Can 7.4/6v Servos Be Fried By A 11v Battery?

Question

My humanoid has a 11v battery, and i'm afraid that it might fry the 7.4/6v micro servos. Will this fry the servos?

Dunning-Kruger · Answer

Let's put it this way... There is a reason why electronics (including things like servos) have a min and max voltage rating... Over volt them and bad things can happen... My advice is buy a battery that matches your servos or use a voltage reg to bring down the 11.1v to 7.4v

Sudo the Banned · Answer

some of the servos im using require a 11v voltage, and the micros need a 7.4/6v, so do these regulators only attach to certain ports?

CardboardHacker · Answer

Depends on what setup you do. One regulator per 1-3 servos or regulate the board with a high amperage regulator and power the 11v servos seperately from the same battery, but not through a regulator.

Sudo the Banned · Answer

Where can I buy a regulator for 2 6v and 2 7.4v servos? any suggestions? the other 20 require 11v (dynamixel 12a's) and I REALLY don't wanna fry those.

MovieMaker · Answer

Search for the BUCK regulators or DC to DC stepdown voltage regulator on ebay. Be carefull to put one regulator to one servo. They are cheap. If you put too many servos to that regulator above it's max amp allowance, it will get hot and come apart because it is mostly surface mount technology. My Honest Opinion. Hope it helps. some will argue that you can run many servos on one regulator. the proof will be in the pudding.

Sudo the Banned · Answer

Cool! Can anyone give me a link to where I can actually buy some of these? I'm new to this, and I have no idea where to get 4 of them for each servo port.

Sudo the Banned · Answer

Anyone?

Doombot · Answer

These are cool...you can get them cheaper but I use these because they have input/output volatge display so its easy to monitor... DROK adjustable buck regulators

Sudo the Banned · Answer

Thanks for showing me those. Is there a manual for it? Also, is it small? the robot is only 16 in. tall, and the body is fairly small. Thanks!

RobertL184 · Answer

If you are looking for something smaller and don't need the display. You can try one of these

https://www.pololu.com/category/131/step-down-voltage-regulators

There are both standard regulators and buck/switching regulator styles available.

or something like this one:

https://www.pololu.com/product/2120

You probably need an adjustable unit. Have a voltmeter handy these don't have the nice display.

Size is mostly determined by the amount of current you need to provide.

Sudo the Banned · Answer

Those first ones are the ones i need. One more question. How do those connect?

Sudo the Banned · Answer

Does anyone know how those connect?

Robot Doc · Answer

According to the website, the regulators have solder points that headers can be soldered to or terminals blocks can be soldered in and then wires can be inserted into the blocks and screws hold the wires by tightening them. Both are included with the regulator.

Sudo the Banned · Answer

Oh. Well, if I have to get those, I will. Is there a 6v regulator where it just snaps right into the servo port and the wire can just plug into it? That is, if regulators like that even exist

Sudo the Banned · Answer

What im trying to find is a regulator that doesn't need to be soldered in. Just a regulator that snaps into the servo port, and then the wire can plug into wire connected to the servo.

Sudo the Banned · Answer

How would these connect? https://www.centuryheli.com/products/productdetail.htm?prtnm=CN2133&pageid=810 Would they just snap into the servo port like i wanted?

RobertL184 · Answer

Sounds like your interested in something like this https://www.troybuiltmodels.com/items/QRSRV.html https://www.amainhobbies.com/product_info.php/cPath/1574_199/products_id/193539/n/Western-Robotics-Tail-Servo-Step-Down-Voltage-Regulator-w-LED-Indicator The issues are expense and your input voltage. One for each servo can turn into a huge amount of money. All of the inline voltage regulators will only step 6v or 7.4v down to 5 to 5.2 volts that I have run across.

Sudo the Banned · Answer

https://www.troybuiltmodels.com/items/QRSRV.html So, would those be able to step down a 12v current to a 6/7v current? thanks!

Robot Doc · Answer

Those are designed to step down a LI-po 7.2 volt battery to 5.2 volts. They will not work for a 12 volt battery.

Sudo the Banned · Answer

So is there any kind of regulator that will bring down a 12v current to a 6v/7v?

Dave Schulpius · Answer

Everything you asked for in a converter is in the first link Doombot pointed you to. With that unit you will not have to solder or even use a volt meter to know how much voltage your outputting. It's small also 2.5" x 1.5". Input Voltage: DC 4.040V Output Voltage: 1.25V37V Output Current: 2A(normal and stable), 3A Max. Here's the link again: Dork It that unit is too big then the Pololu converters are great units. Cant go wrong with Pololu. However you'll have to learn how to solder to attach the header pin. You'll also need to get the proper Molex connectors or jumpers to attach to the header pins. Some people like to solder the power wires directly to the board to avoid using connectors but I think that's a bad idea. How are you going to disconnect if you need to change something. A word of advice and I don't mean to seem condescending. If your planning on building robots you really need to learn how to solder and use a multi meter. The robots you will be able to buy through the store here at EZ Robots will be mostly plug and play. However if you plan on building your own from scratch or other platform you may need some more advanced skills. Learning simple soldering and a basic understanding of electricity and electronics will open many doors for you and take you on some real cool journeys in robotics. Youtube has thousands of vids on most anything you will need to know about these two topics. At the Instructables website there are millions of tutorials also. Here's that link: Instructables And it so rewarding and fun! Isn't that what it's all about anyway? By the way Current is Amps. Voltage just pushes the current through the circuit. Good luck, Dave Schulpius

Sudo the Banned · Answer

Thanks. I'll be getting those soon. It looks like all you have to do is strip the wires and put them in the in port and screw them down. Am I correct?

Dave Schulpius · Answer

Yes, very easy. Just be careful when you tighten down the set screws. Hold the connector with your fingers when you tighten it down and don't over do it. It's easy to twist the connector and crack the solder joint underneath. If that happens you will have no or intermittent power. The only way to fix that is to reflow the solder joint. EDIT: one more thing. Make sure you don't attach anything that will draw more then 3 amps max to this unit. If you do you will burn it out. You may need more then one if your servos (all added together) draw more then this can provide. Think of it like sucking all the air out of a plastic bottle. If you do this and make a vacuum the bottle will crunch.

Sudo the Banned · Answer

One more quick question: there's 3 wires, but two ports. Do I just put 2 wires into one port and one in the other?

Dave Schulpius · Answer

See my edit above for an important additional message. As far as the extra wire: that's the signal wire that go directly from the outside pin of one digital port of the EZB to the servo signal wire. You run the power wires (+ and -) from your power source (the EZB it's self or and external power supply like a battery) through this unit and to the servo.

Sudo the Banned · Answer

How many Amps are in a volt? or is that even correct? (ps, sorry about all the questions)

Dave Schulpius · Answer

Two different things. Simplistically, The amps are the power (electrons) that runs the motor and the voltage is the pressure that pushes the electrons through the circuit. Imagine shaking up a bottle of soda and uncorking it. The Amps would be the soda and the pressure pushing it out of the bottle would be the voltage. There's really a little more to it then that but you should get the idea for this description. It's really not a compacted theory and one worth learning about.

Sudo the Banned

Can 7.4/6V Servos Be Fried By A 11V Battery?

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