Module 03 · Phase 2: Hardware engineering
Actuators, Motors, Electrical & Power Integration
Size motors and gearboxes, budget voltage and current, choose a battery, estimate runtime and keep electrical noise out of sensor measurements.
This overview is open. 8 of 8 guides are written; the others show Coming soon until they are complete and tested.
Questions this module answers
- How do I calculate motor torque and speed requirements and select a gearbox?
- How do I estimate robot operating time and select a battery?
- How do I size a DC-DC converter and find voltage drops?
- How do I diagnose motor overheating and prevent electrical interference in sensors?
What it covers
- DC, BLDC, stepper and servo motors
- Drivers and ESCs
- Harmonic, cycloidal and conventional gearboxes
- Battery selection and BMS
- Power distribution and DC-DC converters
- Voltage/current budgeting
- Grounding and noise
- Cables, thermal management, protection
Guides and design decisions
A. Engineering Guides (5)
B. Design & Selection (3)
Diagnostics, tools and challenges
C. Troubleshooting (2)
- Motor overheatsCase temperature rises or the driver thermally limits.
- Robot stops after running for several hoursStable at first, then a shutdown or stall after a long run.
D. Interactive tools (2)
- Motor Sizing CalculatorTorque and speed from payload, wheel size, slope and acceleration.
- Power Budget & Battery Runtime EstimatorSum loads, size the battery and estimate runtime with stated derating.
E. Design challenges (1)
- Challenge 1: Design an Autonomous Mobile RobotIndoor differential-drive robot: sensors, motor sizing, compute, power, ROS 2, LiDAR+IMU, SLAM, Nav2, tuning and validation.
Practical deliverables
- Motor sizing calculator
- Power budget calculator
- Battery runtime estimator
- Electrical integration checklist
Prerequisites
No existing FixTheRobot lesson covers this topic yet; the module is self-contained.