Are colored robots illegal this year? I assumed not because if Vision Sensor would have been an issue, colored bots would have been banned last year.
Colored Robots
I think it might depend on the colors and how they are used. If you have a big sheet of purple plastic on your robot that might be illegal, but something with purple highlights might be fine.
Our entire robot is powder coated black and green. The green is a similar shade to the cube.
<R12> Decorations are allowed. Teams may add non-functional decorations, provided that they do not
affect Robot performance in any significant way or affect the outcome of the Match. These decorations
must be in the spirit of the competition. Inspectors will have final say in what is considered “non-functional”. Unless otherwise specified below, non-functional decorations are governed by all standard
Robot rules.
In order to be “non-functional,” any guards, decals, or other decorations must be backed by legal
materials that provide the same functionality. For example, if your Robot has a giant decal that prevents
Cubes from falling out of the Robot, the decal must be backed by VEX material that would also prevent
the Cubes from falling out.
a. Anodizing and painting of parts is considered a legal nonfunctional decoration.
b. If using the VEX speaker (276-1504), the chosen audio must not be distracting and must be in
good taste. The Head Inspector and Head Referee will make the final decision on the appropriateness of the audio.
c. Small cameras are permitted as non-functional decorations, provided that any transmitting
functions or wireless communications are disabled. Unusually large cameras being used as
ballast are not permitted.
d. VEX motors, or components of VEX motors, may not be used as non-functional decorations.
e. Decorations that visually mimic field elements or could otherwise interfere with an opponent’s
Vision Sensor are considered functional and are not permitted. This includes lights, such as the
VEX Flashlight. The Head Inspector and Head Referee will make the final decision on whether a
given decoration or mechanism violates this rule.
f. Internal power sources (e.g. for a small blinking light) are permitted, provided that no other rules
are violated and this source only provides power to the non-functional decoration (e.g. does not
directly or indirectly influence any functional portions of the Robot).
g. Decorations which provide feedback to the Robot (e.g. by influencing legal sensors) or to Drive
Team Members (e.g. status indicators) would be considered “functional” and are not permitted.\
Section e makes this seem illegal. That my personal opinion since that could mess with somebody’s vision sensor. Usually, colored metal is allowed, as long as it does not greatly influence the vision sensor, but I may be wrong.
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does the green on your robot at all resemble a cube?
unless something has changed (I am going to be honest do not watch for decorations) but I thought powder coating was illegal last I saw.
Me and my teammate (@Zenix maybe pay attention) were thinking of putting red and blue strip lights on our bot to denote alliance color. Would this be allowed, as it cannot be confused with cube color?
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@2775Josh had those LED strips at Worlds 2019, and assuming that they passed inspection, it was allowed for sure in TP.
R8, pt. g in TP is identical to R12, pt. e in TT.
Rule R8
g. Decorations that visually mimic field elements or could otherwise interfere with an
opponent’s Vision Sensor are considered functional and are not permitted. This includes
lights, such as the VEX Flashlight. The Head Inspector and Head Referee will make the final
decision on whether a given decoration or mechanism violates this rule.
Thus, if it’s ruled to have been allowed in a game where field elements were the exact same color as the lights, then it’s probably allowed in a game where the colors are different.
Lights are totally legal in every way shape and form, you just have to power them off the brain.
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I believe you can have external power too for exclusively the lights
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This is not true you can only power stuff from the brain and nothing else. As far as decorations go they must be completely non-functional and backed by a legal component. Non-functional is described as not influencing legal sensors or giving feed back to the drive team.
They changed rule R12 this year, so it is legal to have lights that are not powered by the brain or cortex.
Internal power sources (e.g. for a small blinking light) are permitted, provided that no other rules are violated and this source only provides power to the non-functional decoration (e.g. does not directly or indirectly influence any functional portions of the Robot)
There was an official Q&A answer about it as well.
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While yes I could just put a USB power bank on the bot, I spent a significant amount of time and money to build adapters that plug into the 3 wire brain ports, so I will be using that anyways. I can also turn the lights on and off via code, so that’s cool.
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It would be really cool if someone made a way to power the lights off of the motor ports. You should be able to get more power out, but I can only imagine the adapter would be much harder, and unless you can power the light through setting a voltage for that port it would be useless though.
I forget what the number of motors was before their power was cut, but if it was only 8 then dont even think about the lights running off of a motor port.
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What would be the need? The lights run off 5-volt power anyways.
You also save a 3 wire port, which is very valuable for V5
My team is not going to be using very many sensors anyways. we will have a potentiometer, an ultrasonic range finder, and that will probably be it.
Im not saying you specifically should do it through motor ports, just that it would probably be helpful/beneficial to figure out a way to power the lights through the motor ports.
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I did that in tp, works great 10/10
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