Does anyone have a circuit that works?
I used several other types with no problem.
I like the packaging of the sensor as supplied by
Lynx, but I can’t get the darn things to work
d 
Are you using a Basic Atom, Atom PRO, or other BS2 compatible controller on a Mini-Atom Bot Board? If so, the Sharp IR Ranger as sold by Lynxmotion is plug and play with this setup. You just have to plug the sensor into one of the analog inputs, and write code or use existing code to read and process the reading from the IR Ranger.
8-Dale
He’s using the IR detector, Not the ranger.
You don’t need an external circuit, you can plug it straight into any input on your microcontroller. Have a look at the datasheet.
It looks like the output goes high (5v) when it detects an IR signal at 38kHz. So you just have to decode the data sent from your remote.