I am a complete newbie with regards to using Arduino and general circuitry building and I am looking for some guidance/advice/confirmation from you guys.
Basically I am undertaking a project which involves a device which requires two degrees of articulation plus a lighting system.
I plan to use two servo motors to power this movement, and a 12V LED light strip for the lighting.
Having done some prior research, I know how to rig up the LED strip with the Arduino, and likewise with the servo motors.
However this is where I start walking in to fog...
Ideally, I would like to control the LED strip and two servos from the same Arduino and also power the LED strip and servos from two different power sources - one for the motors, one for the LED strip. The Arduino will be connected via USB to a PC.
In terms of operation, I would like to control the light strip in terms of on/off and possibly with dimmer control.
The motors will be operated sequentially: servo 1 rotates > servo 2 rotates > servo 1 reverse rotates > servo 2 reverse rotates
So I have in my head, an Arduino, two battery packs (12V & 6V), an LED strip (incl. mosfet & resistor) and two servo motors on a shared breadboard.
Is this something that will/can work or is it an ill-informed pipedream? Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
Yes it can work although it is a bit messy. You could just use one 12V power source for your LEDs and regulate the 12V down to 6 for the servos. Or you could use a 5V LED strip and run the servos off 5V as well.
Note that most servos will not rotate by over about 200 degrees, the exact value depends on the servo.
Sail winch servos can rotate about 3 turns with full position control.
I think you can also get servos that will do a full 360 deg with position control. However beware that many people refer to a continuous rotation servo as a 360 deg servo and they do not have position control - only speed and direction.
So if I split the 12v supply between the LED strip and the servo at the same time, will the LED's brightness not be affected?
No it won't. We are talking about a regulated supply. The voltage will always be 12V up to the maximum current of the power supply. If you do not have enough current then get a bigger supply. You can also use a switching regulator on the servo supply, that will make the current draw less as they are about 90% efficent.
trustybutler:
So if I split the 12v supply between the LED strip and the servo at the same time, will the LED's brightness not be affected?
As long as the supply can provide enough power, no. So get a big enough power supply.
For your 6V servo best to get a buck converter rather than a linear regulator (you'll need a good heat sink as the regulators will have to absorb as much power as the servos take). Or you can get 12V servos of course.
