Robotics Education & Competition Foundation
Inspiring students, one robot at a time.
This Q&A is now read-only

Official Q&A: VRC 2018-2019: Turning Point

Usage Guidelines All Questions

14: <VUR3>c further clarification


MCCC1
22-May-2018

<VUR3>c is the rule allowing steel and aluminum as raw materials for making parts. What limits are placed on the form of raw material. Based on our previous Q&A, it's clear that simple round or square bar, plate, and sheet (industrial standard stock) would be fall under this rule, but what about the following examples, considered by many to be raw materials, that are not so clear:

  1. threaded steel rod
  2. steel pipe or tubing
  3. rolled steel shapes (angle iron, C-channel, etc)
  4. threaded aluminum rod
  5. extruded aluminum shapes (angle, C-channel, small bars)
  6. extruded aluminum shapes, specifically 80/20-style T-slot extrusions
  7. Aluminum castings (produced by the team in their college's own foundry)

If #6 is allowed, would the commercial fasteners available for the T-slot (1/4-20 or M6 t-nuts) be legal, or would the team need to machine their own t-nuts from legal steel bars?

Answered by Game Design Committee

Point 7 (aluminum castings made in a college foundry) would be legal.

Points 1 and 4 (threaded rod) would be legal, if it is the same diameter/pitch as the screws already permitted by <R7c>.

The rest (pipe, tubing, angle, 80/20) would not be legal, other than VEX Robotics products per <VUR2>. These are not raw materials, as they have already undergone some amount of "post-processing" to add functionality.

The intent of <VUR2> is to provide access to a set of commercially available products that teams may utilize to build their robots. This is similar to <R5> for Middle/High School teams, just with a broader library for VEX U. The intent of <VUR3> is to encourage teams to explore fabrication techniques such as milling, 3D printing, injection molding, sheet metal punching, etc, to develop their own new robotic components in addition to those permitted by <VUR2>. Its intent is not for all commercial products made out of these materials to be legal.