Power issues

Submitted by pas81 on Sat, 11/02/2013 - 14:11

Forums:

I have built the PyCy as per instructions on the site but seem to be having power issues. The Raspberry Pi is powering fine off the batteries connected via pin 2 but when I activate a motor the Raspberry Pi reboots. It works fine if I test it without pin 2 connected and with the Pi powered from the mains so I assume its a power issue. Anyone else had this and come up with a solution. The only one I can think of currently is having 2 batteries but i'm not quite sure how i'm going to wire that up.

Thanks

piborg's picture

piborg

Sun, 11/03/2013 - 12:38

Have you tried adding the two resistors in series with the motors:

Powering the Raspberry Pi from a second battery pack is a better solution, it means the motors can run batteries flat without upsetting the the Raspberry Pi, giving PiCy a much better battery life.
If you run with separate battery packs what you want to do is connect + from the battery pack for the motors to V+, and + from the battery pack for the Raspberry Pi to the LDO regulator (as shown above), but not to V+, both battery pack - still get connected to GND (which should also be connected to the regulator).

In summary:

  • RPi battery pack
    • + -> LDO regulator +
    • - -> LDO regulator - and GND on PicoBorg
  • Motor battery pack
    • + -> V+ on PicoBorg
    • - -> GND on PicoBorg
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