[Ianworld]

As was mentioned above, batteries get hot when there is too much current going through them. A bad test for this would be to connect the to terminals together. The whole thing heats up really fast. With the current you're drawing into your robot however it should never ever get hot. Maybe it could get warm, but I highly doubt even that. The fact that your batteries are dying quickly is also a sign that they are just discharging themeselves very quickly over some short. Now this short probably isn't a blatent arcing because the batteries still run for a minute and a half but that just means there is a bit of resistance in the short.

As was mentioned above i'd recomend replacing the breaker panel. Thats a pretty big task but its probably something that has to be done. There is a small chance its something in a victor or some other piece of electronics, but those usually give a pretty clear sign of any internal shorting. You could try something as simple as shaking around your breaker panel and attempting to get any and all metal shavings out of it using compressed air.

Good luck annoying electronics problems like this can be a real killer.