beginner tutorial questions

[Jaevko]

Working my way through the beginner robot tutorial and decided to stop where it mentions RC and do that real quick (link below)

http://www.societyofrobots.com/remote_control_robot.shtml

I bought a Venom VR2T transmitter/receiver. Four questions (please focus on questions 1 and 2, the others I can figure out if you guys don't know but I'm REALLY stuck on the first two).

1) The receiver has three pins for each channel, but there are no colors or anything. Going from left-to-right I assume it goes signal, power, ground, or ground, power, signal since my servo (an HS-311) has those colors in that order. But which one is it? I assume plugging the power into the signal slot would be bad...

2) The top "channel" on the receiver has 3 slots and is labeled VCC. I assume this is where I put the power into? Positive end to where the red slot would go and negative end to where the black slot would go? (exactly where is based on the answer to question 1).

3) The guy in the video doesn't seem to use a capacitor.  Should I use one?  If so is a 220 microF one good enough? Where do I put it and which way/direction/orientation do I connect it?

4) I have battery packs but I also have a scientific regulated power supply thingy...can I just turn that up to 6V instead of using batteries for now?

BTW the receiver can take up to 9V and the servo is supposed to take 6V

Thanks!

[Soeren]

Hi,

The manual would be a good starting point. Anyone unfamiliar with the Venom range can only guess.
You can download the manual from:
http://www.venom-group.com/itemdesc.asp?ic=8184

And if that doesn't help, drop them an email - they should know.

[Jaevko]

Hm, I don't see the answers to questions 1 and 2 in the manual, although the answers could be hidden in pages 3-4 (pdf pages 4-5) in a form I don't understand. Since the pins were unlabeled I figured there was a standard, I didn't just post all those questions without looking at the manual

As for questions 3-4, I don't think the answers would be specific to this product, I would think anyone with experience would be able to answer them.

Thanks in advance for your help!

EDIT: I'll drop them an email tomorrow regarding questions 1-2, however since theres nothing on the receiver or in the manual (that I see...might be missing something?) I would think there is a standard order of power/ground/signal that the company assumes its customers know

[Jaevko]

Double edit: oops hit quote instead of modify the first time!

[billhowl]

questions 1: Compare the Rx and the connector, you will find there is a slot at the signal pin.

questions 2: Yes, you connect the power to labeled VCC, is in the page2 of the manual(Page3 of pdf)

[Jaevko]

Thanks tons! Now the servo doesn't have a slot on the signal side, so for future reference, is that the convention for things without colored wires (side with slot = signal so match white/yellow to side with slot)? Thanks again for your help!!

[Soeren]

Hi,

Now the servo doesn't have a slot on the signal side, so for future reference, is that the convention for things without colored wires (side with slot = signal so match white/yellow to side with slot)?

There's no such thing as a standard pinout for servos despite the rather limited ways to connect them.
I'll agree that their manuals are severely lacking, but they were probably made for people getting a total setup for eg. a car (mainly ESC and steering servo) and so, they just plug in the keyed connectors.

I'm not at all sure whether the signal pin is the one nearest the key - could be, but I'd make certain before plugging anything in.

The R&D team of Venom Racing are on the RC-Groups forum and seems very helpfull, so either ask there, or call/email the company to be sure of all connections.