Battery Testing

The following is a plot of of Power/Voltage (watts) vs. Distance (meters), with the same commands and test done at various voltages.

The starting voltage was 8.35 volts. For each trial, the AEV was subjected to the same commands, the data was recorded, and the voltage of the battery was taken after the trial. This new voltage measure corresponds to the voltage of the battery at the start of the next test. This process was repeated for 4 tests.

As seen by the plot, each test used similar amounts of power, yet the tests had minimal effect on the voltage of the battery. The voltage difference ranged from .01 to 0.03 volts. Furthermore, the decreasing voltage did not produce a reliable trend on distance traveled. The difference in distance traveled could be due to other variables, but overall it is negligible, at least in the short runs like the test runs in this lab. Therefore, no changes will be made to the team’s approach of the MCR. The decreasing voltage is likely to have minimal impact on the AEV over its entire run.