TinyTwo Speed Controllers

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Rapidrory
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Re: TinyTwo Speed Controllers

Post by Rapidrory »

It's only a 8 pin PIC chip with 6 I/O: 2 for servo signal input, and 4 for PWM signals to motor driver chips.. No spare pins there i'm afraid. But if I did a mixed and non mixed version, It's unlikely that you'd need to be able to switch between the two settings as most people have either a transmitter with mixing or without... It's easy enough for me to program them with different versions of the firmware before shipping though.
If someone really wanted to change it they could either get a copy of the firmware off me and reprogram it themselves if they have the right hardware, or ship it back to me and get me to change it. Though that's obviously not something you'd be able to do regularly..
Rory Mangles - Team Nuts

Robots: Nuts 2 and many more...

NanoTwo Motor Controllers: https://nutsandbots.co.uk/product/nanotwodualesc
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peterwaller
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Re: TinyTwo Speed Controllers

Post by peterwaller »

Beware the slippery slope. :roll:
When I started doing controllers for other people almost 5 years ago I tried to accomodate all the variations requested but now after types
A, B-60, B-61, B-63, C, D, D2, P5, RL2, HK4, Rx31 I now make just one (Lem1) which incorporates the lemon DSM2 receiver.
Out of interest and if it is not a secret which motor drive chip do you use.
Rapidrory
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Re: TinyTwo Speed Controllers

Post by Rapidrory »

It would hardly stay secret very long if i start selling them! :P They're a nightmare to use; I probably wouldn't have used them if i'd realized how much supporting hardware they needed...

http://docs-europe.electrocomponents.co ... 04e774.pdf
Rory Mangles - Team Nuts

Robots: Nuts 2 and many more...

NanoTwo Motor Controllers: https://nutsandbots.co.uk/product/nanotwodualesc
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BeligerAnt
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Re: TinyTwo Speed Controllers

Post by BeligerAnt »

Those shouldn't be too diffiult to drive, they should only require a transistor/FET buffer between the gates and the PIC I/O pins.

The thing to be aware of with your board layout is that you won't achieve anything near the datasheet figures for current handling/power dissipation.
The figures are based on a 25 x 25mm PCB mostly covered in copper connected to the FET drain pins to act as a heat sink. Most of the figures also apply to only one die being active, even though all practical applications require 2 active die at a time!
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Remote-Controlled Dave
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Re: TinyTwo Speed Controllers

Post by Remote-Controlled Dave »

These look right up my street!
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Rapidrory
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Re: TinyTwo Speed Controllers

Post by Rapidrory »

I've got the fet buffers, also need CMOS hex inverter chip on there as you need some protection logic on the high voltage side... It would have made design and construction much easier however if it were all in one chip :L

Well I haven't managed to get them to heat up significantly yet, though that is with them only driving half an amp so that's not saying much... And yeah, i always take datasheet values with a pinch of salt...

Having to wait till Monday until I can do anything more; I accidentally shorted the 5V and motor power rails whilst testing it at 12V and fried both the PIC and my Rx -.- I have spares of both, but need to get use of the uni labs to solder in a new PIC...

Out of curiosity, anyone know the rules for selling this sort of thing on Ebay? I can't see it being a problem as long as you had the relevant disclaimers...
Rory Mangles - Team Nuts

Robots: Nuts 2 and many more...

NanoTwo Motor Controllers: https://nutsandbots.co.uk/product/nanotwodualesc
shakesc
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Re: TinyTwo Speed Controllers

Post by shakesc »

Rory

looks good, I'd be interested in purchasing

Chris
I started out with nothing and still have most of it left
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peterwaller
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Re: TinyTwo Speed Controllers

Post by peterwaller »

That explains why I didn't find it before I only considered full motor drive chips with all the control logic built in to make life easier. :roll:
I will be interested to see how you make the connections to the boards I am a fan of making them fully pluggable but I know others prefer them all soldered in.
Rapidrory
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Re: TinyTwo Speed Controllers

Post by Rapidrory »

Yeah, when I originally found and bought the chip i didn't realize that it'd need all the extra hardware untill i put one in a test rig on breadboard :L

I've since found some servo driver chips of the same size, but with all the required logic in them. They were only 1.8A output, but that should be fine for a 2WD robot. Unfortunately, the only data sheet I could find was in Chinese, and I could find no where that sold them. They'd be good though cause you could probably make a dual ESC almost half the size of mine with them! Might have another look some day..

Yeah, i'm not entirely sure how i'm gonna do it myself on the commercial ones; for the prototypes, i'm just soldering all the wires straight to the board :L
Rory Mangles - Team Nuts

Robots: Nuts 2 and many more...

NanoTwo Motor Controllers: https://nutsandbots.co.uk/product/nanotwodualesc
Hogi
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Re: TinyTwo Speed Controllers

Post by Hogi »

any idea on the cost of one of these boards? i might be in a position to start a new ant project around easter time and i was hoping to do either a fan pusher or 4WD pusher. also, what size and weight are they? i'm a complete novice builder so I need all the room and weight i can get. :D
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