pic: It's so dense every wire has so much going on

[GeeTwo]

Originally Posted by Mason_Korkowski

... As far as the 2 layer panel is it meant that positive wires should be red and ground should be black, or do the wires have to each be different colors (ex. VRM to PDP is yellow and black, PCM to PDP is red and black?

The only mandatory insulation colors (for recent years) are non-signal level (that is, power) wires with a fixed polarity. In 2015, the appropriate rule was:

Originally Posted by 2015 Manual, Rule R40

All non-SIGNAL LEVEL wiring with a constant polarity (i.e., except for outputs of relay modules, motor controllers, or sensors)
shall be color-coded along their entire length (from the manufacturer) as follows:

• A. Red, yellow, white, brown, or black-with-stripe on the positive (e.g. +24VDC, +12VDC, +5VDC, etc.) connections
• B. Black or blue for the common or negative side (-) of the connections.

Wires that are originally attached to legal devices are considered part of the device and by default legal. Such wires are exempt from R40.

This means that wires coming out of the motor controllers do not have to follow the color code. On 3946, we extended this color code to include signal-level wires; anything which was always at a given voltage had one of the colors indicated above (perhaps this is what was meant, but the rules aren't clear). We considered different colors for 5V vs 12V (we had no 24V), but economics got in the way. We also made extensive use of the 3M colored marking tape (uses the resistor color code). We placed strips of this tape in a given color (or pair of colors when necessary) at every location involved in controlling a single actuator. For example, we had a strip of purple tape on the roboRIO near the PWM port, at both ends of the PWM cable, on the motor controller, on the motor, and on the wires on both sides of the anderson power poles between the controllers and the motors for a given motor, and even on the PDP connectors and the power wires leading to the motor controller. And the word "purple" was also in a comment in the source code where the PWM port number was defined, for good measure. This greatly simplifies trouble shooting. The bottom line is that color codes go way beyond the game rules; it is always helpful to label and document everything that you reasonably can.