Quote:
Originally Posted by techhelpbb
With appropriate safety and supervision:
Throw it down the stairs into a concrete wall.
Bake it in the oven (not a microwave) while on and charging to say 120 degrees to simulate a hot desert day. Freeze it in the freezer.
Operate it near an open flame.
Put your wireless near it, put your phone near it, put an AM/FM radio near it.
These sound really dumb but your can find a lot of problems like that:
RF emissions
Temperature sensitivity
Mechanical sensitivity
Production of hydrogen gas from charging
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Even better, I can just toss it outside on a regular sumer day. I left my iPod out for 30 minutes accidentally (during a robotics presentation only) and the solder on the inside nearly melted! I will check for hydrogen production, but I doubt it will produce any. Using a NiCad, as previously suggested, it should be not problem. However, let me do a little research on the material. I have 4 WiFi routers and an area just full of wireless communications devices. That could probably help see if RF is any problem. Mechanical sensitivity is going to be there. I am going to try to make it more durable than CIMs, which work for multiple years!
Oh and yeah, they aren't really dumb. They are really just another way of saying, "the fact" or how to do a true safety test!
I'm right now working off a Propeller chip (I know it is a dumb idea, but It's good for prototyping until I get a PIC). I was thinking of a 1000uF electrolytic cap, shorted with a 1Mohm resistor, to slowly discharge it after the power is disconnected. A step-up-down circuit will bring the voltage to 3v, by storing the 12v in a capacitor to make it only a quarter full. This will then go to the battery. This will all be controlled by the MCU to make sure nothing bad happens. There will be a transistor controlling the charge going to the battery. A reverse-protecting diode will be on the battery pack. That diode will make sure the power goes back into the 5v boost converter in one way. The MCU will do the boot-converting too! After I draw the block diagram, I'll post it on CD or my server!