Breaker Trips

[bharrison6]

This year we had a good drive system with 4 andy mark sims. We used a medium-low single gear drive train but obviously had issues about getting pushed by other robots. If next years match requires pushing we will likely go to at least a 6 sim robot with two gears. Question is each of the andy mark sim motors have a stall amp draw of like 133 amps. We stalled out our 4 sims on more than one occasion without tripping any breaker (that I know of). How is this possible? My best guess is that the 40 amp circuits trip first (but we don't realize it) so the motor never draws its full stall current.

Also how do teams who run 6 sims keep from tripping their main breaker? The main breaker does trip at 240 amps right? If they stalled all 6 of their motors at the same time then.... 40 amp breakers times 6 motors = 240 amps. That's not counting any amps from other motors they might have on their robot or the crio/network bridge.

Also, is it legal to put, say 8 drive motors on 30 amp breakers? If it is you would trip your motors quicker when getting close to stall range but it would provide more torque at higher rpm thus getting a higher top speed.

This is of special interest to us since we might try a swerve drive. If we put 1 drive motor on each pod and 1 steer motor for each pod and all those motors have to be on 40 amp breakers we have no room for other motors we may need. It would be nice if we could put the steer motors on 30 amp breakers or possibly put 2 drive motors per pod (this may be crazy because it would be 8 drive motors and 4 steer motors). Any idea what would happen in this situation?

Thanks for everyone's input and I hope everyone had a great time at finals. (Curie rocks!!!)