This week we needed to design a machine as a group. Elements that we needed to deal with were mechanism, automation, and some way to control it.
This week we needed to design a machine as a group. Elements that we needed to deal with were mechanism, automation, and some way to control it.
We met together to ideate on a project. We decided to create a camera that could sweep 360 degrees and then move on one axis.
For organization, we split up into groups. I worked on the software side, helping with the programming, loading firmaware and interfacing with RunDMC.
The initial setup that produced a "Test OK" has a route board hooked up with a laptop with microUSB, cable between router board and stepper board, the stepper with a 20V power, and a router board set to "pwr rpi" setting.
An issue we ran into was that when you start RunDMC, open up the atkstepper, and then "test connection," we got an error for port not writable. Essentially we got a packet sent but not receiving one.
Pushing the reset button fixes this. We suspect that the reset button pulls a specific pin high or low on the router's XMEGA, and that turning the router off by unplugging it (not that there's any other way to turn it off...) leaves that pin floating instead of letting it go back to the state the firmware expects it to be in.
Class demo!