Digital SideCar not working

[grthawk]

Hello people,

We are having problems trying to use the Digital SideCar. For some reason I cannot write any PWM signal, but we are able to do digital input and output from the GPIO pins. I'm not getting any voltage out of the pins for the RSL, and the LED next to it does not light up. The Battery light, 5V light, and 6V light are all lit. And the SideCar is getting 12V from the Power Distribution Board.

I really don't think it is a problem with the Digital SideCar itself because we tried three different Digital SideCars and had the same problem.

I am a java user and should be using the latest update. I flashed the cRIO with the V19.

We actually had it randomly work once when we re-flashed the cRIO, but it stopped working shortly afterward and this magic trick with the re-flashing thing no longer works.

Any help will be appreciated. Thanks.

[Mark McLeod]

Sounds like you have no code running on the cRIO.
What do your status lights on the Driver Station Diagnostics tab tell you is not working?

[grthawk]

I think the code is running, because we are able to do evrything except PWM. The Joysticks are working, analog sensors are working and GPIO pins are working for both input and output. (I made them print their values and they were returning correct values.)

Right now we are using the old DriverStation instead of the classmate PC, so I don't know what the status light will show. But on the old driverstation, everything seems to be fine. (it says it is enabled, in teleop, with a good battery voltage) I just finished configuring the clasmate PC, so I will try using that instead as soon as I get the chance.

[Mark McLeod]

The old DS status is good enough.

Did you try swapping the cable between the cRIO module and the Digital Sidecar? Use your spare from last year or the new one from this year's kit.

The other swappable component is the digital module in the cRIO.
Have you reset the module in the cRIO chassis?
One more thing to check is to inspect the pins on the cRIO module (both ends) and the pins in the cRIO slot on the chassis to see if any are bent or have metal debris in them.

[grthawk]

It worked!!

For some reason or another, I had no problem at all when I used the classmate PC. Maybe the new code is not compatible with the old Driver Station.

Thank yo very much for your help!

[Mark McLeod]

That's good news!

I just plugged in one of our 2009 DS's and it didn't work correctly either.
I won't get around to investigating though until the season settles down a little. Too much else to get done.