Stepper Motor Driver v2.3 2A $20 !!!

[Lee Roberts]

Hey guys check these out:



This board allows you to control one stepper motor, as well as receive input from two limit switches. It is based around the Allegro A3982 Stepper Motor Driver with Translator. The A3982 is capable of driving up to 2A per coil. This board was designed to improve upon and replace the v1.x series of stepper drivers which are based upon the venerable L297/L298 stepper drivers. The A3982 offers a number of improvements:

• Only one chip to solder, as opposed to the two chip L297/L298 combo
• Superior DMOS technology (no heatsink required!)
• Built-in diodes and synchronous rectification (no large diode array!)
• Much cheaper and smaller than the L297/L298 (about $10 cheaper, total!)

The downside is that the board is mostly SMT, although we made a conscious design decision to stick with some of the largest and easiest to solder SMT components on the market. We used 1206 sized resistors and the A3982 itself is in a SOIC package.

The board is very easy to put together, even for a beginner. Using a technique such as solder paste + hot plate, the board becomes ridiculously easy to solder. I found that it is much easier to solder SMT boards in this fashion than to solder pin after pin manually with through-hole components.



There is loads of information about these drivers over on: Reprap.org

You can get the full driver in a kit for $20 !



Full Kit

1. Buy the DIY kit (PCB + Components) from MakerBot Industries

Raw Components

1. Buy the bare PCB from MakerBot Industries
2. Buy the components with ease

Files


You can download the release file from SourceForge that has a bunch of helpful files for this board. It contains:

• GERBER files for getting it manufactured
• PDF files of the schematic, copper layers, and silkscreen
• Eagle source files for modification
• 3D rendered image as well as POVRay scene file
• exerciser code to test your board.

If you just want to peek at the files easily, check them out on Thingiverse.



What do you think, it was the cost that was attractive to me ?

[Conan257]

I'd so buy these as it would allow me to easily use a PC power supply...

The only drawback is that you have to solder your own components on, i'm fairly experienced with soldering but get the shakes so would rather not solder chips on...

Pre-made versions would go down a storm.

[John S]

I agree with pre-made, at least you have some guarantee it will work out the box.

I have never had much success with SMT components, it may be the fact that I have problems getting the MiG down to under 30 amps ?

.

[michael]

Has any one considered using

Driver25PS is a new improved 2.5A Bipolar stepper motor drive board.

Specification

* Popular design using the Allegro 3977 chip
* PS (Power save input) is switchable and reduces hold current to approx 30% keeping chips, motors and power supplies cool. This function is optional and needs a compatible parallel interface to work.
* Unplugable none reversible motor connector
* Improved layout, with all connections on one side and provision for vertical mounting bracket.
* Two phase PWM operation.
* Uses Internal synchronous rectification to reduce board size and heat dissipation.
* Includes thermal shutdown, UVLO and crossover current protection.
* 1/8,1/4,1/2 or full step selectable.
* Dip switch adjustable stepper currents 1, 1.5, 2 & 2.5 amps
* Step, Direction, Enable and PS (Power save) line inputs.
* On board 5V regulator, single supply line (24V - 30V DC regulated supply recommended)
* Maximum 35V @ 2.5A per phase motor output.
* LED indicator display of step, direction, enable and power.
* Dip switch settings for step increment, enable, sleep & current.
* Board size 97 X 60 mm. FR4, immersion gold, 2oz copper, RoHS compliant.
* Loop through power connections.




£18 kit (SMD chip already soldered) or £23 built/tested, He's based in stoke!

From http://www.diycnc.co.uk

[michael]

As for a PSU, I ran 3 of these drivers set to 2 amp from a Laptop PSU on ebay 20v 6amp for £12, Loads available and come with a 2.5mm connector.

Cheap alternative if current is sufficient.

Michael

[Conan257]

I'd like to be able to use a pc power supply (12v) to power everything, but 12v is usually a little low...

Has anyone got any experience with using 12v to power stepper controllers/steppers? Mainly as i'd like a single psu for computer and steppers so I can house it all in a single box.

[michael]

12v Was not enough for these drivers, I agree it would be nice to use a ATX supply as there cheap powerful plus you could use the 5v rail for I/O.

Other problem is you won't acheive anything like the same RPM at 12v you would expect at 24v

Michael.

[John S]

They are very nice drives for the money.
Where Roy scores is he' is a design engineer in real life and can do all this himself whereas others [ no names ] rip other designs off.

Where is shows is put one of Roy's boards on a scope whilst it's operating and see the signal.
Then do the same with other drives and see the dirty signal they turn out.

John S.

[michael]

They are very nice drives for the money.
Where Roy scores is he' is a design engineer in real life and can do all this himself whereas others [ no names ] rip other designs off.

Where is shows is put one of Roy's boards on a scope whilst it's operating and see the signal.
Then do the same with other drives and see the dirty signal they turn out.

John S.

Couldn't agree more, I have had 8 of those boards and a few of the previous version without PS feature. Roy is great bloke and very helpful. I killed a couple of KIT boards by putting network resistor in wrong way and he fixed and returned them free of charge.

Michael.

[Smiler]

I agree with pre-made, at least you have some guarantee it will work out the box.

I have never had much success with SMT components, it may be the fact that I have problems getting the MiG down to under 30 amps ?

.

Need to go pulsed TIG from that point John.


Jeff