Im sure most of us recover parts from where they can be scavanged
I recently picked up a "broken" printer/scanner from work. Ive pulled out a whole stack of working DC motors with encoders, belts, pulleys, cogs and rubber wheels.
It also has a cool looking little strip light which must be the light source for the scanner. Its like a flourescent tube, but tiny and slightly flexible.
Being a factory built item of course there are no clues as to what connection does what, however on some of the small boards (such as those holding the encoders and motor power supply combined as one board on the back of the motor) the traces are nice and clear so we can work out which wire does what.
Does anyone have any tips for establishing voltage requirements for these parts? would it be fair to assume that anything "electronic" is going to be running on a standard 5v? would the motors be similar or the same?
one could "try" it with 5v as a starting point, and then make a judgement based on how it runs (and try 9V and 12v perhaps) or is there a more definative way of doing this?
Any info would be greatly appreciated, and if appropriate ill try and compile it all into a blog post for future reference!
