I am just wondering if anyone has been able to do this kind of setup on stepper motor controllers. I am needing to transmit control information where wires cannot traverse to control a stepper motor, and have it feedback and sync to the master controller back on the "home" side of the gap.
My main concern is going to be the "pump" of the stepper motors. If they lose signal during the operation, the stepper will stop work, correct?
Thank you!
I would not consider sending the individual step signals by wireless (or by a wired serial connection). Instead send the data for a complete move and let the receiving Arduino convert that to a series of timed step pulses.
The Python PC program that I use with my little lathe sends to the Arduino the total microseconds for a move and for each of the three motors, the interval between steps. The Arduino then uses that data to create the correct number and timing for the steps.
My PC communicates with the Arduino using wireless but it could probably also do the same thing using, for example, nRF24L01+ transceivers. My Arduino code relies on the serial data being received into the Serial input buffer while a move is in progress so the data for the next move is ready when the move is complete. It may be necessary to adopt a somewhat different strategy with wireless.
...R
How do you ensure the axis move synced to each other? How does it know if one of them misses a step not to plunge into the work with the one that doesn't miss a step?
My motors move in sync because the intervals between steps have been calculated (on the PC) to achieve that.
I don't have any way to check for missed steps on my system - there is always the BIG RED SWITCH.
You could add rotary encoders to verify the movements but they put a huge computational load on a 16MHz Arduino which might easily reduce its ability to produce fast steps.
Better to size your motors so that they don't lose steps.
...R