Current draw is not a problem in this case. The high school class I teach is building robots and we're draining a 1000mAh LiPo battery in 5 minutes, so a milliamp here and there is not an issue. Currently we are using a cheap indicator that plugs into the charge connection and buzzes when any individual cell drops below 3.3v, and we set them off pretty quickly when the batteries are under heavy load. Since everything is already controlled by the Pico, and I'm not using the ADC channels I thought it would be nice to just check the voltage only when the motors are stopped, and put a warning in the authentication payload of the nrf24L01 modules so their controllers could beep at them, or turn on a warning light, or maybe a vibration motor.
As an aside, this is totally feature creep, and I shouldn't be worrying about it. I'm trying to figure out how to use KiCad and get my PCBs designed for fabrication before my students are finished physically building their robots. It doesn't seem hard, but every small task requires a level of understanding and attention to detail that I'm not used to. My DRV8874 motor drivers require a "bulk capacitor" whatever that is, that's VM rated, whatever that means, and what size should I choose, and what's its footprint, and will JLCPCB have them in stock? I can do these things, but they take a lot of time to figure out, and that's just one capacitor out of dozens. I probably shouldn't be figuring out how a voltage reference works at this point.
These Picos with MicroPython sure make life easy though. Everything I need from them they just seem to do without much trouble on my part.
As an aside, this is totally feature creep, and I shouldn't be worrying about it. I'm trying to figure out how to use KiCad and get my PCBs designed for fabrication before my students are finished physically building their robots. It doesn't seem hard, but every small task requires a level of understanding and attention to detail that I'm not used to. My DRV8874 motor drivers require a "bulk capacitor" whatever that is, that's VM rated, whatever that means, and what size should I choose, and what's its footprint, and will JLCPCB have them in stock? I can do these things, but they take a lot of time to figure out, and that's just one capacitor out of dozens. I probably shouldn't be figuring out how a voltage reference works at this point.
These Picos with MicroPython sure make life easy though. Everything I need from them they just seem to do without much trouble on my part.
Statistics: Posted by BrianZweerink — Sat Jan 27, 2024 1:52 am