Quote:
Originally Posted by slijin
The low thermal signature of the main PD circuit is likely because all the plastic casing acts as a good insulator, disguising its true thermal signature. The cRIO part does somewhat surprise me, though.
|
I suspect the cRIO's heat has a lot to do with the runtime we saw that day. The robot had been on for most of the day, even when it wasn't being driven, and of course it's only a few inches from a very hot compressor. The (steel?) housing holds heat pretty well.
Seeing the heat built up around the sprockets in the arm was most interesting to me. We always knew it was a fairly high friction area, but seeing the heat spreading out into the plastic really illustrates the matter. Had I seen that during the build season I might have opted for some sort of further lubrication.
Obviously, thanks goes out to
CRREL for taking the time to photograph the 'bot for us. We hope to get some time with the same camera technology during the next build season to help spot friction, bad connections, educational video of machining operations and who knows what else? They've also been a major sponsor of our team since 1996. We've been very lucky to have access to CRREL and the people who work there.