Air Compressor

[William3370]

Before you read: My goal is to make an air cannon


I've only been programming for a year and this is our teams second year to compete and last year's game made it especially to just program a simple push bot. I had no experience and volunteered to take the position of head programmer because no one else wanted to.

I'm considerably more knowledgeable now than I was last year but i've never touched VIs or things such as solenoids and autonomous mode.

Please Correct me if i'm wrong:

A solenoid sort of acts like a button (that's a big sort of) in that when it is turned on it sends a true or on statement and when it is off, it sends a false or off statement. It controls things like Gyros, accelerometers, and of course air compressors and the like.

Now to set one up (programming wise) I know that I have to do all the basic good stuff like opening it in begin.vi and closing it in finish.vi.

But what im wondering is how to send the signal for on or off? Does it act like a jaguar or PWM for the compressor? And if so do I need to program a reverse command so that their is a forward and reverse?