[billbo911]

Originally Posted by Phil Mack

You seem to disagree that a better power supply is needed, but then cite exactly why a better power supply is needed, so I'm confused.
If the device is running in and of itself, connected to nothing but a battery like the KOP backup battery, then the voltage supplied by the battery would be sufficiently clean for the simple regulator (that is onboard the device) to power the device.
If the device is being powered by the 12v battery of a complete robot, there are many other noisy loads on it that can easily drop the voltage below 7 volts for however short a time. That is probably enough to cause a problem for the embedded micro controller if it is anything like any other PIC that I've worked with.
So I would probably add another stage of voltage regulation just like the regulator circuit on the device, but with larger capacitors and think that would probably be fine, but I'm not so confident in that idea as to post it as a solution.
~Phil

Your confusion is well founded. I did contradict myself, a bit. I guess what I was trying to say is that the regulator onboard will work fine until the supply voltage dips below ~7vdc, and as you point out, for no matter how short a time. At that point, it is worthless.
Honestly, I don't know if adding a couple caps is legal, but it certainly would provide the filtering needed, assuming they were large enough. So, instead of advising adding more caps, I opted for using a more robust power source. The backup battery will have enough power as long as it has enough capacity. As of last year, a larger backup battery was within the rules, as long as you charged it from the KOP charger.