Before one proclaims how the exchange of information in an
international, educational competition should function, one may be better
off putting themselves in other people's shoes before voicing an opinion.
Many of the more crude emails that I received are from first year teams or
from teams that are from countries where English is very far from their
native language. The latter is an obvious handicap as much of the pertinent
literature is not available in other languages and learning another language
and learning how to be an engineer is quite an obstacle. The first year or
very young teams that I talk to have similar resource issues, as in their
faculty advisor has no clue about vehicles, and their university is more
prepared to have resources biased to underwater basket weaving than
engineering anything.
My point is, that not every one begins playing with as full of deck as
everyone else in this competition and not everyone out there chooses to ask
questions. I'd just assume have the questions you speak of being asked as
opposed to the would be questions askers making something that is so
unsuccessful that they are not motivated to try again.
As an aside, I received an email from the WSU (Wichita State University)
steering system group asking me about very specific details about two of our
cars and their steering systems (and how they worked). Of course I told
them what I could remember about them off the top of my head, like you
stated if they want to copy it, that's their problem. Per your reasoning
should I have explained to them that they need to contact some industry
people?
In other words............Calm Down.
Mark Hagedorn
Western Washington University
Vehicle Research Institute
Program Assistant
360-650-3045
mark_hagedorn@hotmail.com
http://vri.etec.wwu.edu/minibaja/index.html
----- Original Message -----
From: "Mini Baja" <mini-baja@wichita.edu>
To: <mini-baja@Autox.Team.Net>
Sent: Wednesday, January 19, 2005 8:49 AM
Subject: Rules and Stuff
> Hello all,
> I have been inundated with email requests from teams regarding every
> little aspect of a car. The point of this competition is to do your own
> research make a decision and run with it. If you're smart, you'll give
> yourself enough time for mistakes and possible corrections. I've had
> teams ask me for the exact specs of my car. I realize there are a lot
> of new people each year. Wichita State University has the advantage of
> having an ongoing team versus a senior design team project type team.
> If you have questions, fine, but please read the rules, look at other
> teams' websites, contact some industry people and go from there.
> If you don't know how to set up a suspension, go to the library and
> check out a book. If you have a question about brakes and how they
> work, get a book. DO YOUR OWN HOMEWORK. That's the only way to really
> learn anything from Mini-Baja. If you try to copy other people, you
> might as well stay home, because they will always be ahead of you.
> I wish all the new guys luck and I will try to help anyone who needs it,
> but like some of the people who have been around for a couple of years,
> I think it's just wrong to start asking for everything under the sun
> because you don't want to do the leg work.
> If any of you are this type of person, good luck. I'll be waiting for
> you at the finish line.
> Thanks,
> Brian Herr
> Team Captain
> SAE Mini-Baja Team
> Wichita State University
> http://webs.wichita.edu/baja
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