What are COTS - Consumer Off the Shelf Parts?

1. Consumer off the shelf parts (COTS) are just pre-manufactured parts that we can buy off of the market

2. These parts are made by FRC specific vendors or just general vendors (there are some exceptions with the general vendors so check to see what’s FRC legal in the manual for the current year and what isn’t)

3. These parts almost always have a STEP file (a file we can import into Onshape) for easy assembly

4. Of course, besides parts we buy hardware, raw materials, tools, etc.

5. The swerve modules we have are a big example 

Suppliers and where to find them

See the "Buying Materials" page for a more comprehensive list

1. Some folks have made directories for popular parts: Find Robot Parts

2. List of places

3. Folks on Chief Delphi (a FIRST forum) have also made some lists during technical discussions:

   1. Chief Delphi

4. Some popular ones with the team:

   1. AndyMark - FRC

   2. McMaster-Carr - Generic

   3. Rev Robotics - FRC

   4. West Coast Products - FRC

Why buy COTS parts?

1. Sometimes making a certain part or even assembly is extremely hard and/or expensive for the team to accomplish by itself

2. These vendors provide necessities that we just can’t make like: 

   1. Bearings

   2. Gears

   3. Belts

   4. Pulleys

   5. Sprockets

   6. Bolts and nuts

   7. Pneumatic cylinders

3. It’s our job to utilize the resources made available to design & create a robot