Drive simple little servo-motor with HiFive1

HiFive1 Rev B
1

I made a simple wiring like this arduino example.
I wonder if there example code to drive a servomotor with integrated PWM on E310 ?

I tryied to use the default arduino Servo library but it’s sound to be not implemented yet :

WARNING: library Servo claims to run on (avr, sam, samd, nrf52, stm32f4) architecture(s) and may be incompatible with your current board which runs on (riscv) architecture(s).
In file included from /tmp/arduino_modified_sketch_606983/Blink.ino:24:0:
/opt/arduino-1.8.5/libraries/Servo/src/Servo.h:73:2: error: #error “This library only supports boards with an AVR, SAM, SAMD, NRF52 or STM32F4 processor.”
#error “This library only supports boards with an AVR, SAM, SAMD, NRF52 or STM32F4 processor.”
^~~~~
exit status 1
Error compiling for board HiFive 1.

It’s not a surprise :wink: but I wonder if somebody has already tryied to drive Servomotor with HiFive1, to mutualize efforts ?

2

It doesn’t really answer your question, but my experience of RC servos is that you don’t actually need PWM with them. You just need to send them a pulse with length between about 500 us and 1500 us from time to time … and it really doesn’t matter much whether you do that at 200 Hz or at 20 Hz. A couple of digitalWrite() with a delayMicroseconds() between in your main loop should be fine. (and maybe a short delay() to prevent it being toooo fast)

1 Like
3

Thanks bruce, it simply works !
http://www.fabienm.eu/wordpress/?p=1189

4

\o/

I see you’re using the same $1 servo I bought a dozen of from dealextreme once. They seem to work fine if you don’t need huge power.

In my local model shop the cheapest servos they had were $40!! And I think they were not better.

5

It was more expensive than $1 i think but provided with a robotic kit in fact :wink:

6

Seriously :slight_smile: https://www.aliexpress.com/premium/sg90%20servo.html

1 Like
7

HI bruce!

Is the same applicable for bldc motors? (1400kv used for quadcopters?)

8

It’s the same for normal RC plane “ESC” (Electronic Speed Control) units that control the motors. The ESC takes exactly the same input as a normal servo – you plug them in to a servo channel on the radio.

I haven’t done anything with quadcopters. I’d have thought they’d just have four ESC (or a big one with four inputs). But I don’t know. Maybe they do something different.

9

I did some googling. Seems like it’s basically the same. The only thing is they’re using pulse lengths a lot shorter than 1 mS to get faster response times. That makes sense when the control signal is coming from an on-board autopilot with IMU and PID and stuff, not from a bloke on the ground wiggling his thumbs.

10

Thanks bruce

11

This code works for the Arduino Zero I set up previously but I get the same error as Martoni when I plug in my HiFive 1. Do you have any insight in where I should put my delays to get it working?