Power/failsafe LED

I think its a good idea so long as the pit crew know the score. Its very easy for me to fit one.

Mark - do the 4QDs still draw current once the capacitors are charged up?

Yeh Jonno - unless the LED/bulb is broken :-(

thats true, they could be not working, although faced with 15 robots dead in an arena, which one do you go for first ? :)

Its not definate, but it least its an indication.

Jonno

I wouldnt go for any mate - id leave it up to you to sort out ;-p hehe

Mark , it is not a case of the FRA approving my events or not, or of me agreeing with theirs.

The insurers of the event are the approving authority, they have their own experts whose opinions they seek as to whether the event is safe enough to insure.
My insurers accept my experience and certified ability and it is up to them whether they need to apply the FRAs rules or continue to accept mine.

It is virtually impossible to run a public event without insurance these days, and very foolish of anyone who tries to.

I have no quarrel with FRA using whatever safety rules they like at their events to suit them and their insurers.

However at my event, within the Yeovil Festival of Transport, I run the event to suit my insurers and the YFT organisers.
They are happy to accept that, without any additional input from the FRA or any other organisation.
I am not rejecting the FRA€™s rules, or saying that their experts who drew them up are wrong, I just reserve the right to apply higher standards if I see fit.

Power indicator lights will only be accepted as an optional accessory at my events and play no part in safety.

The YFT is a huge event with hundreds of exhibitors and has been run very successfully for many years by a very experienced team.
They have their own established standards that all exhibitors, me included, have to come up to.

Within the robot fighting sport, we do not need different groups nit-picking at each other€™s rules. That will do us no good at all.
We should accept that, as long our events are properly insured, it is up to the individual expertise of the organisers to run the show properly.

Rodger, you are right in that at the end of the day it comes down to the insurers who set the minumim standards but I dont see why you are against the light. If all robots require a light and you put the link in during a tech check and it does not come on then it fails. If its on when the link is out then it fails. Even in our robot we have had wires short to the chasis on a number of occasions and if that happened with a wire before the link it is possible for it to become active. A light would indicate this. How else would you know unless you did a full tech check after each fight. We have two power lights one across each speed controller. Whats the point in the FRA if people dont follow thier guidelines. Read some other threads you will find alot of people wanting to standardize the rules for everyone not just the UK. It will take alot of time but hopefully it will happen. I must point out that I dont speak for them but Im sure that they will listen to you as you do have alot of experiance and have been doing this longer that me.

Jim, I would have to check to be certian but I thought it was a couple of mA.

I should also point out that I dont like the failsafe light idea as it stands and using the PCM Rx would not be allowed under this rule as you cannot be sure they are in failsafe without using a dedicated channel and even then its not certain that it will work unless setup very carefully. PCM Rx are the best for rejecting interfeance as they have active error control.

I have nothing against the light as I have already said, if you want to fit one then fine.
At my shows I will not use the light as a reliable power indicator, only a removed link means power off as far as I am concerned.

Thanks for the rejection of the link socket lamp! Always good to get constructive criticism. :proud:

Weve read this with great interest and its causing a fair old bit of debate again amongst the committee.

Please bare with me, Im not a politician so find this stuff quite hard work, but Id like to clarify a couple of things if I can:

We understand Rogers and others point of view, as with every EO the final decision on safety practices is down to him, as its his neck (metaphorically speaking) thats on the line should there be an accident.
Its unfortunate that Roger was not a member of the FRA at the time this rule was introduced, as his view would have undoubtedly then have been taken into account along with all the other EOs.
We hope Roger will join the FRA over time and become a contributor, as has been said above.. theres no question as to his own technical knowledge and he has a perfect right to reject the FRA rules if he wishes.

Saying that.

This wasnt a rule that was introduced for the fun of it, there was and is great concern that at the most dangerous time of roboteering i.e the load and unload of robots, EOs, roboteers and arena staff had absolutely no external way of telling what state a robot was in.

In the instance of the afore mentioned accident last year, a roboteer returned to the robot after placing it into the arena because it appeared to not be working, he then proceeded to fiddle with the internals of the robot without removing the link, something which is very easy to forget to do in the heat of the moment. Due to the lack of exterior indication of power on board, the arena staff were not aware of this and had no means of being aware of this, they just had to trust that the roboteer was looking after himself properly. As it turns out, the link was in and the robots weapon was live.. the flipper fired while the roboteer was leaning over the robot and he was struck fairly soundly in the forehead region and thrown backwards a good 3 foot.
Luckily for all involved the arena door absorbed some of the force of the strike before it got to the roboteer... so the accident was not as serious as it could have been despite giving everyone present a damn good scare, and the roboteer in question a very nice bruise!

Returning to robots after activation is something that as EOs weve all seen on more occasions than we care to mention, and fiddling with robots while the link is still in is equally as common.

We would be extremely silly as live event organisers not to recognise this and try and provide a relatively easy to install and effective solution to the problem, remember that not only could an accident of this type be nasty for the roboteer involved, it could have far reaching ramifications for the event organiser and the growing live sport in general.
There is also the problem that should an accident of this type happen again after we as an organisation became aware of the issue, we could in theory with no solution in place actually be accused of being lax in setting down our best practice procedures.. this would not be a good thing for anyone, especially considering the great progress we have made over the past year or so with live event safety standards.

In closing:

The light has clear plusses for all the event organisers involved in the FRA, they between them run the large majority of the live events in this country and the technical team and roboteers that advised on this solution have all agreed it was the best way to deal with the problem without causing undue technical issues for the roboteers.
If it turns out over time it doesn€™t work, we€™ll undoubtedly re-evaluate but for the foreseeable future the power light is required for all FRA events in order for a robot to be run.

It€™s been suggested that we provide a guideline and suggest acceptable parts for roboteers so as to take some of the confusion out of the issue, I€™ll make sure it€™s discussed at the next committee meeting and that progress is made on this as soon as is possible.

Thanks once again for the feedback, this is after all part of what the FRA was about right from the start, we€™re not here to dictate but to garner opinion and try and take informed decisions on what is best for the sport.. I hope to see this long continue :)

Regards
Samuel Jones
FRA safety executive

How big and bright would a lamp have needed to be to be visible to the arena staff under those circumstances?
quote:

the arena staff ... just had to trust that the roboteer was looking after himself properlyIm sorry, I dont agree. The arena staff dont have to assume the roboteer isnt being daft through adrenaline - - they have to insist they SEE the link before allowing him to proceed. And insist loudly if need be!

What all events need is an officious, anal-retentive safety officer who has the presence of mind to yell LINKS OUT!!! as roboteers approach their machines.