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I doubt it is the motors. The probability of all 3 motors failing at the same time seems rather low. More likely is something common to all, like the power supply or drive. Also check for broken...

You will probably need much more than 100nf. If your car battery chargers are the simple transformer/rectifier chargers they will not have any filtering on the output so you will need 10,000 uF or...

I don't really understand what you are trying to do, but unless your motors are turning extremely slowly USB will be problematic. USB is not real time so any pulses to the motor will arrive...

What diameter and length of lead screw are you using? Depending on length, diameter, and bearings you may not be able to do 1500rpm without whipping.

The diagram shows opto isolator inputs, so it is unlikely you will damage anything by trying different connections. Before connecting to your breakout board, I would identify the correct inputs by...

A normal supply would have a transformer to isolate it from the AC line, however this one implys that the 110 AC line is rectified and filtered to get the 170 volts DC for the motors. This would mean...

This page has a description of the step sequence.
http://www.cs.uiowa.edu/~jones/step/types.html

Also, are you sure it is a stepping motor? I bought some surplus motors that were listed as...

This page has a list of various acme screws. http://www.nookindustries.com/acme/AcmeAvailability.cfm
It has a column showing "torque to raise 1 lb". If multiply that column by the number of lbs...

Generally, higher voltage lower current drives have more inductance which causes the torque to drop more rapidly with speed. Comparing them in the same application with the same supply voltage you...

A bipolar stepper will get about 1.4 times the static torque of the same motor driven unipolar. If wired bipolar parallel it will also use 1.4 times the unipolar current.
The ease of opening and...

What do you mean by "comming loose"? If you mean the set screws are vibrating loose, then loctite should fix the problem.

Yes, but it would have the same problem as resistors. Any linear approach would waste lots of power and convert it into lots of heat.

Yes it is normal for current limiting resistors to get very hot. With a 12v supply, those resistors will be dissipating nearly 11 watts which is all turned into heat. That is also higher than the...

If you are doing 3-axis, then this would be cheaper than linistepper. It is a unipolar chopper type drive and would let you run much higher voltages....

That is a rather low supply voltage for those motors. Two amps at 3 ohms means the motor is rated for 6volts. Generally for good speed you want the supply voltage to be 10 to 20 times the motor...

If it is a working machine you can just measure or estimate the maximum force needed to turn the crank handles when machining and then multiply by the radius of the crank to get the torque.

With a 6-wire motor, the current rating would most likely be for unipolar connection and for a single phase, so measure from center tap to one end to get the resistance.

I believe the purpose of the pdf is to help determine the current rating for the power supply. There will be capacitors on the output of the supply, and they recommend additional capacitors if the...

After Mariss corrected me about the voltage, I thought about it a lot and think I understand. I hope he will chime in again if I get it wrong.

The main reason the average current from the supply...

Under static DC conditions where L and C have no effect, Ohms law is always applicable, thats why it is called a law. You just have to apply it correctly.


Ian,
When they talk about "rated...

The current ratings are usually set so that the motor does not get too hot when static with a constant current applied. The static heating comes from the DC power disipated in the resistance of the...

A few of the cheaper bipolar drives have no current setting and need external power resistors to limit current. It is usually best to avoid these drives. If your drive has a current adjustment, it...

A 12 volt motor should work on 5 volts, but it would not have much torque and would not be able to step very fast. You said you are using a PC power supply and that might be the problem. The negative...

I just found the data sheet for that M106 drive, and it is a very primative drive. It does not have step/direction inputs and has no current control. It probably won't work with any software except...

Hybrid just refers to the internal construction of the motor, and has nothing to do with being bipolar. Many bipolar stepper motors are hybrid, and they use the same drivers as any other bipolar...

If you use the voltage from ohms law(ie V=IR), this will limit the current to the safe rated current.

However, the motor is an inductor, and the current through an inductor can't change...

Ambient temperature is not a spec for how hot the motor can get, it is a spec for the temperature in the room or enclosure in which the motor can work(ie the room temperature). The actual motor...

Quarter step will be smoother because the steps are smaller, and also because the steps normally have equal torque. With the basic half step mode the torque is not the same on each step and this can...

Like Gerry said, voltage is equal to current times resistance. That is called Ohm's law, one of the most basic equations of electricity.

Eric,
Yes, first thing is to try lowering the velocity and acceleration settings. If it still skips steps with very low velocity and acceleration settings, then it is probably some mechanical...