How does the IR setup work?

[phrontist]

I don't fully grok how the IR system displayed at the kickoff works (and I have read many a thread). The part that confuses me is how the sensors determine what angle the beacons are at. Triangulation is easy once you know which direction the beacons are realative to your robot, but how can this be accomplished?

[Greg]

Well, you just keep track of the servo position. Because the pwm value you output to a servo actually corresponds to its position, you can easily convert the position at which the sensor (located on the servo) saw the beacon into degrees and calculate the distance to the beacon.

If you are not using servos, you can accomplish the same thing with a motor and a potentiometer.