(the second motor is in 5, 6, 7, 8 (I have a bigger ic)
Only the first motor works. The other just wobbles back and forth. Does annyone know what I have done wrong?
PS the circuit worked tempromentaly when I breadborded it on 2 seperate ICs. I thorght that the tempromental-nuss was due to a dodgey connection somewhere (which I am plauged with on breadboards)
assuming the motors are the same model, try swapping the 2 motors with each other, and leave the wires and connections all the same, to see if the problem travels with the motor or not.
double-check every connection for continuity.
try different slots on the breadboard.
make sure your battery has enough juice for the task.
make sure your code is properly talking to the right MCU output pins.
make sure you are complying with the voltage and current limits of the IC’s and motors.
Make sure you have the right operation voltage (Normally 12V for stepper motors). Make also sure your battery has the capacity to power a stepper motor. Depending on the size of the stepper, they can draw a lot of current.
The Data Sheet says 3.15 V for these motors. A full Ampere per coil, but only 3.15 V.
Note: the darlington eats some of your volts and may not be able to deliver all that current. Also, your wire and connections may introduce (variable!) resistance to the system. There may be the cause of the differences between motors/experiments.
…so there is a limmit to how much I can draw from my battery at once. For example: I have 2500 mAh batteries so they should be able to provide 2A (+ for the darlington) for a bit over an hour but they actualy have a max current draw so even though theres the capacity something else has stoped it???
if so how do I know the limmit of my batteries (they are NiMH if that helps) and if they cant mannage it then what kind of batteries can?
wow this is harder than it looks, mayby I should have just saved up longer and then just bought something to do this for me. Thankyou for your advice anyway
do you have a more complete schematic showing your MCU and both motors and the battery, and other components like resistors and capacitors?
whats the exact battery and MCU you have?
did you do everything we suggested earlier like swapping the 2 motors? this will tell you if the problem is the motor or not.
show us your code. does your code “Excite” the motor as described in the datasheet?
does the problem only show up when running both motors at same time, or problem shows up whenever you run 2nd motor?
you are correct, running a stepper motor is not always easy. but if you remain patient and double-check everything 2 or 3 times you can do it. dont assume anything is obvious. I have found that sometimes you must verify 2 + 2 = 4 at least 8 times. :-)
Step2: 'with un possibily un nessesary highs and lows just to see if it changes anything.
low Orrange2, Yellow2
high Blue2, Red2
pause PauseTime
low Red2, Orrange2
High Yellow2, Blue2
pause PauseTime
low Blue2, Red2
high Orrange2, Yellow2
pause PauseTime
low Yellow2, Blue2
high Red2, Orrange2
pause PauseTime
Return
Im using a Picaxe 28X1 chip on their 28pin learing board (like in the first robot tutorial)
I dont have a complete schematic so I shal describe. There is the normal picaxe board (like I said) so the output from the microcontroller goes through 330 ohm resistors and then through a wire to the darlington chip. I have the darlington chip wired up just as in the picture (i got it from google) but my chip has 8 inputs and outputs so its just plugged in like the picture but with 2 motors. I have the outputs of the darlington chip going straight to the motor. The darlington chip runs of the motor’s power supply (as in the picture). I just have the battery soldered onto stripboard and then the relevent connections soldered onto the same strip: I have no capacitors or anything to smooth it.
I have tried the motors with 3 and with 4 of each battery: duracell AA (alkanine), Ansmann energy didgital AA (NiMH, 2850mAh) and Hähnel Rechargeabble AA (NiMH,1800 mAh).
When I swapped the motors it made no difference: the one marked in the code as number 2 still just jittered and the one as number 1 rotated contunuously. I have the same problem with number 2 wether the 1st one is plugged in or not.
I think that the amps is much for the darlington :( however, I dont know of any other chips with higher amp caperbility. At the moment I am just running it for a few seconds anyway at a time so I doubt it will have burnt out yet and there are loads of schematics round the internet for steppermotor drivers that use that chip so mayby the datasheets I have read have been wrong??
Anyway, thanks for all of the feedback everyone: this is a big help
Even the normal batteries (NiMh and others) have daasheets. Not all brands and models publish them, but you could google generic AA NiMh cells from any main brand to get a feel for max current draw. Or whatever standard type you are using in this case.
Thanks to all of your realy good feed back ive mannaged to get them both running at the same time: on on a breadboard, the other in a circuit =) Typicaly I dont have enough headder pins to make a new circuit so that will have to go on hold for a while but again: thankyou!!!
