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Controlling a 1.5-3v dc motor with BS2 board — Parallax Forums

Controlling a 1.5-3v dc motor with BS2 board

herculeshercules Posts: 4
edited 2013-04-29 07:27 in BASIC Stamp
I need the motor to turn on for a few seconds, and that's it. Initally I thought I'd just plug it into the pins on the left, like I would do with an LED, but that is not working and I have no idea why. Any help would be great, thanks!

Comments

  • Mike GreenMike Green Posts: 23,101
    edited 2013-04-29 07:27
    Any microcontroller I/O pin can only provide about 20-50mA of current and pretty much any motor requires much more than that, particularly when starting. You need a switching transistor to provide the current and you need a protective diode to prevent the motor's back EMF (voltage produced when the magnetic field in the motor's coils collapses when the current is cut off) from destroying the Stamp's I/O pin.

    See the Nuts and Volts Column #6 for details. Go to Parallax's main webpage and click on the Resources tab, then click on the Nuts and Volts Columns index link and find Volume #1, Number 6.
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