http://www.piclist.com/io/stepper/linistep The "how it works" and "Tuning"
sections are worth the read...

....and of course it's the best price you can find on an excellent
controller.


---
James.


-----Original Message-----
From: pic microcontroller discussion list [mailto:PICLIST@MITVMA.MIT.EDU] On
Behalf Of Picdude
Sent: 2004 Mar 23, Tue 11:07
To: PICLIST@MITVMA.MIT.EDU
Subject: [EE:] CNC stepper-motor controller?

I've been pondering the purchase of a CNC lathe/mill, but for cost reasons
I'm going to do this incrementally ... pick up the basic machine first, then
add on stepper motors and CNC capability later.  But I'm researching
first...

Seems like there are multiple vendors that make CNC controllers and the best
part is that they're all compatible (work with the same software, interface
thru the parallel port, and control the same types of motors).

I'm thinking of making my own controller instead of spending $500-$800 for a
ready-made unit, but I'm evaluating if this can save me any money (I really
expect it would definitely be worth my time).

I found a bunch of general stepper-motor controller circuits thru google,
and it seems that the L298 drivers are popular for this size stepper motors
(Nema 23, generally 100-150 oz-in units).  Not sure if the motors are run
unipolar or bipolar (I'm still figuring out what exactly that means) though.

I'd like to control this with a PIC.  The PIC and par-port side of things
should be easy, once I figure out what this interface protocol standard is.

Any of you know what this parallel-port "standard" protocol is?  Got any
good circuits that do this already, to save me re-inventing the wheel?

Thanks,
-Neil.

--
http://www.piclist.com hint: The PICList is archived three different ways.
See http://www.piclist.com/#archives for details.

--
http://www.piclist.com hint: The PICList is archived three different
ways.  See http://www.piclist.com/#archives for details.