[FTC]: Static Electricity Discharge Video

[PhilBot]

Hi

As a veteran team (2818) I've heard a lot of talk over the years about NXT's locking up due to static electricity.

I've never experienced it, until this weekend.

At the end of a match, as the robot was going up the ramp it just stopped, and it was determined that the NXT had frozen.

At the time I put it down to murphy's law.

However, my opinion changed as I was driving our robot around on our practice field tonight. As it touched the ramp a HUGE (maybe 3/4") spark jumped from the ramp to the robot frame. And proceeded to lock up the NXT.

Holy Cow... it was amazing.

So, wishing that I had a video, I attempted to recapture the event.
It didn't take me any time at all to get the robot to cause sparks.
So, I've attached the video with two events.

http://youtu.be/LanVM9ogLl4

Note: Neither of these times did it reset the NXT... I guess it wasn't big enough.

In both cases I just had the robot do a few loops and then approach the ramp. The sparks actually occurred at the exposed metal portions of the ramp.

This would be hard to avoid.

I've seen ALL the FIRST recommendations re Static Discharge. But like many of my friend teams... I think eliminating the cause would be the preferred method (ie: anti-static mat tiles)

Phil.