static electricty and burned out components
Posted: Sat Feb 28, 2015 7:25 am
Hello: I have an R2D2 robot I built many years ago, that I am having problems with electronics burning out. I am guessing it is caused by static electricity but I am not certain.
Last year I burned out my easyVr voice board and the atom microprocessor and I have no idea why.
recently,I lost my left drive motor, for unknown reasons and while working on the robot, yesterday I burned out my Lynxmotion ps2 wireless controller.
I do have 3 capacitors tied across the drive motors, so I presume that is good enough, but...
I am thinking I am getting static electricity into the electronics while I work on the robot and burning out these parts. Needless to say it can become expensive and is very frustrating.
I know of precautions to take like static mats etc, but I think it is getting directly into the circuitry somehow.
Can anyone point me to circuits that will help block or prevent voltage spikes and surges that may be causing this?
Currently I have a 1600 mfd capacitor tied across my 5V regulator output. But as I say this has not helped.
Specifically what happened yesterday is I was running the robot off my 12V wall power supply while working on the motor problem and I found out it did not have enough amperage to run the drive motors, so I connected the main 12V battery and instantly burned out the PS2 controller. I cant imagine why? both power supplies are 12V and the electronics run on 5v from the regulator, so I cant imagine why any surge got through the system. Also for years I have run both main and battery power connected without any problems. so, I really do not know what caused the recent failure, I am grasping at straws.
Any advice would be appreciated.
-Stampee
Last year I burned out my easyVr voice board and the atom microprocessor and I have no idea why.
recently,I lost my left drive motor, for unknown reasons and while working on the robot, yesterday I burned out my Lynxmotion ps2 wireless controller.
I do have 3 capacitors tied across the drive motors, so I presume that is good enough, but...
I am thinking I am getting static electricity into the electronics while I work on the robot and burning out these parts. Needless to say it can become expensive and is very frustrating.
I know of precautions to take like static mats etc, but I think it is getting directly into the circuitry somehow.
Can anyone point me to circuits that will help block or prevent voltage spikes and surges that may be causing this?
Currently I have a 1600 mfd capacitor tied across my 5V regulator output. But as I say this has not helped.
Specifically what happened yesterday is I was running the robot off my 12V wall power supply while working on the motor problem and I found out it did not have enough amperage to run the drive motors, so I connected the main 12V battery and instantly burned out the PS2 controller. I cant imagine why? both power supplies are 12V and the electronics run on 5v from the regulator, so I cant imagine why any surge got through the system. Also for years I have run both main and battery power connected without any problems. so, I really do not know what caused the recent failure, I am grasping at straws.
Any advice would be appreciated.
-Stampee