The Magical IR Board

[Uberbots]

In light of all of the... bad things that are happening to some of the IR boards that i see here on CD, i think it is time to post the story of the IR board with 9 lives.

Ok, so this story starts out with a short circuit. A bad one at that. We had built a custom IR receiver panel with 8 receivers built into it, and two of them shorted together. So the IR signals stop being processed- and with good reason. We look at the IR board and it is smoking- we let the genie out of the copper trace leading to the output pins where the IR sensor is (was). looking at the trace, it was destroyed. there was a hole burned right in the middle of it, and i was convinced that the board was dead, and so we started to prepare the second board.

But then, my dad got a wonderful idea. He soldered a small copper wire clipping over the gap. We turned on the board and, lo and behold, it returned to life as if nothing had happened. It responded to input and everything. So we put it back on the bot, and proceed to test another hybrid mode. As the robot is making its high-speed turn, we start to notice MORE smoke pouring out of the IR board. So we run over, take a look, and now the ENTIRE trace that was leading to the IR sensor was gone, charred up, and fallen on the floor somewhere.

But my dad was persistent- we had the technology to make this board come back again. so we solder a longer peice of copper wire to the two ends of the trace, turn the board on, and IT WORKS!
AGAIN!

so this is a story of the IR board with 9 lives. I guess what we have learned, contrary to the experiences of other teams, is that these little guys are very hardy, and that a short in that place is fixable.

=D

[Al Skierkiewicz]

Billy,
That kind of damage tells me there is something else wrong. I would first look for a shorted regulator and/or the possibility of a short to chassis in the mounting. If you find the chassis short, that indicates another part of the robot is also contacting the chasis and passing current throught the frame and through the little trace on the IR board. When you replace the fuse (board trace) with a bigger fuse (the wire) something else will have to give. Let us know what you find.

[Uberbots]

Originally Posted by Al Skierkiewicz

Billy,
That kind of damage tells me there is something else wrong. I would first look for a shorted regulator and/or the possibility of a short to chassis in the mounting. If you find the chassis short, that indicates another part of the robot is also contacting the chasis and passing current throught the frame and through the little trace on the IR board. When you replace the fuse (board trace) with a bigger fuse (the wire) something else will have to give. Let us know what you find.

No, it was an intermittent short in the custom sensor board. my dad trimmed all of the elongated pins coming out of the sensors, and then cased them all in hot glue.
we havent had a problem since then. I will post again if something comes up, and the new record for most burnouts survived (=

[Cow Bell Solo]

sorry to ruin the spirit but it did not have nine lives, but it is a good story anyways and has a good moral, don't give up(that is what I took)

[Al Skierkiewicz]

Billy,
I am glad you found the real problem. I fix things for a living and I use the "smoking gun" approach. If you don't find the real cause of a problem, it isn't fixed. It is just waiting for the best time to come out and bite you. Good luck!

[popo308]

Wow you guys got lucky...
We just turned are board on one time at Midwest and it died...

[Al Skierkiewicz]

Brent,
You should have come and asked me. I had the hardware to reprogram if you had wanted to use it.