Controlling Stepper Motors

Stepper motors are strong, slow and accurate. Their strength and relatively slow speed means they can usually be used without any gear-down mechanisms. Their extreme accuracy makes them ideal for robotic devices. They can be easily obtained from old computer equipment such as disk drives or printers. Stepper motors have unique running characteristics.

Unlike traditional electric motors, stepper motors cannot be operated without a controller. There are two ways to control a stepper motor:

Computer Control.

Use the parallel port of a PC to drive stepper motors.

Electronic Control.

Build a driver circuit that turns a stepper motor at a constant speed.

Other stepper motor pages on the Web:

• Stepper Motors, by Ian Harries
• Control of Stepping Motors, a tutorial