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Help me make my own "starter kit"

e14 Contributor

Hi'.

 

I'm new to this board, so I'm sorry, if this has been requested thousands of times. I find this site a little confusing.

 

So, I wanna start some experimenting with automation of mechanic, hydraulics and building cnc-machines (routers, lathes, 3d-printer and other robots).

 

 

The beginner kits available seems to target a wide group of arduino-users. It looks like a lot of the things, I'd get would end up collecting dust.

 

So what do I need?

 

It looks to me like I'd need:

Some kind of arduino board

3-4 stepper motors

1 stepper-shield per motor.

 

But is that all?

 

I have various components, from when I used to make tube amps and effect pedals for guitar. So smaller things like jumpers, potentiometers and bread board is already there.

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  • Hi smeden!

     

    Welcome to e14!

    I guess there's a fair bit going on, but it looks like you found your way to the best place to ask Arduino questions though!

     

    For the starter kit, definitely include a breadboard and patch wires. I like the soft wires with the added pin connections, but on a budget you could use cat5 wire (just strip the ends). And I found that it's nice to have extra breadboards so that a project can stay on one while I try other things on another breadboard.

     

    LEDs are cheap and always come in handy - they're an easy way to show status or test if a connection is giving power. They're also great when learning.

     

    You'll probably need an assortment of resistors, as they always seem to be needed.

     

    Do you need buttons or switches for your project?

     

    And make sure the Arduino board comes with the required USB cable (or buy one at the same time).

     

    I think that covers the basics - the rest depends on what you want to do image

     

    Hope that helps!

     

    Cheers,

    -Nico

  • in reply to ntewinkel

    Well, that sounds good. Thanks.

    I loads of resistors and diodes. I think my stock of spst, spdt and 3pdt switches will work.

     

    Side question:

    Is the arduino uno even able to control 3-4 stepper motors?

  • in reply to e14 Contributor

    In terms of IO pins, it looks like the Uno can handle 4 stepper motors (4 pins each), but in terms of power you might need to add a separate power supply to run the motors (connect the ground to the Uno ground).

    I'm not sure how much processing power is required to run a motor, but I would imagine that would be ok.

     

    Cheers,

    -Nico

  • in reply to e14 Contributor

    Allow me to rephrase that for you:

     

    How many PWM pins doth

        an Uno have in its core?

    Quoth the PiMan, "Only six, never more."

     

     

    Oh, I am sorry, we were speaking of stepper motors.

    Digital pulses in phased sequence and that lot. 

    That's very good, we don't need no stinking PWM.

  • in reply to billabott

    Hi billabott,

     

    I didn't realize that stepper motors would need pwm.

    The reference and tutorial don't mention the need for pwm to run stepper motors and the tutorial also uses a non-pwm pin.

    Am I missing something?

     

    Cheers,

    -Nico

  • in reply to ntewinkel

    The Muse got in the way of the facts.  Beggin' your forgiveness, your honor!

  • in reply to billabott

    And here I was thinking that it HAS to be true, because it rhymes! image

  • in reply to ntewinkel

    Yes, I will never forget my first one.  She was a beauty, she was.  Bigger than my fist!  Must have sweated for four hours in the shop to unencumber the dear thing.  Come right out of one of those big commercial printers.  Yes, sir, she did.  I gently laid her on the e-lab bench and do you know she would not move a twitch until a little ole NPN transistor rhythmically pulsed her power lines with the help of a square wave from the Signal Generator on that very same lab bench.  Some of the other e-tech students came by to admire the silver stepper lady in action.

     

    Ta ra ra boom de-ay.

     

     

    If you E^2 people have a little time and the inclination to read some real literature by a Master; try this one.

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  • in reply to ntewinkel

    Yes, I will never forget my first one.  She was a beauty, she was.  Bigger than my fist!  Must have sweated for four hours in the shop to unencumber the dear thing.  Come right out of one of those big commercial printers.  Yes, sir, she did.  I gently laid her on the e-lab bench and do you know she would not move a twitch until a little ole NPN transistor rhythmically pulsed her power lines with the help of a square wave from the Signal Generator on that very same lab bench.  Some of the other e-tech students came by to admire the silver stepper lady in action.

     

    Ta ra ra boom de-ay.

     

     

    If you E^2 people have a little time and the inclination to read some real literature by a Master; try this one.

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