Disabling PWM outputs w/out disabling entire bot.

[AdamHeard]

Originally Posted by flameout

The joysticks don't read "127" when they're centered -- outputting "127" would cause the robot to move. It's not tough to find out exactly what needs to be output to stop the motors, but if (when) the joysticks drift, re-calibrating would require a code download to adjust for the new bias (not a big deal, unless the issue's discovered 5 min. before a presentation or something).

This isn't true. I spent years programming on the IFI system. If you calibrate the victors properly (which takes mere moments, and a BIC pen), and then specifically output 127, they will not move. Not tomorrow, not a year from now, never. I'm not saying let the joystick control it, I understand they drift. I'm saying have a switch, or trigger pull, or something to put it in "sit mode" where you tell it 127 specifically. This won't result in a much different system than just no calling the pwms, but it works perfect (and you can do it on more than 2 outputs).

We used to have a psuedo-disable that just 127'd all outputs and it was used routinely during programming/debugging. Hundreds of hours of robots with 6-10 victors all content with their neutral signal and never moving.