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Four Stepper Motors ? — Parallax Forums

Four Stepper Motors ?

BladerunnerBladerunner Posts: 25
edited 2004-11-17 05:58 in BASIC Stamp
HI
I am new to motor control and want to know if four stepper motors can be controlled by on Basic Stamp.
If not what could be a solution?

Thanks
Kevin

Comments

  • Dave PatonDave Paton Posts: 285
    edited 2004-11-16 23:48
    Sure, it just depends what control scheme you pick, since the Stamp can't drive them directly. There are a bunch of serial stepper controllers out there, which makes it easy. If you go with a parallel controlled scheme, like my favorite chip (the National LMD18245, 7 control pins, used in pairs for bipolar steppers), you can mux them together, or user serial to parallel shift registers (the 74HC595 is a popular choice).

    Out of curiosity, what are you going to br doing with the steppers?

    -dave

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  • BladerunnerBladerunner Posts: 25
    edited 2004-11-16 23:59
    Thanks Dave
    I will be using a photodiode to step all the motors at the same time… So when there is light detected the motors will be on, no light they will be off. It is an art project and I am working with unipolar steppers

    Kevin
  • Jon WilliamsJon Williams Posts: 6,491
    edited 2004-11-17 01:06
    You probably want to use a couple 74HC595s and ULN2803s to drive the steppers -- this will free up some pins; in fact, you'll need only three pins to control all four motors. Your code will have to be tidy if you want to motors to rotate smoothly. If it's just a matter of moving from one position to another, it shouldn't be too tough. We have a book called StampWorks that you can download that shows how to use the 74HC595 and simple stepper control.

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    Jon Williams
    Applications Engineer, Parallax
    Dallas Office
  • Dave PatonDave Paton Posts: 285
    edited 2004-11-17 05:58
    The drivers will of course depend heavily on the motors you choose. The ULN2003 Jon mentioned is good up to about 1A under normal conditions. What kind of steppers are you planning to use? The data sheets are easily Googleable and there are some wonderful app notes too.

    Jon is right about keeping the code tight. You'll need to make sure you shiftout the new step values quickly enough that the motors don't stutter.

    -dave

    ▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔
    This is not a sig. This is a duck. Quack.
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