Introduction to Motor Control (Workshop 4) - Detailed Guide

Guide Contents

I. DC Motors

II. Servo Motors

III. Stepper Motors

IV. Demo Part 1: Assembling the Circuit

V. Demo Part 2: The Code

I. DC Motors

DC Motors come in two variants - brushed and brush-less. Most DC motors are brushed, especially small motors. They use graphite brushes, magnets, and coils of wire to create motion when a voltage is applied. Brushed motors are good when positional actuary is not important. Brush-less motors do not have graphite brushes and use sensors or a separate motor driver. They have less friction but are more complex to use. (See Workshop Guide 3 for a demo involving a DC motor.)

II. Servo Motors

Servo Motors use a small DC motor, a potentiometer, and a gear train. The gear reduction applied to the DC motor increases the output torque, making the motor easy to use. Servos specialize in high positional accuracy.

IEEE Winter Design Competition!

Don't have anything to do over the four long weeks of winter break? Enter the Winter Design Competition!

The Winter Design Competition is almost exactly like the Open Design Competition except for a few small differences:

       - It runs from now until January 28th (The tentative date of the ODC Workshop 5).
       - It has a prompt.
       - No need to sign up.

The prompt of the competition is simple - make something that can teach someone math. It doesn't matter what shape, size, or method it takes, just make it teach math and that's it!

The project will be judged by our officers using the official rubric for the final Open Design Competition and there will be prizes for the winner and runner up! (Official rubric attached in a forthcoming email.)

First Prize: A Raspberry Pi (literally a computer the size of a credit card) and 20 bonus points towards your final Open Design Competition score in March!

Second Prize: A $20 Gift Card to Sparkfun and 10 points towards the Open Design Competition!

This is a great opportunity to stay fresh over break and sharpen your design skills for the competition. Not only that, but you might win an awesome prize and get a leg up on the competition in March!

Good luck!

Cameron

Workshop 4, Motor Control Tonight (Tuesday, 12/10) at 7pm (TIME CHANGE)

Notice - Workshop 4 has been moved to 7PM in ENGR 100 (location is the same).

Besides an exciting presentation and demo on motor control, will have pizza and drinks and will be going over the Winter Design Competition!

See you there!

Open Design Workshop 4 - Motor Control - Tuesday December 10th at 6pm (With Free Pizza!)

Take a break from studying this Tuesday the 10th at 6pm and come join us in Engineering 100 for the last Arduino workshop of the semester! You'll get to learn all about motor control with the Arduino, play around with the DC and Servo motors in your kits, get the official scoop on the Winter Break Design Competition and enjoy some free Pizza!

See you there!

Cameron

IEEE