TinyG with external driver (Stepperonline CL42T)

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  • December 17, 2021 at 8:17 am #12107
    DuaneKaufman
    Participant

    Dear Sirs,
    I was wondering if anyone here as interfaced a TinyG to an external driver like the CL42T (or equivalent) through the stepper control header connections?

    I would like to for a project I am working on with 4 axis, and if I have to roll my own, I would like to do it in the most off-the-shelf way possible, so others can too.

    For my own education, are the broken-out stepper signals on the Tiny G PNP or open-collector (looking at page 4 in https://www.omc-stepperonline.com/download/CL42T.pdf)?

    Does anyone have a go-to level-shifting breakout board that can be used on these signals to drive the driver module? What’s the best way to deal with the inverted logic of the TinyG ENABLE signal?

    What’s the most straightforward (and reliable) method of using/attaching a level-shifter board (I was thinking using a header on the tinyG and simply mounting the level-shifter board to plug into the header on the TinyG).

    Appreciate any pointers.

    Thanks in advance,
    Duane

    December 24, 2021 at 7:10 am #12112
    cmcgrath5035
    Moderator

    You ask good questions, all lack specific details on your knowledge base and require some interpretation on my part.
    I’ll assume you are familiar with the tinyG wiki found here
    https://github.com/synthetos/TinyG/wiki
    I’ll assume you have found and understand the tinyG schematics found here
    https://github.com/synthetos/TinyG/tree/master/hardware/v8schematics/v8h

    For my own education, are the broken-out stepper signals on the Tiny G PNP or open-collector (looking at page 4 in https://www.omc-stepperonline.com/download/CL42T.pdf)?

    Review https://github.com/synthetos/TinyG/wiki/TinyG-Using-External-Drivers
    It addresses some of your questions, I am assuming you are calling J17 – J20 the breakout signals. These are simply bridge points on the internal connections between the microcontroller and the 4 driver devises on tinyG.
    they are 3.3V logic levels and you should assume limited drive capability.
    I would not recommend you assume these logic points meet the Logic Signal Current spec on the CL42T sheet, you will need a buffer.

    I know of no breakout boards easily adaptable to tinyG.
    You should review https://github.com/synthetos/g2/wiki/G2core-on-DUE—External-Interfaces the suggested circuits for interfacing G2 boards are a good guide. You should fully understand the G2 environment, it may be more adaptable to your project. There are breakout boards available for a Duo running G2core.

    You could simple invert the enable lead, but you must then analyse you built up system to ensure that steppers will not be enabled during power up and power down transitions.

    tinyG has been successfully interfaced to more generic opt-isolated step-dir=enable stepper drivers. The CLT42T is aimed at a more complex stepper. In fact I am not sure exactly what a

    r 2-phase NEMA11, 14
    and 17 stepper motors with incremental encoders(Encoder resolution must be 1000-line).

    is.

    It is also unclear how you would deal with the fault signal returned by the CLT42T. tinyG would not know what to do to recover from such a fault, in general.

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