Robot arm control electronics

[edgas10]

thanks , yes i understand how the motors work, but i´m a newbie in robotics.
i´ve made a cnc machine
if i go with the servos is there any board that is simply to connect and can store the positions?
my ideaa is to have a box with a joystick or two to control the movement of the motors, and a pot to control the speed of motors.
thansk

[edgas10]

i´m just concerned because i think servos are not very robust.
thats why i´ve choose the dc motors the thing is that these motors cant find a position, and cannot be controled with a potenciometer for direccion.

[Fivetide]

Just a thought if you want to use a small compact computer for the software you could use a Raspberry PI with a wireless dongle.. just a thought

[edgas10]

would this board be suitable for my needs?

16 Channels Servo Steering gear USB Controller driver board for Robot MCU | eBay

[edgas10]

or this?
DFRobot - Romeo Robotic Arduino Board w/ 2ch DC Motor C | eBay

[D.C.]

if i go with the servos is there any board that is simply to connect and can store the positions?
my ideaa is to have a box with a joystick or two to control the movement of the motors, and a pot to control the speed of motors.
thansk

i´m just concerned because i think servos are not very robust.
thats why i´ve choose the dc motors the thing is that these motors cant find a position, and cannot be controled with a potenciometer for direccion.

I'll say it again as you seem to have missed it, a servo IS A DC MOTOR (usually)(with a gearbox, encoder and electronics). You seem to have a mental block processing that fact. There are many thousands of different types of servo to suit all uses and budgets, if you are looking at for example a 9g mini servo made of plastic with cheap plastic gears you would be correct to say it is probably too weak for you. But if you are looking at a high end robotics dynamixel servo made from titanium it is rather a lot of overkill.

Until you can say what forces you want your robot arm to deal with you can't really pick the right motors, until you have chosen the motors and figured out what their power requirements are you can't choose a control board/driver/chip because a 3 amp draw on 300mA chip will not work just like it's daft to buy a 70V - 15A board for a servo that wants 1A at 12V.

If you want something that just works out of the box with all the work done for you, you need to buy a robot arm kit.

Lynxmotion - AL5D Robotic Arm Combo Kit (BotBoarduino)

Don't forget you also need a way to save positions, delete positions, name positions, select positions, a way to instruct the robot arm to move to the correct position etc etc. You will need a lot more than just two joysticks to get the functionality that you desire.

[edgas10]

ok lets say that i use the mg996 servos, they can handle 11kg so its good enough for me.
the arm of the robot will have 20 cm in the first and 20 on second section (starting from base)
the box to control i was thinking on using pots to control it .
to store the position i can draw a scale around the pots this way i can write them on paper and them when i need it just put the pots in the right place

[D.C.]

ok lets say that i use the mg996 servos, they can handle 11kg so its good enough for me.
the arm of the robot will have 20 cm in the first and 20 on second section (starting from base)

How do you know that is good enough for you?
Have you actually worked it out?
How much does everything weigh?

The 11kg is 11kg-cm - That means when supplied with 6V it can move an absolute maximum weight of 11kg that is attached to a point 1cm from the centre. You are proposing to stick a microphone, a microphone holder, a load of aluminium, connectors and several servos at a distance of 40cm, I seriously doubt an 11kg-cm servo will handle that load...

If you examine the previous link I sent you as an example, a different sized servo is used for every joint, because each joint in the chain needs to be stronger than the last to move the additional weight. You can't just throw together a random bunch stuff and hope it all works, that is fine if you are learning how to do things but will just end in failure and disappointment if you are trying to deliver an actual useful product.

PS I'm getting a bit confused as you keep drip feeding in various bits of information.

Are you trying to make a 'robot arm' like this:
Home Made Robot arm picks up coin - YouTube
Home Made Robot arm picks up coin - YouTube

Or do you actually want a 'motorised microphone' like these:
Mic robot prototype - YouTube
Richard Z. Kruspe on the Rammfire amp emulation - YouTube
Robot Mic Stand - YouTube

[Fivetide]

Personally hardware is the easy thing to workout - the hard part is finding a program that will make everything move at the right speed and stop when you want it to.

[Jonathan]

There's a very good selection of hobby servos at Radio Control Planes, Helicopters, Cars, Boats, FPV and Quadcopters - Hobbyking should you decide to use that type of motor.

the hard part is finding a program that will make everything move at the right speed and stop when you want it to.

That's when you write your own.