pic: 121 Thermal Imaging

[Andy Baker]

Rob, Tom...

Do you still have this equipment at your shop? I'd like you to try something that I've wanted to try for a while:

When your robot is cool, power it up and then take a thermal image picture of the electrical system. I *think* that this same tool can show points where crimps and connectors are not fastened or connected very well. These hot spots could predict where loose connections may occur after a few minutes of driving.

If you don't have any hot spots, then your connectors and crimps are good. Being the Rhode Warriors that you are, this is most likely the case. You could also go to the effort of fabricating a poor crimp and testing to see if this imaging tool can detect it.

IF this works and detects poor connections and crimps, I would imagine that a tool like this would be very valuable at a FIRST event on inspection and practice day. I can see a line of robots waiting to be thermally inspected to see if their crimps and connections are robust.

I'm speculating that this tool will do this, as I am a mechanical engineer and not an electrician.

Andy