So um, our cRIO just died while we were driving. And now when we turn on our robot, NONE of the status lights on the cRIO turn on. Moreover, to show that its not just the LED lights that are blown out, the Ethernet lights on the cRIO do not turn one when they are connected. The cRIO is definitely getting power (first of all the power distro board is green, then we used a multimeter and found that the cRIO out on the distro board is giving 24.5V and on the receiving end of the cRIO it is also getting 24.5V. We also rechecked the WAGO connection to the cRIO and that was good as well)
Ok I will just include some other of the other catastrophic events that happened to us that could somehow, possibly be related:
Eth2 on our driver station did not light up ( but finally figured out that we could use a hub to plug the Laptop and Router into eth1)
Driver station intermittently bluescreens
We reimaged the cRIO and our drivers station (yes we followed all the directions
Oh, and the Ethernet port on the back of our laptop stops working intermittently too.
So after fixing all of this we were able to deploy code (but when we tried to run as startup, it could not detect a connection to the cRIO)
So is our cRIO broken? If so, how is this even possible? (We have always treated our cRIO with nothing but gracious professionalism) Is there any way we can get another cRIO ASAP – the build season will be over soon!
I’m not sure exactly how things are staffed on weekends, but post to the NI forum or look for the phone number for support and returns. It is not at all common, but there is an internal fuse and a few have been blown so far this season. They will get a replacement out very fast.
For 1, 2, and 4 I would blame ESD to the Driver Station, it is extremely rensitive. Have you grounded your DS as demanded by <R82.1> in Team Update #7?
Probably not the problem, but if you’re using Victors, check that the mounting screws are not shorting against any of the terminals. Also, try removing the cRio from the robot. You could have some sort of wierd potential on your frame issue from some sort of electrical short.
You should be able to get a replacement pretty quickly by contacting NI on Monday. In the meantime I’d like some more details on this issue. You mentioned the cRIO died while driving… some questions:
Was this actually while driving (no human contact with the robot at all), or were you downloading code or otherwise working on the robot?
Did anything else happen at the time of the failure (massive collision, another component failed, etc.)?
Have you always used the PD module to power the cRIO?
Have you ever “hot connected” the cRIO by plugging in a live power cable?
hot wiring seems to possibly kill it, that may be our downfall as today our cRIO died, but there were other issues that could have caused it.
hard to believe the cRIO doesn’t have protecters on it to avoid this, but hey maybe it is that the conection was lose on ours possibly causing the problem.
Other teams have burned up the cRIO so don’t count that out.
Please check the voltage input (measured at the cRIO connector). If you contact NI to get a replacement make sure you send in your broken cRIO quickly so we can take a look. Killing a cRIO is very rare, and so far has been impossible to reproduce in the lab, so when you call in please provide as many details as possible including your configuration, what was happening at the time of failure, length of time you’ve been using the cRIO, etc.
A recent thread here on CD said that the cRIO has an internal fuse. Some team blew that fuse, which would give the same symptoms that you are describing.
