Weird Motor Controller Problem

Hello,

I am trying to use a Basic Stamp II to control a Dual Serial Motor Controller, which in turn is driving a 4V motor. However, the BSII locks up after executing a serout command. For instance, using the example code in the manual, where a For loop increases the motor speed from 0 to 127, the BSII will lock up randomly at different loop iterations. Once it locked up when speed was 33, another time when it was 54, another time when it was 96, and so on. It only made it up to 127 once out of all the times I tested it. Is this a problem with the Basic Stamp? With the Motor Controller? Both? I’ve also tried using different baud rates, with similar results.

Hello,

The Basic Stamp is unlikely to be the problem, and the motor controller does not have any outputs that connect to the Basic Stamp to make it lock up. Therefore, the likely problem is your power supply or the electromagnetic interference from your motors.

Usually, the two easiest solutions are to put small (0.1 uF) caps across your motors and using separate power supplies for the motors and logic. If that does not help, please give us more details about your power supplies and motors.

- Jan

Jan,

Thanks for the quick reply. As it turns out I was able to try out the DSMC on some different motors, and everything worked well. For some reason, though, even after shunting it with small caps, I was never able to get the original motor to work with the DSMC and BSII. It’s a moot point now, though, since I can use a motor that works with the DSMC in the project that I’m working on.