Pre-charging pneumatic air tank

[MrBasse]

Originally Posted by mikets

Thanks for pointing out the 5V signal. I was about to check it out. So we would have to either use a resistor/Zener diode to step down to 5V or use a 12V relay instead. Just to reiterate, we are not using this at the competition. We are thinking of using it in the shop for testing and prototyping. The rake will have all the safety and relief valves in place. In my opinion, it is safer than the students trying to pressurize it with a battery and a switch box. I will get together with our pneumatic expert to make sure all the safeties are in place (i.e. safety relief valves, pressure gauges, emergency stop button etc). This is mainly used for testing a prototype that is not a complete robot, so there is no other electronics and certainly no cRIO.

Why are you using FIRST components if you are just prototyping? What is the point of going through all this hassle when you can just use a shop compressor with a regulator? If you want to make this be as safe as possible and use FIRST legal components, then get another cRIO and complete the test robot.

When we test we use a small pancake compressor that shuts off at 110 PSI and we use the regulator to limit working pressure to 60 PSI. If we want a real cordless option we run an old 8 slot cRIO on our testing chassis. I just don't get why you would want to over work a small 12V compressor for shop testing.

For competition use see nearly every post above, especially DonRotolo's. It is hard to agree more with someone...