I have recently been asigned the task of repairing my teams older robots. I was about to instal a reflective tape sensor but I cannot find any documents that are very helpful. I would like to know how other teams supplied the 10-30 volts to the sensor and also how they used the sensor. Thanks in advance.
The sensor is powerd from the 12V battery, which you would normally connect through a 20A breaker in the fuse panel.
If you goto the www.usfirst.org website you should be able to find the spec sheet for it in the archives from last years documentation. (I would post it for you but I dont have it at home).
Model Number QN18VN6LV - http://www.bannerengineering.com/products/photoelectrics/qs18/.
For the edubot you could use 2 9volt batteries in series. Radio Shack sells battery clips, you will tie the red on one battery to the black on the other, and use the free red and black as the power to the sensor.
The output acts like a regular switch, so its either open or grounded. There is an output for Normally Open (NO) and one for Normally Closed (NC). They are the inverse of one another. The output will read as follows within the robot controller:
NO: No reflection = 1, Reflection = 0
NC: No reflection = 0, Reflection = 1
You can adust the threshold using the little switch on the casing. Power it up and play around with it to see how it works. The LED will light up when it sees a reflection, so you can test it without the robot. The spec sheets say it has a range of 6m when you’re using reflective tape.