[jdiwnab]

This isn't criticism, only addressing all of your concerns.

Originally Posted by Al Skierkiewicz

OK,
You first picture clearly shows a wire going to the gearbox and it looks strangely like the red lead of a Chalupa motor.

The wire that looks like it is going to the gear box is just diconnected from anything. it looks like it is on the gear box but it is just over it. But it does look like it.

Originally Posted by Al Skierkiewicz

Next you have a screw missing from motor(+) on one of the controllers which leads me to believe you using a common ground or are wiring motors in series.

The screw is out becuase we were disconnecting things, and we pulled the wire out for that moter.

Originally Posted by Al Skierkiewicz

Lastly, as someone has pointed out, the mounting hardware on your controllers is touching motor(-) again giving a sneak path to frame. 4-40 allen screws work OK but tywraps work and are non conductive.

We see that, and we will check it out when we get back to check the robot. but it would seem odd that several wires would be doing the same thing and creating this problem

Originally Posted by Al Skierkiewicz

As to the question about magnetic fields...the answer is no. Yes a wire in the presence of a magnetic field may have current induced in the wire. This is dependent on two things, the magnitude of the field and the field must be changing or the wire moving. Since the motor is a permanent magnet, the field is not changing, and since the wire is not moving there can be no current induced in the wire. Since the motor leads are connected to a fairly low impedance, any induced current would be tiny compared to the motor run current.

I agree that it is far fetched, but when isolating everything, that was about the only thing we could think of at the time. As far as no magnetic field changing, some magnet has to be moving for the moter to go. But it still seems unlikely.

Thanks for you help. All options will be considered. We will look at everyting on Monday when we get back to school.