Blown talon srx modules

[Michael Hill]

Originally Posted by Mike Copioli

I agree it should fail. But I would not suggest that the product is crap if it did fail because of this.

I'm not suggesting the Talon is crap. I'm suggesting it may not be due to ESD. It sounds like you've taken the proper precautions, but somehow, through the normal course of use, Talons are being blown; Not by one team, but by several. ESD should not kill products that are used in a manner in which they are intended to be used, if not also have tolerance for wiring mistakes (this is a competition full of people who make mistakes). My guess is something thermal is happening in combination with ESD. It looks like The protection diode is only rated up to 125 Celsius, which I think is normally fine. However, when put in an enclosed box like the SRX is and put inside of a robot with potentially not enough air flow to convection cool the fins, perhaps the diodes aren't able to offer the full protection they normally would. I don't have any temperature measurements to back this up, and I'm not exactly sure how you could accurately (and easily) measure the junction temperature while simulating the SRX enclosure.

That's really my best guess at the moment.