Interpretation of 3e

[retired1]

Look at 3 e. It says that no portion of the boomilever may touch the wall below 15 cm for div B. There is NO least in the current rules.

[dholdgreve]

Look at 3 e. It says that no portion of the boomilever may touch the wall below 15 cm for div B. There is NO least in the current rules.

Hmmm. They must have issued 2 different versions of rules!!! Mine says : "e. Before and throughout loading, no portion of the Boomilever may touch the testing wall
below the Contact Depth Line which is more than 20 cm (Div. B) or 15 cm (Div. C) below the center of the hole for the Mounting Hook (5.a.iii.)"
Note that is says WHICH IS MORE THAN ... (It also says 20 cm, not 15 as you stated) .

At nearly every invitational I have been to, the events are run by an attending team. If we all agree that the greater the vertical distance is, the easier the challenge becomes, then if the team running the event were to arbitrarily increase this to 25 cm, and tell no one but their own team, technically they are still within the rules but have given their team an unfair advantage. I think we will see a clarification on this.

[retired1]

Read it again--It says that no portion of the boomilever can touch the testing wall below the contact line.
Note also that I said `15 cm for div B should have said Div c.
Therefore, any contact such as the 25 cm you reference is in violation of the rule. I do not think that a rule change is required.

[Unome]

Read it again--It says that no portion of the boomilever can touch the testing wall below the contact line.
Note also that I said `15 cm for div B should have said Div c.
Therefore, any contact such as the 25 cm you reference is in violation of the rule. I do not think that a rule change is required.

I think what dholdgreve is saying is that the grammatical construction makes it look like the contact line is defined as "more than 20 cm (Div B) or 15 cm (Div C)". The intention, of course, was something like "cannot touch the wall more than X distance", but the way it's written makes it possible to interpret alternately.

[dholdgreve]

^^^ What he said...

[retired1]

I think that you are missing the front of the sentence which no portion.
I think that the sentence construction is unambiguous.

[dholdgreve]

I think that you are missing the front of the sentence which no portion.
I think that the sentence construction is unambiguous.

Not to beat a dead horse... But the actual quote is: "e. Before and throughout loading, no portion of the Boomilever may touch the testing wall
below the Contact Depth Line which is more than 20 cm (Div. B) or 15 cm (Div. C) below the center of the hole for the Mounting Hook (5.a.iii.)"

As stated, it says that no portion of the boom can touch the wall below the contact line, but then goes on to say that the line must be more than 20 cm, not exactly 20 cm +/- .01 cm. or anything similar to that.

It's the whole "more than" thing that I take issue with... I just don't understand the intent at all.

[retired1]

OK, I see said the blind man. If I understand you. you would like the 20 to read 20.000 and the rest would be OK???

[Unome]

OK, I see said the blind man. If I understand you. you would like the 20 to read 20.000 and the rest would be OK???

Simply removing the "more than" part would leave nothing ambiguous at all. Although it's unlikely for anyone familiar with SO to interpret it incorrectly except by purposeful effort, as written it may be ambiguous to someone new to SO who doesn't think about it.

[triangulator]

I think i found a loophole.

Since no portion can touch the testing wall, one could attach a piece of wood extending to the floor.

If anyone actually did it, though, the boomilever would probably not qualify as a boomilever, and that length would probably weigh a lot. Also, they would have to know distance to the floor beforehand.