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Electronics Resources

2008 Electrical Rules Summary

A two page summary sheet of the critical power distribution robot rules for 2008. Wire gauge, colors, circuit breaker requirements, proper Spike and Victor wiring, Victor calibration, and finally the pinout assignments for Team 358's RC.
2008 Electrical Rules Summary ( Adobe PDF

, 484 KB)

Electrical workshop - December 2007

An in-house workshop on the standard robot electrical system, followed by practical proper wire stripping/crimping/soldering was held one evening. The workshop covered basic theory, major components of the FIRST robotic electrical system, details on the FIRST Robot Controller and how it works with the spikes and speed controllers to command things to happen, FIRST rules and restrictions on our electrical system design, wire gauges, measurement instruments, such as volt meters and oscilloscopes, etc.
Here is the supporting handout outline the workshop followed: Electrical Workshop 12/06/07 ( Adobe PDF

, 36 KB)

References

Check out Battery University for online practical battery knowledge.
Wire Gauge: Amps & Ohms - Find the gauge that's right for your job

PWM Signal Generator

A simple hardware solution for driving motors at variable speeds without a FIRST Robot Controller. Makes for quick and easy bench tests, testing prototype and final motor assemblies by the mechanical sub-team, without having to wait for the programmers or electrical guys to show up. Free your mechanical guys to test stuff on their own while you are safely far away.
PWM Signal Generator ( Adobe PDF

, 276 KB)

DC Motor Tachometer

Turn any DC motor into a tachometer, a sensor to measure the instantaneous speed of a rotating wheel or shaft.
DC Motor Tachometer ( Adobe PDF

, 120 KB)

Portable OI Power Supply

Isn't it tragic that the robot, which is so free to roam where it will, should be tethered (figuratively) to an Operator Interface that must be plugged into an outlet to operate. Well free the robot from the tyranny of the wall outlet by building yourself a simple portable battery pack. This can also be constructed from rechargable batteries.
Portable Operator Interface Power Supply ( Adobe PDF

, 124 KB)

Substitute RC Power Supply

When the new RC is first received with the KOP it’s often not so convenient to lug around a full-sized 12v battery and it’s accompanying support circuitry just to test programs and algorithms. A miniature power supply, perfectly adequate for driving the RC for testing purposes is as simple as a 9v battery. Although simply holding the battery to the RC 12v terminals will work, it's kind of hard to balance in position. By placing that 9v battery in a project box and adding the proper connectors a rugged portable power supply is created. The same technique can be used to create a portable power supply for the O/I board.
Substitute RC Power Supply ( Adobe PDF

, 190 KB)

12v Exide Battery Tester

Contrary to what you might expect, not all Exide batteries are created equal. We have received brand new batteries that did not perform well at all while older batteries were outstanding! When you’re in a match it’s critical to be able to depend on your power source to perform up to advertised specs. You don't want to have your battery drop suddenly to a low voltage. Our testing station started out as a way to evaluate the condition of our older, prior year batteries to tell us if we should order new spare Exides.
12v Battery Tester ( Adobe PDF

, 384 KB)
Source Data ( Microsoft Excel

, 36.0 KB)
Exide Battery Spec. ( Adobe PDF

, 510 KB)

OI Analog Multi-position Switch

With only one of the many unused analog inputs on the OI (typical joysticks use only two of the four available analog inputs) you can make a multi-position switch to send a large number of possible selections to your robot. We've used this in the past to select mutiple arm pre-set positions, e.g., stow, pickup, carry, cap, high-five.
Joystick Port Analog Switch ( Adobe PDF

, 26 KB)

Double-up Joysticks

FIRST published this wiring diagram to take advantage of the normally unused analog inputs on each OI joystick port to hook 2 joysticks to a single port.
How to Use 2 Joysticks on a single OI Port ( Adobe PDF

, 118 KB)