Quote:
Originally Posted by morpheous115
I am mounting a couple of sensors and solenoids in a certain area on our robot and was wondering if we were allowed to connect all of our grounds to a few specific wires that led back to the RC?
For example: For a double solenoid I would have two powers and one common ground and for a couple of momentary switches I would have a common ground etc.
-morpheous
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Morpheus,
There is no specific rule related to wire returns for solenoids except if you think about the wiring for a single solenoid. That wiring requires a pair of wires from the Spike to the solenoid. (red & black) In the Spike user's manual there is a method for connecting a dual action solenoid using both Spike outputs with a common return for the dual action solenoid only. Since First rules do not require adding breakers to the common side wiring, common electrical practice would dictate returning each solenoid on a separate wire back to the breaker panel that feeds that Spike. This prevents some teams from overloading a single #18 wire with the returns from several devices fed from several 20 amp breakers.
Remember that the breaker capacity specifications are dictated by the wire size not the load.