I've asked about glue on mission models in the past, and Virginia/DC
FLL policy is that we do not glue together mission models in
tournament kits.

I haven't handled the viruses enough to know, but I agree that the
trailer and the groceries are kind of fragile.

With the caveats that (A) teams may not take mission models apart,
even temporarily (Rule 10) and (B) missions that obviously benefit
from mission model destruction/disassembly are marked scoreless (Rule
14):

Wheels on the trailer--the scoring condition in the dock is that the
trailer is properly loaded, and the wheels touch the dock north of the
white line.  In the example, the trailer is in the dock and the wheels
are touching the dock, so this would be scorable (if the trailer is
clean and has the meat inside, of course.)

Groceries--accidentally broken groceries can score on the table if all
parts of the grocery item have their weight entirely supported by the
table

Viruses--I haven't seen anyone's method to deliver viruses to the sink
yet, but, judging on my parts-sorting experience, I wouldn't expect
that the extra time needed to collect pieces of broken virus to send
to the sink would be significant.  If a table referee sees that the
viruses are persistently disassembling themselves, then I anticipate
that he or she would apply Benefit of the Doubt when assessing the
final field condition.  My personal rule-of-thumb is that teams get
benefit of the doubt whenever it is plausible that a mission model
failed due to incorrect assembly.

Steve Scherr
VA/DC FLL Referee Advisor

On Thu, Nov 3, 2011 at 7:20 PM, Andy Traiger <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> While practicing our robot missions a couple of weeks ago, it was quite
> annoying that we had several viruses that would not stay together.  To solve
> the problem we glued the two pieces that make up the viruses together.  I
> know glue is not permitted on the robot, but if certain mission models fall
> apart very easily, are they glued together at tournaments?  It could be
> harder for the teams trying to load up at least nine viruses to send to the
> sink if several of the viruses are broken in half.  It’s not like the robot
> caused the viruses to break apart with excessive force or anything, some of
> those things just won’t stay together.
>
>
>
> While I’m thinking about it, the wheels on the trailer are another thing
> that can fall off without too much force.  How would a trailer be scored if
> it was delivered back to the dock and the back wheels separated from the
> trailer at the last second and ended up in scoring position with the trailer
> right next to them?
>
>
>
> And some of the food mission models break very easily too.  If a piece of
> food (that is not normally in multiple pieces) is delivered to the table and
> breaks in half when it drops on the table, does it score if all parts of it
> remain on the table?
>
>
>
> Andy Traiger
>
> Vienna Robotics
>
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