automotive stepper motor with Arduino

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zachheine
 
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Joined: Wed Oct 29, 2008 10:33 pm

automotive stepper motor with Arduino

Post by zachheine »

I have been looking at automotive stepper motors typically used for dashboard instruments. I am wondering if this is something that could be controlled from the Arduino. The website of the manufacturer is http://www.switec.ch/products/switec/switec.html. Thanks.

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karlgg
 
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Joined: Sat Dec 27, 2008 2:41 pm

Re: automotive stepper motor with Arduino

Post by karlgg »

Looking at the specs from the website, any bipolar (four wire) stepper controller should be able to run them. Just don't get something meant to drive huge power-motors, these things want less than 20mA.

GuyC
 
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Joined: Sun May 22, 2011 1:58 am

Re: automotive stepper motor with Arduino

Post by GuyC »

This is a very old thread, but I've confirmed the miniature Switec X25 series stepper motors can be driven directly from the digital IO lines on an Arduino without an intermediate controller. (Yes I understand the risk of driving inductive loads from the MCU.) The appeal of this is being able to drive 1, 2 or 3 analog gauges from an Arduino with no other components. The manufacturer link provided in the original post is no longer valid, but the Switec motors and clones from VID and MCR are readily available as replacement parts for GM instrument clusters, and sell for less than $5 each.

I've posted an Arduino library for the Switec X25 motors on github here https://github.com/clearwater/gaugette and the project blog is at http://clearwater.github.com/gaugette/.

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scott_fx
 
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Re: automotive stepper motor with Arduino

Post by scott_fx »

this is awesome. i was a little confused about how to properly set up your library though.
i have the SwitecX25 library in the libraries folder but im unsure of what to do/where to put the gaugette folder. i'm pretty new to arduino and programming so please forgive the ignorance. could you possibly walk the n00bs through the setup?

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