Robot Mishap

[Rachika Garcia]

We were testing the speed of the balls coming out. And the lawn sprinklers turned on under the robot. What are the possibilities that our chips and victors and stuff were fried?

[Bharat Nain]

It depends. If the water hit the electronics while they were turned ON, the electronics probably fried. Otherwise, you might have a shot but make sure everything is extremely dry before you try anything.

[David Brinza]

Did the robot stop operating? Did any breakers "pop"? Is there water dripping out of the motors?

These are some clues that you might have some real issues. If the motors got really soaked, it may take quite a while for them to dry out. You might want to disconnect the motors on the robot and see if the rest of the electronics components (RC, Victors, radio) turn-on properly (after they've been allowed to dry). Then you can checkout your motors one-by-one.

[Ianworld]

You may want to try drying the pieces off using a hairdryer or very, very carefully with a heat gun. Only once you're absolutely sure everything is dry should you try turning parts on again. I might even try to just incrementally reconnect the electronics. Start with just the non-drivetrain parts and then slowly reconnect power to the pieces. Electronics can get wet, sometimes even short and survive but FIRST robot parts, especially victors are prone to dying from relatively simple shorts.

[Jay H 237]

You could also use compressed air to dry things out.

If the water got inside the vents of the motors it could have diluted the lubrication and/or cause rusting. This may not appear as a problem right away, rather become a long term dependability issue. After they dry out listen to them and see how they sound.

The "good" news is atleast this wasn't salt water.

[Justin Stiltner]

After hearing the story that dave lavery told about FIRST robots at a demo operating in like 1" of water and rain id say youll be fine, let everything dry out, oil your gears, sprockets and such to prevent rust and cross your fingers.

[devicenull]

Make sure you pull out all the PWM cables, and get the water out from between them..

Take the fans off the victors, blow out whats below them with compressed air.

I can tell you that there's a pretty good chance the robot controller survived. It's one rugged piece of hardware.. I can't even count the number of times we've shorted various pins with metal shavings, to no ill effect. Same with the radio.. we put a pop rivet through the transmit light, and it still worked. Not perfectly, but it worked.

Not knowing what your robot looks like, and what got hit.. I can't tell you much.. make sure you open the transmissions and re-lube them though.. they are the last place you want rust.

[Al Skierkiewicz]

Rachika,
The things I am most concerned about would be the speed controllers and the RC. A little water won't kill a motor but it might wash a little of the lubricant out of the bearings. The RC has a pretty tight cover but it is not waterproof. Much of the interior on both the RC and the speed contollers has a coating on the components so they should be good if you are sure they are dry. (The speed controllers are wide open to water and metal shavings. A good shake on a speed controller, (outside of the robot, please) should reveal any residual moisture in side. A hair dryer applied to the opening for several minutes ought to take care of what might be left inside. Dry all electrical connections and let the robot sit for a few hours and you should have very few if any problems.
Sensors, pots, microswitches etc., might not fair as well but use the same technique, shake, inspect and use the dryer. Servos would give the least amount of problems, I think. The wire entry has a gasket and the case is pretty tight so I don't think you should have any problems there.