Quote:
Originally Posted by Alexa Stott
One word: e-stop. Seriously, you should never run your bot without it. If you see something going wrong, simply stop it.
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In 2007, we had an arm that moved at 20 RPM, driven by a CIM. I flipped a value (long night...) and it went for it, trying to slam through the ground. I had less than 1/2 of a second to hit the disable button before it would have slammed into the ground under full power. Had my hand not been on the controls and my trigger happy kill reflex on full at that point in time, we would have had a lot of repair work left to do.
So, while a kill switch helps, it is no magic bullet. I'm not sure I would want someone learning how to program with that arm, since I would have to be continually on the kill switch, ready for their next mistake. Putting them on a simulator until they were further along would make the experience a lot more enjoyable for both of us.