Chief Delphi - Word of Warning: Victor 883 and 24V

If you're a veteran team that's been around for 7 or more years, chances are, you may have some Victor 883's sitting around collecting dust.

Team Fusion was given a broken Cruisin Cooler. These guys have a low RPM, high torque 24V motor in them.

Well one of the members that graduated this year, and I were getting it all fixed up. We were trying to decide how to control this 24V motor. I remembered reading that the 883 is capable of handling 6-30VDC. Perfect!

Well... not so much. My buddy rode it for about 20 seconds, then the smell of magic smoke entered the room. Popped the lid open and yep... Victor was smoked.

Well, we didn't find anything else wrong, and just suspected that it may have been one of Hurricane Katrina's victims when the roof came off damaging some of our equipment in the storage room. I managed to find an unused Victor 883 in one of the storage boxes. I got on it, and it drove for about 20 seconds again, then swiftly came to a halt.

No smoke this time though... but Victor has no output. I can get the Neutral Orange, and Forward and Reverse Red and Green, so communication was good.

Well, now, hours later, I find this nasty little tidbit of information.

Quote:

Eric,

The older Victor 883's that were included in the FIRST kit of parts are not capable of running at 24V. The units will be damaged if 24V is applied. The Victor 883-24V that is available today was a complete redesign of the PCB.

Regards,

Tom Watson
Innovation First
(903) 453-0802

From: Eric Gobst [mailto:ericrobodox@gmail.com]
Sent: Tuesday, January 01, 2008 11:03 PM
To: Info-Innovatoinfirst
Subject: Old Victor 883 at 24v

Hello IFI,
I am sure you get these questions a lot:

Victor 883's that were provided inside the kit of parts for FIRST Robotics Competition in past years, are they able to run 24V (if the 24V fan was added)?

Also, are the new 883's different from the old 883's from inside the kit, and if so, what are the changes?

Thank You,
Eric
____

Source

So for future warning, since this hasn't popped up in some years, don't use FIRST Provided, or old Victor 883's for 24V applications. They will not work.

Well, that was my DOH! moment of the day.