Hi, do you have any plans to start offering the Jrk in a fully assembled option? I ordered some of your fully assembled simple motor controllers for a project I’m working on, and they worked great. I’m also going to need some linear actuators for this project, and the Jrk seems to offer the ideal solution for controlling them. I’d really like to be able to order a few Jrk’s fully assembled since I have absolutely zero experience with soldering, and I don’t want to ruin them trying to attach all the stuff to the board.
Hello.
Thank you for your suggestion. I’m happy to let you know that we are now offering a “fully-assembled” jrk 21v3 motor controller.
- Ben
Great! That is just what I’m looking for. I’m a programmer that is getting into this stuff without much experience in robotics or electronics. Most of my experience is on the software side of things. I had one introductory computer engineering class back in college a dozen years ago, but we never got into soldering or anything too complicated in the lab. Your motor controllers and software development kit have been a big help to me so far. I was initially thinking I might need to get some PLC’s and learn how to write code for them for this thing I’m working on, but I think your stuff is a lot easier to use and much more cost effective.
I think the 21v3 should be adequate for my needs, but I might need to step up to the 12v12 if I need more power. Won’t know for certain until the prototype comes together and I know what sort of weight we’ll be dealing with. Even if the 21v3 is too small, it will enable me to continue work on the control software for my project and I can just swap it out for 12v12 later if needed.
Thanks again!
Unfortunately, it looks like the jrk 12v12 will be out of stock until April, so I hope the 21v3 works for you in the interim! I understand your reluctance to learn soldering on a $50 motor controller, but soldering is a very useful skill if you’re going to be getting into electronics and robotics, and it really isn’t difficult to pick up. There are a number of good guides out there if you google around. After an hour or two of practice soldering header pins into something cheap like this mini board, you’d likely be soldering like a pro.
- Ben
Yeah I think I will probably try something like that. It would be a good thing to know. I’ve also thought about taking a class or two over at one of the local colleges just for fun. I really liked the lab projects and building stuff on the breadboard when I took that one class back in college.
If I had to do it over again, I might go over to the computer engineering department to do more with hardware and electronics instead of staying in computer science to focus on programming. That’s been good to know too, but the electronics lab was a lot more fun.
I think the 21v3 should keep me going pretty well for now. With that, the actuator, the SMC’s, and the motors I purchased previously I can make a small model and get my basic application software done. Then it’s just a matter of scaling it up later. The code won’t work differently for more powerful motors.
That sounds like a reasonable plan. Can you tell us more about what are you building? I hope you share your results with us; it sounds like you’re making something cool and I’d love to see how it turns out.
- Ben
Wish I could, but it’s for an invention I’m helping someone with. Can’t really spill the beans on what it is yet.