7. Troubleshooting

The following are some suggestions for ways you can troubleshoot your qik:

• Test for life: With nothing more than power connected, look for a green LED heartbeat. If you do not see the green LED flashing, you either lack sufficient power (e.g. the voltage is out of range or the power supply is too noisy) or your qik is damaged. See Section 3.a for more information about power requirements.
• Test your serial connection: Put on the BAUD1 jumper (with the BAUD2 and CRC jumpers off), connect your TTL serial control source to the qik’s RX pin or RS-232 serial control source to the qik’s SIN pin, reset the board, and send 0xBF (191) at 115.2 kbps. You should see the red error LED turn on. If you then send the command 0x82 (130) at 115.2 kbps, you should see the green LED pulse on (this might be hard to distinguish from the heartbeat LED), the red LED turn off, and, if you have a connection to the qik’s serial output, you should receive the byte 0x40 (64). You should try this first with a computer running our Serial Transmitter Utility, which will help you determine if the problem is with your code.
• Test your motors: Try running the qik in demo mode first without motors connected and then with motors connected (see Section 3.d for more information about demo mode). If the qik experiences problems only with motors connected, this is a sign that your problems are likely due to insufficient motor power or motor-induced noise. Ensure that your motor power supply can provide the current your motors are drawing, and ensure that your motors are not trying to draw more current than the qik can supply (13 A continuous per motor channel, 30 A peak). Take steps to limit motor noise (e.g. solder 0.1 uF capacitors across your motor terminals and use short, twisted motor leads).

If your problems persist, please post on our support forum or contact us directly.