Hi,

The following explains my dilemma. The bars are loaded on the robot horizontally. For the most part they are delivered to the hopper horizontally. However there seems to be a bar that lands perpendicular or slanted to the conveyor by no fault of the robot. It is simply how it lands on the hopper, which is dependent on how other bars are arranged on the hopper and/or the movement of the conveyor.

Thanks!!!
Carey

Date: Tue, 20 Oct 2015 21:56:26 -0400
From: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [VADCFLL-L] Unclogging Question
To: [log in to unmask]

This is a good question, and shows how the actual play of the game can yield a lot of insights that I won't think of before seeing it in action.

At this time, my ruling is mostly no, the Careers leniency does not allow you generally to straighten out stuff in the red sorter hopper.

The leniency exception reads:

Unclog east chute blockage by hand, and/or put mis-sorted bars into their correct bin, including bars that didn’t land in any bin.

The hopper is not the east chute, and the bars waiting to be sorted have not yet been mis-sorted, so the leniency does not apply. On the other hand, a bar that made it onto the conveyor section and jammed up against the entry to the east chute ought to be adjustable with the Careers leniency, since that clearly is an east chute blockage.
In addition the mission comment says "please use the R10 leniency for Model errors." Bars that were unloaded by the Robot into the red hopper and end up askew are not a *Model* error, but rather an outcome of direct robot action, so this reiterates why it would not be appropriate to allow the team to straighten out the bars in the hopper.

I'll have to check to see if model operation won't jiggle this kind of misalignment into place so that the bar can go on the conveyor belt, but I can imagine circumstances where it would not.
I'll also bump this question up the chain for more discussion.

Steve Scherr
Virginia-DC FLL Referee Advisor

On Tue, Oct 20, 2015 at 8:24 PM, CJ Shier <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

Hi,

I have an inquiry regarding the manual unclogging of the sorter. If a career person is within the sorter area, the leniency clause states that we are able to unclog with our hands any bars that clog the sorter. My specific question is does this include misaligned bars waiting to be sorted? In other words, if the bars are unloaded and land perpendicular to the conveyor belt, thus rendering the bar in the wrong position to sort, is this considered clogging the operation? Can we align the bars manually in the proper direction for sorting (in the horizontal direction)?

Thanks!!!
Carey

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