Low-level control of motors of AL5D PLTW Robotic Arm Kit

Lynxmotion Robot Arms
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Hello!

I am a Robotics Ph.D. student at Khalifa University and working on the control of Manipulators. I would like to know if low-level Control possible for AL5D PLTW Robotic Arm Ki.

By low-level control, I intend to confirm whether we can use the actuator’s input (for example motor voltage or PWM at the joints) to control the angular positions of the respective links of this manipulator. Usually, we have PID controllers installed inside the DC servo motors. My project would be about implementing other forms of controllers (different from PIDs) at the joints in the DC servomotors and perform the position control.

Thank you,
Kind regards,
Ahmed Rehan
Graduate Teaching Assistant / PhD candidate
Robotics Engineering, Main Campus
PO Box 127788, Abu Dhabi, UAE

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@ahmed481 Welcome to the RobotShop Community. The AL5 series use servo motors from Hitec which are not intended to provide any low level control: there are only three wires in: GND / V / Signal, where the signals is the PWM pulse corresponding to the desired angular position which the onboard (internal) electronics handle. You could hack each servo to make use of an external DC motor controller, but that would obviously void the warranty. There are not many robotic arms which allow for direct manipulation of each motor (since things can go wrong resulting in issues, breaking parts or burnt motors (how would that be covered under warranty?).

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