Battery Monitor Project

[Joe Ross]

Originally Posted by Ether

For practice, you are connected to the Driver Station and can see the voltage on the screen.

There are benefits to knowing the battery voltage immediately, rather then 30 seconds after turning on the robot.

Originally Posted by Bonzabonz

I checked out the battery beak and it does seem like a good product. As far as functionality goes, ours would be simpler since it only shows the voltage equivalent, not accounting for the load drop -unless you could somehow read it while the bot is running (probably unlikely). Ours was also designed for permanent mount on the robot. As far as price goes however, we were thinking of a price point of around $20, which is a fraction of what the battery beak costs on andymark.

Would it be worth it to teams to have a quick indicator of general battery charge, or is the load check the make or break for this sort of thing?

We have considered building a simple voltage meter in the past for this reason. However, we decided that the adafruit meter posted was cheaper and simpler then building our own. We have not purchased one, however.

After several years experience, our drive coach can tell the voltage of a battery based on the pitch of the fans of the Victor fans. This probably only works for younger ears, however.

[Ether]

Maybe I'm missing something. I thought the question was marketability. I don't see the market for that limited need when you can Velco a $4 digital meter to the practice bot if you want to know the voltage prior to power-on.

[Mark McLeod]

I've used one like the Adafruit one for years on my traveling teaching system.
We also have one on the robot this year.

It's quite handy for double checking the battery voltage in pit or queue by just flipping the main breaker on, then off immediately. No need to tether.