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Citrus Circuits

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Basic Sensors

Lesson 7

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What are Sensors?

  • Provide information
  • Allow for automation
  • More precise than observation

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Types

Rotation

  • Mag Encoders

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Limit

  • Magnetic/Hall Effect

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Visual

  • Color
  • Proxy
  • Limelights

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CANcoders

Mag Encoders

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  • Senses rotation using magnetic field.
  • Encoders are most commonly used in FRC to mark the rotation a motor does, which is helpful during autos.
  • Many motors on robots also have encoders connected to them because they are quite key to the functioning on the robot.

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Hall Effect/Limit Switch

Magnetic Limit Switches/Hall Effect

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  • They have 2 types: linear (analog) and digital
  • It is a type of sensor which can detect magnitude of a magnetic field using the Hall effect
  • A hall effect works by using semiconductors (like silicon) to measure the changing voltage (rpm) when placed in a magnetic field, this allows it to measure the magnetic field
  • This allows the robot or other things to measure how many rounds the wheels on the robot takes and this tells us what specific position the wheel is in

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Visual (Color/Prox)

Color/Prox Sensors

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  • Senses color and proximity
  • Measures colors and various target distances
  • Color measurements: red, green, blue, and alpha (clear) values
  • Color data best collected closer for strongest color differentiation

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Visual (Limelight)

Limelight

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Sees retroreflectors/vision targets (Apriltags)

  • Plug-and-play smart camera for FRC
  • Better on a static ip for better boot time and DHCP assignments have some issues and this helps with that.