I have purchased a motorized slide potentiometer from Bourns. I'm just trying to get a basic reading of it in a voltage divider setup before even connecting the motor, and despite scouring the data sheet (which isn't much, this thing is simple!) but for the life of me, I can't figure out what's going on. I assume I must be misunderstanding the part.
The part is: PSL01-1082A-103B1 PSL Series Motorized Master Slide Potentiometer
Here's the data sheet: https://www.mouser.com/datasheet/2/54/psl-1280324.pdf
If I am understanding correctly, this is a linear taper potentiometer. I cannot get stable or consistent results from the potentiometer track on either of the identical parts I purchased.
When I try to read the resistance across pins 1 and 3 of the 4 pin pot connector, I am expecting a stable constant resistance. I get wildly varying values on my Fluke multimeter that reads other pots fine. I get values around 116Kohms, but the value jumps around even if I just set the pot down on the table with the multi test leads attached.
When I try to read the resistance across pins 1 and 2 (the wiper) I get incredible noisy readings, ranging from about 30ohms on one side of the slide pot level position to 13K ohms on the other. If I push the slide level with even minor force towards the extreme ends of the pot, that reading shoots up to ~130kOhms.
When I connect the pot to an Arduino UNO, with pin 1 to +5V, pin 2 to A0, and pin 3 to GND, and try to print the value with the default AnalogReadSerial example, I get extremely, extremely noisy values that jump around and often make no sense. I get this same behavior on both of the versions of this part I purchased.
Just to be clear, and I aware that one of the four pins is the touch track, and I am not accidentally testing that.
Perhaps I'm fundamentally misunderstanding the part, but I've scoured the data sheet and it doesn't seem like I'm missing anything. I assume I'm supposed to be able to read this like a standard slide pot so I can use that value to drive the motor. I purchased another Bourns motorized slide pot, a PSM01-082A-103B3, and its potentiometer (both tracks) works exactly as expected, with stable readings on my multimeter and microcontroller. However, this part will not work for my application due to its size.
Any idea what might be going on here? I'm losing it