Charging the 7.2 Volt Batteries

[devicenull]

If it's such a problem removing the battery from the robot.. charge it on the robot. I'm sure you can set up some sort of circuit/mechanical device that will disconnect the battery from the RC when you plug the charger into it. Then just mount a battery socket somewhere easily accessible on the robot, and when you get back to the pit, plug the charger into it.

Or, mount a robot battery with this circuit on your cart, and when you put the robot on your cart, plug the charger in. No drained battery during the match, but you also don't have to switch the battery out. Because it doesn't seem to be that much of a load.. you should be able to replace the cart battery once a day, and be fine.

It also seems to me that to use this circuit, you would have to have your robot powered on in the pits.. which doesn't exactly seem like a good idea. No one should be using radio's there, but what if someone has a misconfigured OI, and it manages to link up to your active robot? If you don't have the robot on in the pits, your battery gets charged for what? 3-6 minutes at the most (set up for match, match, clean up from match). And it would be a bad idea to have the robot on in the pits, because, at least from my experience, you are always working on the robot.

[roboticsguy1988]

Well i don't think its as much of the fact of a full recharge as make sure that the camera and the servo's and other stuff don't take most the batteries energy when ther may come a time where you need that extra boost.

Besides if it is charging all throughout a match wouldn't that mean a faster recharge in the pits?

Besides in a way this also would help (according to how you wired it) if like a team member forgot to put a new backup battery in there at least the servo's and the camera could run off of the circuit..... or purhaps it comes disconnected suring a game.

There are several advantages especial for a little circuit that take a VERY SMALL amount of weigth and space.

[DonRotolo]

Originally Posted by eugenebrooks

<snip>We compiled...

Spoken like a true software guy...

BTW, the best tool I have found for really testing the condition of your battery (main or backup) is this. I have one and it is very cool.

Don

[MikeDubreuil]

Originally Posted by roboticsguy1988

Now where is this design?

I was wondering where the design for the charger circuit was and 2006 reference guides for the RC and OI. I asked IFI and received this response:

Originally Posted by Tom Watson

The 2006 control system is basically the same as the 2005 system with the exception of the User processor on the RC. The new user processor is a PIC18F8722. The Operator Interface is exactly the same as the 2005 model.

If has not been determined if the charger circuit will be released.

[roboticsguy1988]

Well it would actually be simple to come up with a circuit that charges it anyway. As long as it went along with all the rules. I will read over the electrical and custom circuit rules and see if i can find anything that wouldn't allow that.

[Craig Roys]

Originally Posted by roboticsguy1988

Ok, everyone knows the common way fo charging the 7.2 Volt Backup Battery, taking it out and connecting it to the charger. Although while reading through the 2006 FIRST Encyclopedia (Rule Book) I noticed Rule R53 in Section 5 on page 16. It States:



Now where is this design? I spent about a half hour looking through IFI's website.

In case you haven't found it yet:

http://www.ifirobotics.com/docs/firs...up-charger.pdf

This is all they had posted - it's a link in the small print at the bottom of the ifirobotics home page.

Craig Roys

[Makubesu]

The 9V charger is the charger IFI has been shipping for years for the 7.2V batteries, so it's fine to charge them with it.

Thanks for your help, the 9v one worked perfectly.

[Al Skierkiewicz]

It is important to remember that when a robot is involved in pushing or is running with motors near stall, the main battery gets down to 7 volts or even lower. We have observed conditions on robots where they regularly drain the main battery down to 4 or 5 volts. It is for these reasons IFI began using the backup battery. Remember that the backup keeps the main proc alive and keeps the radio modems talking, no matter what voltage the main battery has fallen to. If you are on my alliance, I hope you are using a charged backup battery with no ties to the main battery and no attempt to compete with the bachup battery disabled.