Foster
January 22, 2012, 7:52am
1
Please see the first 10 seconds of this video at the start the red driver unfolds the robot (look at the red square in the interaction zone). It looks like he releases latches and shakes the robot so it unfolds.
Is this type of manipulation of the robot legal?
Karthik
January 23, 2012, 10:39am
2
Foster:
Please see the first 10 seconds of this video at the start the red driver unfolds the robot (look at the red square in the interaction zone). It looks like he releases latches and shakes the robot so it unfolds.
Is this type of manipulation of the robot legal?
Let’s take a look at the specific rule, <SG5> from the VEX Gateway Game Manual.
<SG5> During the Autonomous Period, Drivers and Coaches may handle their own Robot while the Robot is in contact with their own Alliance Starting Tile. During contact with the Robot, the Drivers or Coaches may not intentionally manipulate or modify the position of any Scoring Objects (aside from any which are being loaded into the Robot), either by direct hand contact or indirect contact via the Robot.** Drivers or Coaches also may not change the configuration of the Robot other than in the act of fixing the Robot (i.e. it is okay to reposition the robot relative to the field, but it is not okay to manually lift up the Robot’s arm). **
The intent of this rule is to allow teams to fix Robots that are unable to move, to load Match Loads into the Robot, to reposition and/or reorient Robots, **and to activate additional autonomous modes by interacting with the Robot via sensors or buttons. **
The intent of this rule is not to allow teams to manipulate their Robot in such a way that they are controlling the Robot via human contact or creating motions that lead to scoring.
Violations of this rule will result in warning for the first offense. Subsequent offenses or an egregious first offense will result in a Disqualification.
Physically releasing a latch (i.e. pulling a pin, shaking the robot until the latch releases, etc.) is not legal as it would be considered to be changing the configuration of the robot. Activating a sensor which causes a latch to be released, would be legal.
Foster
January 24, 2012, 8:56am
3
I got a Private mail from the robot owner
Hey, I noticed your thread asking about the legality of our robot’s flip out mechanism. Just as clarification, the robot that you linked to is not actually physically unlatched as it flips out. At the beginning, the coach opens the valve for the pneumatics (conserving air until the last possible moment just for good measure) which pushes the wings out. After the coach legally repositions the robot, he presses a limit switch that tells the robot to finish locking the wings in place and to move into the stack. The limit switch was implemented in case we found a situation where we didn’t want to run our normal autonomous of running into the middle goal. Sorry if the video was a bit ambiguous on the legality of the mechanisms involved! Hope this cleared it up
So it looks like they are OK since they are using a limit switch to trigger the action.
Thanks!
You’re welcome! Another example of why we don’t issue blanket rulings based on video. There can be many things that the footage doesn’t make clear.