22nd FRA General Meeting - 23 January 2010

Minutes of the 22nd FRA Governing Body Meeting

Saturday 23th January 2010

Committee Present  Kane Aston, John Bell, Clive Brown, Mike Hamilton-Macy, Pete Lale, Leo Van Miert, Shane Swan, Ed Wallace

Members present  Geoff Smith, Mike Lambert

Event Organisers  Grant Cooper, James Cooper, Nick Cooper, John Findlay, Alan Young

Apologies  Tim Bence, Gilbert Grimm, Andy Kane, Tom Kane, Jenny Smith, Tony Somerfield, Trevor Wright

Items of Discussion

1. Review of Investigation

The investigation carried out under the FRA code of conduct was discussed at length but no further action was taken or recommended. Geoff Smith and Mike Lambert were present to represent Jenny Smith’s interests. As the investigation has already been made public by the involved parties, members will be able to make their own conclusions. John Findlay confirmed that Geoff Smith and Jenny Smith are currently banned from Roaming Robots events. Geoff Smith questioned a statement made by John Bell in an email dated 20th September 2009. John Bell has officially retracted the statement: “I was trying to stay in the background until I was accused in writing of taking the parts”.

2. Presidential election

John Bell and Jenny Smith were nominated for the presidential election. Due to other events the election was put on hold. Jenny has since stood down from the running’s leaving one candidate to be elected. John Bell is therefore elected president for the remainder of the term.

3. Resignations

Karoline Pannell has stood down from the position of Secretary.

Kane Aston has taken on the position and will be assisted with memberships by Clive Brown.

Geoff Smith has stood down from the position of 'acting’ Safety Officer.

Jason Marston has been nominated as Chief Safety Officer. To assist his position Ed Wallace, Grant Cooper and John Findlay will assist as Safety Officers.

4. Review of 21st Meeting Minutes

Roaming Robot Arena Trials

The current Arena trials are progressing well. The FRA has asked Roaming Robots to ensure an exclusion zone outside the arena is enforced to minimise risk.

40MHz Phase Out

The scanner was not run at Portsmouth and there is no conclusion that 40MHz are experiencing interference from 2.4GHz radios. 40MHz is no longer permitted for use in Heavyweights as of 1st January 2010 and will be phased out in 2011 for featherweights. Cost is not an issue as 2.4GHz sets are available for less than 40MHz sets.

Leo Van Miert noted that the DRG and the GRA do not have plans to phase out 40MHz.

Rule Updates

A number of rule updates are being written at present, these include: Lithium Rules, Tether Rules and Judging Rules.

Entry Fees

RoboChallenge charge an entry fee to ensure attendance and to support a prize fund. Roaming Robots and Robots Live do not plan to charge for entry at this time.

5. 2010 Events

Roaming Robots are running a Championship in conjunction with Robots Live. The Governing Body voted to make this the FRA UK Heavyweight Championships.

Decision  Agreed (8 for, 0 against)

The UK Championships will follow the same format as 2009 with some minor alterations based on feedback and experience.

Robochallenge are currently finalising details for the UK Featherweight Championship planned for September.

Shane Swan presented a proposal for the €œTeam Bud Trophy€ based around the structure of the Challenge Belt where a series of 1 on 1 battles are fought at events with the current winner taking the trophy home. This was well accepted and is due to start at the Barnsley event on February 13th-14th.

Kane Aston suggested that a similar competition could be run for the featherweights however it could be based on a melee format.

One Driver. One Robot. Competitions such as the UK Championship are normally based on a One Driver, One Robot system. For clarification this means that any one robot may have a number of drivers throughout the competition. However any one person can only drive a single robot. This is to avoid situations of people entering multiple machines to increase their chances but allow the flexibility to share driving of Robots between people such as teams and schools.

Robogamez 2009, Malaysia. Hosted by the Universti Tenaga Nasional and complying with the FRA rules and regulations was a successful competition. Videos are available on YouTube (Robogames UniTeN). The winner, Universiti Malaya has been guaranteed entry to the UK Featherweight competition. Robogamez will be hosting further competitions in 2010. Firstly "Voyage D'Xploration: The Great Ocean Race€ (water based robot competition) and €œResist or Surrender II: The Fallen Strike Back€ to be hosted in South East Asia with the intention to become an annual competition.

Nearly 20 events are already arranged for 2010.

6. Website

Forum usage has continued at a steady rate of increase with general acceptance of the new format. The benefits of the new software are making management of the forum much simpler.

A Wiki will be setup to allow members to create and maintain their own part of the site intended to be used to create how to guides, event reports and more.

Live events will be merged in the forum and a separate page created to make event listings simpler and easier to maintain.

7. 2010 Membership

Clive Brown will be present at both Barnsley on February 13th  14th and Whitwick on February 27th to collect memberships. Members not able to make these events can still send memberships via the post using the form available for download on the website.

8. AOB

Items brought forward for next meeting proposed for Sunday 7th March 2010

Discussion of Magnetic weapons

Tech Checking Course

AGM