Designs

[MP Fan]

I'll give you my 2 cents, if you like: a golf ball must start below the lowest scoring jug to be eligible to earn 2 points, but any golf ball may be used to initiate or complete an ETS.

Thank you, Flavorflav and Chalker. I'll submit a succinct question to FAQ's.

[chalker]

BTW, Chalker, why do the rules say no impound at Regional? Every competition I have been to or heard about has added it back in. I honestly don't see how you could do any reasonable number of devices without an impound.

Primarily to give flexibility to the event supervisors. The primary reason we typically require impound is because there is some unknown variable announced at the start of the competition. In this case, at regionals, the target time is set by the rules, hence there is no unknown variable.

[Flavorflav]

If I might suggest, it would cause less difficulty to leave it in and allow regions to waive it (which they could always do) than to say that it doesn't have one on the rules and require the regions to put it back. All of the NY regionals that I am aware of added impound back in, and so did the Cornell, Yale and Islip invitationals. More importantly the risk-benefit calculation all goes the other way: if someone doesn't get the message that there is no impound, the worst that happens is they show up a bit early. We had one team that didn't get the message that there was one, and I had to put them in tier 3.

[SWAnG]

It's been suggested to submit FAQs, however, it's been over 2 months since another FAQ has been posted. I've asked several questions and without them being answered, I'm not exactly sure how to proceed. The last thing someone wants is to be DQd at state or have to redo there entire device a couple weeks before state arrives...

[phil9047]

For energy transfer sequences, would a ball rolling over a switch count as Mechanical to Electrical? I know it's not quite an energy transfer, but does that count?

[SWAnG]

For energy transfer sequences, would a ball rolling over a switch count as Mechanical to Electrical? I know it's not quite an energy transfer, but does that count?

Yes, I believe so.

[captjack]

Does anyone know if parallel tasks designed to switch off motors are allowed this year?

[bernard]

Does anyone know if parallel tasks designed to switch off motors are allowed this year?

Last year, rule 3.f. allowed parallel tasks to switch off motors: "Parallel and/or dead end tasks are not allowed with the exception of switching off motors or for the Bonus Task." I don't see anything like that in this year's rules. What are you trying to do? Maybe you could do it without a parallel task.

[captjack]

On the new ASL there is a VL-E task that turns off a motor then sends current through a solenoid, so I guess I'll have to go something around that route.

[BlueBlur107]

First year my school has ever done this event and I'm kind of on my own here. I'm racking my brain trying to figure out how the final ball scored can activate the buzzer if there is nothing allowed in the jugg. Can the ball exit the jugg and still be scored? Also, just for clarification for a energy transfer to be scored it must be initiated by a golf ball correct? Thanks guys.