weak link which probaly plagued many Bots

[archiver]

Posted by Bob Drexel.

Engineer on team #358, Titans, from Hauppauge and Festo Corp..

Posted on 4/10/2000 8:36 PM MST



Just a note to all on our findings, which I suspect gave intermittent problems to many. Our problem was typical, inconsistent jerky motion with poor control of key drives (i.e. drive wheels). Well, after hours of trouble shooting our robot (took four rounds to finally solve it), the culprit was the thermal breaker mounting base. If you pop off the plastic cover you’ll find that the breakers are held in place on three extremely small fingers utilizing friction only. These weak fingers are susceptible to bending which compromises the electrical connection and causes excessive resistance. This all leads to thermal buildup and cooked breakers.

After insuring a tight connection to the spade’s of the breaker our intermittent problems were solved (unfortunately to late).

Anyway, we had a great time, (we’re a rookie team) placed 77th in the nationals, learned a lot, and will be back next year!!!!