Asking about 2A Motor Shield for Arduino

Other Hardware Motors, Mechanics, Power and CNC
1

I will use this motor shield to control the motor, my dc motor which only has 2 pin connection.

Here is the motor shield: 2x2A DC Motor Shield For Arduino - DFRobot
which has more information in: Arduino_Motor_Shield__L298N___SKU_DRI0009_-DFRobot
and it is the dc motor: Micro Metal Gearmotor 50:1 - DFRobot

According to the motor shield information, that is:
Introduction
This DFRobot Arduino Compatible Motor Shield (2A) uses L298P chip which allow to drive two 7-12V DC motors with maximum 2A current. This shield can be directly mount onto standard Arduino Duemilanoveand Arduino Mega.

The speed control is achieved through conventional PWM which can be obtained from Arduino’s PWM output Pin 5 and 6. The enable/disable function of the motor control is signalled by Arduino Digital Pin 4 and 7. The Motor shield can be powered directly from Arduino or from external power source. It is strongly encouraged to use external power supply to power the motor shield.

Specification

Logic Control Voltage?5V (From Arduino)
Motor Driven Voltage?6.5~12v(VIN Power Supply),4.8~35V (External Power Source)
2 way motor drive
Logic supply current Iss??36mA
Motor Driven current Io??2A
Maximum power consumption?25W?T=75??
Up to 2A current each way
Pin 4,5,6,7 are used to drive two DC motor
Support PWM speed control
Support PLL advance speed control
Size: 55x55mm

what does it mean 2 way motor drive?
what is the difference if I use PWM or PLL? Can it affect the speed of the motor? Can it both to rotate the motor in forward and backwards?
If I use higher voltage for the external powersource, will it affect also the speed of the motor?

Thank you very much. :smiley:

2

2-way means backwards and forwards.

Not sure exactly what they mean by PLL mode (their manual has a code snippet for both modes, the snippets are identical). PWM is the standard pulse-width modulation used for speed control.

Greater external voltage will mean faster top speed yes - note the shield will swallow about 3V in the driver chip, so allow for that.

When is says 2A max, that's being extremely optimistic, it'll take it for short periods only, assume 1A as the practical upper limit for continuous operation - the driver chip will get extremely hot even then. The chip is available in an alternate package with a big tab for mounting on a heatsink - this is the version that can handle 2A properly (and even then it will lose about 5V which is a lot).

3

I have this same shield how do you increase the current to the motors?