If you're seeing this message, it means we're having trouble loading external resources on our website.

If you're behind a web filter, please make sure that the domains *.kastatic.org and *.kasandbox.org are unblocked.

Main content

Click n' stick base & batteries

In this video we show you how to connect Spider's motors to his tap light base. Created by Karl Wendt.

Want to join the conversation?

Video transcript

So in this video, we're going to attach our tap light base and thread the wires from our motors and from our batteries through the tap light base so that we can connect them to the parts of our bot that we need to connect them to. So we're going to thread those wires through. Those are the motor wires. And it's important that we line up those holes. You can see there's three holes on the tap light. We want to make sure we line those wires up with those holes and pull the wires through there. So once we've got those lined up, we can sort of bend them out of the way. Make sure everything is right in the center and everything is lined up the way we want to be. So the tap light base has double stick tape. So we'll peel that double stick tape off. And once we have it lined up the way we want it, we'll double check and make sure that it's in the perfect location above our motors and batteries. And then we'll press it down and make sure that it's in place. So we want it right in the center. If it's off the center, then the wheels may rub up against the side and could cause some problems for us. So it's really important that tap light base is right in the center. And so we've got our motor wires already run through, and now we're going to connect our battery wires. So the battery wires need to come in through the same hole on the right side there. And we'll just connect our nine volt battery connector. So one thing that's important is, when you're connecting the nine volt battery connector, you have to realize that the power is then able to flow through the wires. And so, the two ends of the wires, because they're a similar length, may end up touching one another, which means they could short out and heat up a lot and cause problems for you. So you want to tape off one end of the wire until you get it connected so that they don't short out and cause your battery to heat up or cause the wires to heat up and basically ruin your battery. So make sure you tape off one of those wires while you're connecting everything together. So we've got one side connected. And then we're just going to do the other side. And again, we'll use our nine volt battery connector. We're going to thread it through the holes and connect it to our battery. Now the thing is, on the battery on the front, we're going to connect the wire-- we're going to run the wires from the battery through the front hole instead of through the side hole, because it'll be closer to where we want it to end up on our motor controller. So that's how to thread the wires through.