TinyTwo Speed Controllers

All things antweight

Moderators: BeligerAnt, petec, administrator

Post Reply
Rapidrory
Posts: 1160
Joined: Sun Nov 24, 2013 9:54 pm

Re: TinyTwo Speed Controllers

Post by Rapidrory »

Duff, if I don't flag up any major issues in preliminary testing (so far I've literally only turned it on for 30 secs and checked if it turns the motors when I move the sticks on my Tx :L) , and if I get some more built, I'll let you have one for £5 (cost of components) at the AWS. If it dies, I'll either fix or upgrade it with a newer version. Some field testing would be useful, even if it is only small scale (I don't plan to release more than this one ATM)
Plus, this is only the second time I've released something I've made into the wild so to speak, so be good to get some customer support practice too (first thing was a valve guitar pedal for a friend, and that's still going after a year, so I have some hope!)

I'm hopefully going to be running one in Tinny as the TinyTwo doesn't fit, so you guys can see it under battle conditions... Just gotta hope it survives ok now or it could be somewhat embarrassing :P
Rory Mangles - Team Nuts

Robots: Nuts 2 and many more...

NanoTwo Motor Controllers: https://nutsandbots.co.uk/product/nanotwodualesc
User avatar
Rhys
Posts: 738
Joined: Tue Oct 29, 2002 12:00 am
Location: Caerphilly, South Wales

Re: TinyTwo Speed Controllers

Post by Rhys »

To be honest mate, for a fiver, if it dies, it dies.
Image
Rapidrory
Posts: 1160
Joined: Sun Nov 24, 2013 9:54 pm

Re: TinyTwo Speed Controllers

Post by Rapidrory »

Hehe, fair :L Just to say it won't have any connectors or frills, just a set of wires coming out of it like in the photo...
Rory Mangles - Team Nuts

Robots: Nuts 2 and many more...

NanoTwo Motor Controllers: https://nutsandbots.co.uk/product/nanotwodualesc
User avatar
Rhys
Posts: 738
Joined: Tue Oct 29, 2002 12:00 am
Location: Caerphilly, South Wales

Re: TinyTwo Speed Controllers

Post by Rhys »

Oooh, wires... luxury. :P

I've been at this since AWS 14 (albeit with little success), so hopefully I should be ok with just wires. To be honest, there aren't many high voltage, high current controller with a small size available at the moment, so I thought I'd jump at the chance. Even if it lasts just one event I would have considered it a wise investment.
Image
Rapidrory
Posts: 1160
Joined: Sun Nov 24, 2013 9:54 pm

Re: TinyTwo Speed Controllers

Post by Rapidrory »

Hehe, well hopefully it'll last longer than that... though I can't promise anything!

Btw, are you planning to run a servo on the aux power at all? If not I could just fit a 5v regulator instead of the 6v variable reg, which would greatly tidy up the rear of the board as it would get rid of about half the passive components (which mostly don't quite fit due to a minor routing error), and I trust those 5V regs more as I've used them a lot with the TinyTwos.
Rory Mangles - Team Nuts

Robots: Nuts 2 and many more...

NanoTwo Motor Controllers: https://nutsandbots.co.uk/product/nanotwodualesc
User avatar
Rhys
Posts: 738
Joined: Tue Oct 29, 2002 12:00 am
Location: Caerphilly, South Wales

Re: TinyTwo Speed Controllers

Post by Rhys »

Well the plan is to have a spinner running off 3 cells, with a tiny servo to self right. So I could probably run the servo and receiver off the 5v reg on the speed controller for the weapon motor. Unless you can think of a more efficient way of doing it? It would probably make the drive ESC a bit simpler as there would be no need for a 5v reg at all.
Image
Rapidrory
Posts: 1160
Joined: Sun Nov 24, 2013 9:54 pm

Re: TinyTwo Speed Controllers

Post by Rapidrory »

Nah, it has to have a voltage reg of some form on there to drive the PIC chip :L If it's only for self righting then the 5V Reg should be fine; I've used it with Lionel's 2Kg/cm servo before, and it can happily flip robots with that. If I can ensure that the 6V rail is stable enough with a servo, i'll just stick the 6V reg on there; I just don't want it to spike and fry your Rx :L
Rory Mangles - Team Nuts

Robots: Nuts 2 and many more...

NanoTwo Motor Controllers: https://nutsandbots.co.uk/product/nanotwodualesc
Rapidrory
Posts: 1160
Joined: Sun Nov 24, 2013 9:54 pm

Re: TinyTwo Speed Controllers

Post by Rapidrory »

I now have 4 NanoTwo HPs, all of which have already been conscripted into service for Saturday!

Image

Having made a few tweaks and adjusted the firmware, they now run pretty stably off a 2 cell lipo; had one with a 180mAh 2 cell run both Tinny's motors at full speed for an hour before the driver chips finally locked out due to low voltage (was on 7.5v by that time). There was no load on the motors, so need to do more test, but I've driven Tinny around a bit with one in and it seemed fine.. just gotta keep the Lipo charged :L

Got a bit more work to do on the firmware, and more tests to run (I uploaded a broken copy of the firmware to the uni computers so couldn't do any testing until I got home today), but I'm hoping to have them going well by Saturday. :)
Rory Mangles - Team Nuts

Robots: Nuts 2 and many more...

NanoTwo Motor Controllers: https://nutsandbots.co.uk/product/nanotwodualesc
haz
Posts: 1855
Joined: Thu Apr 15, 2010 11:20 am
Location: Underwater Lair
Contact:

Re: TinyTwo Speed Controllers

Post by haz »

I'll buy one cash in hand at the aws if you're selling?
Rapidrory
Posts: 1160
Joined: Sun Nov 24, 2013 9:54 pm

Re: TinyTwo Speed Controllers

Post by Rapidrory »

Sadly all four are now spoken for... I had planned to get a whole bunch ready in time for the AWS when I originally started this project, but I barely have 4 as it is :L

They're still largely untested, and the tests I have done show waay too much noise being coupled onto the servo data wires, causing it to think you're waving the sticks round madly under heavy load, which isn't ideal... Gotta try sort that and a few other things it in software and hardware before Saturday..

Next AWS may be a little more realistic, and I can probably ship them before that... they'd have some decent firmware too, not something that's about to take me all night to throw together :-?
Last edited by Rapidrory on Thu Mar 06, 2014 6:49 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Rory Mangles - Team Nuts

Robots: Nuts 2 and many more...

NanoTwo Motor Controllers: https://nutsandbots.co.uk/product/nanotwodualesc
Post Reply