Choosing a battery for a small first robot

[Warhawk87]

Short, simple, to the point, best 2 cents ive heard in a while lol.  Thanks for the link and your help!

[waltr]

and it says it needs external components like capacitors and resistors to work

Yes, it does need all of the parts shown in the sample schematic.

Building something like this is an intermediate to advanced project. With all the pre-built charges available buying one is a good idea.

[Warhawk87]

Ok so I'm just going to go with a regular charger, which brings up the question again, how do I connect the battery to the charger if I have to remove the adapter(to connect it to my microcontroller I need the bare leads)?

[waltr]

Several solutions have been presented.
I use a double throw switch to disconnect the battery from the processor and connect the battery to a connector for the charger.
I have also pulled the battery connector off the processor to connect a charger.
Have also use jumper leads and clipped onto to terminals that connected to the battery. Not the most recommended as reversing the connections or shorting the clips is easy.
If the processor board has a regulator that can take the charger output voltage then disconnecting the batter from the processor isn't required. Just wire in a connector to go to the charger.

[Warhawk87]

Ok ill have to look at the board specs again to see if it does that.... Thanks for the help!

[Yuveer]

Hi Guys

I'm new to robotics. I have a 6 Volt Battery supply and i want to give my microcontroller 5V and my dc motors 3V. Should i use a Low drop out regulator for both the microcontroller and the dc motors? My batteries are capable of 2700 mAh which i think is highly sufficent as i only need my robot to be in operation for maximum 15 minutes.

Yuveer

[joe61]

Also, i wanted to have 2 dc motors to run the wheels but after a quick glance i only found 12v and higher dc motors.... If i go with a 6v battery, does that mean im stuck with servos?

No there are lower voltage batteries available. I've gotten some from Pololu that I'm happy with

http://www.pololu.com/catalog/category/22

Joe

[waltr]

The 6V Pololu metal gearmotors do work very well. I use two of the 100:1 micro-metal motors with the Pololu wheels and encoders.
The Bot weights about 10oz (0.28kg) and it is very hard to stall these motors.