[mcraig1137]

Just wondering i have been told by few people it can be done and some say it cant be done. my question is can i operate 2 stepper motors from one driver?
reason for it is the carriage i am building has a ballscrew on each side and thats the reason for needing to drive them at the same time

[jfong]

Always use separate drivers for the stepper motors. You can hookup the step/dir lines to both drivers.

[millman52]

1 motor = 1 driver just as jfong said....

[rockcliff]

As mentioned it's best to use one driver per motor, but it is possible to drive 2 motors from one driver, as long as the combined current of the 2 identical motors is less then the max. driver current, and the motors are wired properly, as if the driver only see them as one motor, one coil per channel, otherwise they won't run very smoothly

https://youtu.be/gFr9AL5QrVw

[Dennis Bohlke]

A driver for each motor is a good plan.

The next consideration is calibration or homing the machine to switches.

My solution was to know when the machine was homing when a limit switch was engaged the corresponding motor would not move, the side that had not engaged the limit switch would continue movement. Both limit switches had to be engaged for the Axis at limit to be sensed by the host program.

It was a bit of logic but once it worked the gantry was squared each time the machine was homed.

Dennis
Super Tech & Associates Main Web Home Page