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SimpleStepper

Copyright (c) 2013, Jonathan LURIE, All rights reserved.

This library is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU Lesser General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 3.0 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.

This library is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU Lesser General Public License for more details.

You should have received a copy of the GNU Lesser General Public License along with this library.

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SimpleStepper is a simple library for running a stepper engine on an Arduino board. Il was tested with the EasyDriver from Sparkfun.

Here is how to start with it:

1- install it as a regular Arduino library

2- In your Arduino sketch, include SimpleStepper

 #include "SimpleStepper.h"

3- Initialize some values before constructing an object:

 // the pin for direction
 const int motorDirPin = 5;

 // the pin asking to perform a step
 const int motorStepPin = 6;

 // number of step in one entire revolution
 // note: this is not mandatory when performing solo steps
 const int totalNbStep360 = 200;

 // define the speed of rotation in RPM
 // note: this is not mandatory when performing solo steps
 const float speedRP = 0.25;

4- Construct your SimpleStepper object and initialize it:

 // Construct, using the values defined previously
 SimpleStepper m_motor(motorDirPin, motorStepPin);

 // defining the direction
 // note : not only for init, can be change later
 m_motor.setDirectionCounterClockWise();
 // OR
 m_motor.setDirectionClockWise();

// defining the number of step in an entire revolution
// note : not only for init, can be change later
m_motor.setTotalNbSteps(totalNbStep360);

// defining the speed in RPM
// note : not only for init, can be change later
m_motor.setRPM(speedRP);

6- Let's spin it!

You have several way of spinning:

// spin with an angle in degree.
// It will use the speed defined above (if possible), use:
void rotationDegrees(float nbDegrees);

// spin over a number of steps.
// It will use the speed defined above (if possible), use:
void rotationSteps(long int nbSteps);

// perform just one single step. Does not depend on the speed (RPM) neither
// on the total number of steps in an entire revolution.
// Useful for precision work:
void renegateStep();

7- A bit further, for experts

Other modes are possible for an independant movement, but they are less precise than renegateStep(). They are based on the fact that a renegateStep is actually composed of 8 micro steps.

Micro steps can be used independently but the heigh of them are not equal in term of degrees. Anyway, you can use those ones:

// performs half a step (4 micro steps)
void renegateHalfStep();

// performs a quarter of step (2 micro steps)
void  renegateQuarterStep();

If you think (or know) your stepper motor does not count 8 micro steps for one step, you can go to the top of the file SimpleStepper.h and edit the following line:

#define _MICROSTEP_ 8