’s not to say that some visitors can’t be in the aisle for short periods.
But the majority of the team should be in the stands, watching or, more importantly, scouting. Only the essential ~4 people, your safety captain, and a mentor/coach will fit comfortably
My 2 cents
And sometimes, the safety captain won’t fit…
off-topic funny story about the above
[spoiler]Being on a smallish team (~10 students) during high school, I was filling two jobs at competition in Atlanta; namely, safety captain and scout. Friday morning, the pit crew (drive team) sent me to the stands because scouts were needed. The joke’s on them, though–I barely got there and scouted a match or so before the team leader, who was in the stands, got a call from the pit crew and sent me back. The safety judges were looking for me…and I wasn’t there! I spent about half the competition in the pit after that.[/spoiler]
Sooo true. Last year we got yelled at a few times by judges because we had to put our ramps down to work, and it went into the aisle.
I would recommend trying to minimize the number of people in the pit area at one time. It reduces the risk of injury. Also, I would recommend putting together a core group of a maximum of 4-5 people who know the robot really well and make them the pit crew.
In St. Louis the judges were expecting no more than 6 people total in the pit at any time. Taking this into account we have limited the number of people in the pit to a maximum of six and still they are stepping on one another. I would personally like to see a maximum of 4 or 5 to maintain a safe environment to work in.
I believe the saying “The more the merrier” applies everywhere but in the pits.
2 people should be the minimum so you have a safe lift team for your robot, and maybe 5-6 should be your maximum.
I’ll admit my team has a problem with this being rather large, and with most people interested in knowing what’s up with the robot (especially after matches where the robot has taken a beating). Everyone wants to rush back to the pits after matches like that, and ask the pit crew what’s happened.
Note that as a Safety Advisor I’ll be looking for this among other things in Philadelphia this year.
Just keep it safe no matter how many people are there, but keep a fair limit.
Your team’s pit area isn’t a Volkswagen or a Phone booth folks…
Let’s not try to set records as to how many people we can fit in there. 
We have usually on 2 people working on the robot, our drive team, and our Safety Captain in the pits at all times. Other than this we ask the members to go talk to other teams to find out about their robot or scout(the job noone on our team wants to do). We have been pretty sucessful with safety in the past. Two safety award in Philly for the win. But yeah, I really see no need for more than the people listed above in the pits at any time. It is prety small and cramped. With more people than that in the pits it seems to get very hectic and makes it harder for the pit crew to work on the robot. I know people want to know about what is going on with the robot but they can ask the people who were in the pits. And Elgin, how about some heads up for what you will be looking for ;). Ha.
In the pits, we usually have a pit crew of around 3, and one of:
- one or two programmers,
- special crew(lift, manipulator, electronics, etc),
- people who aren’t where they are supposed to be
I’m sure it’ll be something along the lines of what’s in here:
http://www.usfirst.org/community/frc/content.aspx?id=470
I’m actually not sure. This is my first time with this volunteer position.
I’m going to be working mostly with a crew who have worked in the S/A position before though, so rest assured we will be looking for safe behavior & recognizing that in a positive way, but I’m sure we will also be looking out for problem areas, and addressing them as well to maintain a safe environment for everyone.
How many people arent supposed to be there though? Because with what you named 1 person that is not supposed to be there doesnt seem like it would hurt. Just in case you do need them for something. We’ve had a situation where something needed to be done but everyone else was doing something and there was an extra person there and they did the job. But this was back before my freshmen year.
mirror finishes are not allowed, ya you should try to minimize the number of people in the pit at one time