After cruising through the First Choice offerings this season, it hit me that there are no SRXs available. We have never actually gotten any SRXs from First Choice, but we sure do use the CAW exemption every year.
Assuming similar rules in 2019 for CAW and assuming there aren’t SRXs in the actual KOPs, we just took a $1440 hit to our CAW. This could significantly impact the robot we are able to put on the field this year. Swerve is tough on the CAW. We’ll have to make some difficult choices.
In 2018, the Q&A item was Q130 that had said the following:
This chronological independence was both useful and a relief. Whether it will be the same in 2019, we don’t yet know though. Sounds like a good Q&A question when the system opens.
It would make sense. Given that the Spark Max is essentially the same thing with some extra features and at a lower price, I don’t see many Talon SRXes being sold for next season.
This is still the first season of the SPARK MAX though. A lot of people, including me, are skeptical of any new product until it has seen at least one season of competition and is thouroughly vetted and battle-tested. We are buying a few NEOs and MAXs for testing, but I know my team is also planning on buying about 25 SRX and SPXs this off-season in expectation of not using the NEO on this season’s robot. Despite whatever gains it might provide, it’s not worth risking our season on the unexpected behavior of an untested product.
Same here. Will enough maxes be available? Don’t know. How compatible is it with talons? Don’t know. How does it and the neo handle low batteries, extensive high loads, and long run times? Don’t know.
The simple fact is that we just don’t in now much about these components, and even pre-orders won’t be arriving until later. Do a risk matrix and decide if this is something worth the risk for you.
R12. … B. items from the current year’s KOP, up to the KOP quantity (including the rookie KOP items). Identical replacements may be used to meet this criterion.
They upped the value by $1000, but took away both the prior year exemption AND the unlimited number exemption. Heads up to all teams that may be taking a $500+ net hit to their CAW.
Look at the top post in this thread. Previously FIRST allowed any number of parts from any KOP to be exempt from the CAW. We (and I suspect a lot of other teams) used a LOT of SRXs on the robot, using the exemptions to stay under the the total $4000 limit.
The Rookie kit of Parts has 2 CIM motors and 2 Victor SPXs in it. On your BOM this year, you can account for 2 CIMs and 2 SPXs as costing $0. If you used more than 2 CIMs, the remaining CIMs are accounted for at Fair Market Value (Vex/AM list price).
Assume you got 2 775pros from FIRSTChoice this year (note: I don’t have access so that’s a random example. You could similarly account for up to 2 775pros at $0.
The same goes for anything you bought entirely with your PDVs.
It’s important to note this is an accounting gimmick. If the CIMs from the kit caught fire and you needed to use all new ones that didn’t actually come from the kit, you could still cost 2 of them them at $0.
This is different from previous years where you could cost an unlimited number of an item at $0 as long as even one of it was in the KOP, on FC, etc.