Looking at robot construction rules We see that structural elements that are not intended for robot construction may not be used. Can my student legally use the dark grey 0x2 connector pins that came with the Rapid Relay field kit as that same piece in a different color is intended for robot construction? The part number for this kit is not yet online so he is unable to follow the suggestion in the 2024-25 legal parts guide to check that the first part of the part number is the same as the exact same part in lighter grey- which the student does not have enough of.
Thanks in advance!
Coming back to add this since we can’t edit posts.
The overall color of the pins does not make any difference UNLESS you have the very early burgundy colored pins (2013). They are ‘softer’ and require less effort to get them apart. The pins from the VEX GO series are softer (if you look regular VIQ pins are round/smooth at the divider, GO pins have flat sides) so if you have GO and VIQ keep an eye on the pins.
Likewise color does not matter for the beams. In the before times, you could get all the parts in multiple colors and teams used it to create some very color rich robots. The only way to get large numbers of colored beams is via the field parts. You can get smaller quantities of color parts via these packs VEX GO Parts Packs - VEX Robotics
Our team only started last year and so we missed out on being able to get really cool color options. Now we’re stuck with using color piece from the Field Element Kits. We used a number of the red beams on our bot this year and we’re looking forward to using the bright yellow ones from this year’s game next season!
I find it hard to believe that with ONLY robot activity that the field elements broke. The gray translucent plastic is stiffer than the colored ones. But it takes a GREAT DEAL of force to break them.
So far, the only translucent field pieces to break for us have been the two 1x beams attached to the shock absorber ramp in the Loading Station…which of course have been getting slammed by the game balls while experimenting with different loading strategies.
In my case, I hace seen several loading stations with broken ramps (probably from loading too roughly) built with clear pieces, but none with the solid ones. At home, we had the ramp built with one new clear piece and one now opaque one. The clear piece broke while the opaque one remained intact. I don’t know anuthing about plastics, but I would like to know if there is a diffrence or was these cased just a fluke?
Many clear and transparent materials (including plastics) are known to be more brittle and less strong than their non-transparent siblings.
TLDR: if you need to optimize for optical properties, in addition to mechanical strength and toughness, you will need to increase production costs by adding more processing steps and/or more expensive components or compromise on mechanical properties to keep compatible manufacturing costs.
One additional note. The clear plastic pieces are heavier then their respective opaque ones. For example, the opaque 2x20 beams weigh 19.04g according to my scale. The clear-grey plastic 2x20 beam weighs 19.56g with the same scale (the graduation is 0.01g, so that is not where the difference comes from) This is a difference of 0.52g, not much, but it is interesting nonetheless.