Serial to CAN Gateway in new Black Jaguars?

[dlavery]

Originally Posted by dmcguire3006

As far as CAN being a liability because of single point failure (as opposed to independent PWM line), I'm sure that no one has built in redundant motors so the net result on a cable failure would be the same between CAN and PWM.

Actually, there are some very significant differences between the failures. If you lose a PWM cable used in the traditional configuration (and honesty, there are probably very few teams that have NOT had a PWM that came loose or someone forgot to plug back in at one point or another), at most you lose one motor. In almost every case, the robot is still operable, although with reduced functionality. If you lose a CANbus cable, or have a single device at the head end of the bus catastrophically fail, you can lose access to every motor connected to the bus.

The risks associated with these two options are substantially different. Whether the risk profile is a reasonable trade given the benefits that come with the use of a CANbus configuration is something that each team will have to assess for themselves. Based on your tolerance for risk and your ability to take advantage of the added capabilities of CAN, this trade-off may or may not make sense (personally, I think that for most teams it certainly will make sense, and I would expect to see a lot of teams using the CANbus configurations this year - they just need to understand the risks of doing so).

-dave




-