Working on a kinetic sculpture: I was thinking about running 5 heavy duty servos with a bit of a load on an Arduino Duemillenova without any motor controller. The servos have a separate regulated 5 volt 300mApower supply, and only one of the servos should be fully working at maximum speed at any one time. Do you think this will blow up my Arduino? There is a bit of code that can protect your Arduino from current spikes, does anyone know what that is and if it would be all I need? I have a Renbotics servo shield that I could try to use, but I didn't just because I've never used it. I have another section where I need to use ten servos, with a second Arduino. Here is a short video of the parts that each servo has to move. It's pretty lightweight, but was just too much for a standard servo to lift.
Just a point for future reference, you can not protect from voltage spikes by using code. Yes, sometimes well written code can help prevent voltage spikes in some of the outputs, but as a general rule, it has to be protected by electronic components, ie capacitors. Particularly on the power supply as it is out of control of the arduino. Although it is correct that there would be little feedback if there is an external supply. If you wanted to be extra careful, you can put a diode reverse bias across the motor poles, or if the motors run both forward and reverse, two opposing Zener diodes in series with a voltage rating just a bit higher than the motor.
