2DOF Motion Seat School Project

Hello everybody,

We are the graduating class of the Robert-Gerwig-School from Furtwangen in the Black Forest for the apprenticeship "System Electronics Technician".
As a final project we aim to build a working 2DOF system.

We follow the instructions of the scrock-thread.

To control the motors we have developed our own power stage and created a prototype, which is equipped with an Arduino micro slot. It is used to control up to three motors. Only two channels are needed for the 2DOF system.This will of course be further developed and, if desired, at the end released for you as files for download.



In parallel, a frame is currently being created by our precision mechanics. Pictures will follow.

For the further development of the motion seat we have some questions for you:

1. Currently we are looking for 2 motors that are suitable for the project.
a. What do we need to consider for this when choosing motors?
b. What information do you need from us so that you can recommend motors?

2. Are limit switches needed for the motors? If not, why not?

3. What software do we need for a first motor test using a PC?

4. What software and license is needed to test the whole thing with "Assetto Corsa" in the final step?

5. May we, for us, also post the German text in addition to the English in the thread? As spoiler or italic?
a. Is there any "spoiler" function at all?

Thanks in advance

The class 3BFE3 of the RGS-Furtwangen


Edit:
Done

Thank you for your detailed answer.

1st Update:

Software:
We have done our first test with the help of SMC3, SimTools and Live for Speed. The test was only partially successful. We could establish a connection between LFS and SimTools. We have configured SimTools with the help of the scruck video and we could observe the movements of the axes.
We also configured the SMC3 program with the help of the same video, but we could not detect any signals on the Arduino ports, although the connection between PC and Arduino is established and we selected the correct COM port in SimTools.

1. Did we forget a step?
2. Is it perhaps necessary to establish a connection between SimTools and SMC3?
3. Does SMC3 require all motors and sensors to be connected to function properly?


Electrical Hardware:
As part of the software test, we built a small test setup with motor connected to a potentiometer. Since we don't have a Hall sensor yet.


For this we used a 1M potentiometer. We connected terminal "a" with +5V of the Arduino and terminal "c" with GND. This creates a 0V to 5V signal between "b" and "c" (Vbc), which we connected to an Analog In port.
The goal was to see any response from the motor.

Mechanical Hardware:
The precision mechanics have made progress with the mechanical hardware. Here are some pictures.
Base-part
Motion-part
Any suggestions for improvement?
Keep in mind: Our team has added wheels for ease of transportation in the school building.

Thanks

The class 3BFE3 of the RGS-Furtwangen

Thank you noorbeast for your great support,

we connected our H-Bridge with the Arduino like this:



In SMC3 we changed Mode1 to Mode2. Thanks for the tip with the blocked COM-port from "SimTools". Now we only use "SMC3 Utils" and we have a connection . But now when the motor 1 is in "on-mode" all output pins from the first motor (3,2 and 9 of Arduino Uno) are constantly 5V. We double checked it with an oscilloscope. This creates a short circuit.

We followed the step by step tutorial from RufusDufus

And now we are stuck at step 9. There is no movement because of the short circuit.

Here is our configuration:


Thanks in advance

The class 3BFE3 of the RGS-Furtwangen

Greetings,

we have inspected our circuit and went over every connection to make sure that there was no obvious mistake. After the inspections we figured there was something wrong with our testing-circuit.
So we created two schematics for each mode.

How our H-Bridge works:

Our H-Bridge power stage accepts 4 inputs per motor. 2 PWM inputs for left and right rotation, as well as 2 seperate GND/ENABLE pins. Both PWM and ENABLE pins can receive a PWM signal and will switch on the motor, if the other pin receives +5V.

E.g.:
PWM left is +5V, ENABLE left receives PWM -> the motor turns left
or
PWM left receives PWM, ENABLE left receives +5V -> the motor turns left

PWM right works the same way.


Mode 1

Partial schematic for our setup/connections between our Arduino with SMC3 in Mode 1 and our own H-Bridge circuit for one motor. Based on the original mode 1 plans we found on the forum (which can be seen in the SMC3 tutorial thread).

Mode 1 has no output, everything is low.

Mode 2

Partial schematic for our setup/connections between our Arduino with SMC3 in Mode 2 and our own H-Bridge circuit for one motor. Based on the original mode 2 plans we found on the forum (which can be seen in a previous post above)

Mode 2 causes a short circuit in our H-Bridge as mentioned above.

We did not change anything in the SMC3.ino program, except Mode1 and Mode2.


We hope you understand our problem. We do not know what we've done wrong.

Please help us.

The class 3BFE3 of the RGS-Furtwangen

We use our own Hardware:


The circuit diagram to our H-Bridge is in the post below.

We do really need your help, we have no more idea what we are doing wrong.

Solution & 2nd update

We have found a solution to our problem regarding the short circuit:

The whole circuit was rewired, as well as a suspected software problem of SMC3 has been resolved. We don't know what exactly the problem was, but the program worked again after we restarted the PC after a week.

To prevent the problem with the short circuit in our wiring from occurring again, we decided to add an interlock. For this we developed another circuit board. The interlock is there so that the motors cannot be controlled with clockwise and anticlockwise rotation at the same time.

In the following video you can see the function of our prototype.



Today we will start wiring the motors, which will be mounted to the rig later. Once the setup is working, we will intigrate the built circuit, including the motors, into our rig and do the calibration, so we can start using the motion seat.


Details:
Our motors: MY1016Z3 DC 24V 350W.
Our interlock board which we created:

We are very close!!!

No, because the mechanic needs to get overworked. I hope we can post a new video in a few days.

Now we have a little Problem, we can’t give more progress, our teacher was ill (covid) and now we have 6 Weeks Holidays.

But we made a test with the Sim. And one side hasn't enough power. We are thinking the motor transmission has a power-turning-side, so we need to turn the motor around.

Greetings, and thank you for your support.

We can't get into the school building at the moment because of the holidays.

Hello,

yes we are back and busy rebuilding as our system was too heavy.

The system before:



We want to rebuild it similar to this now:


Our goal is to be done with it on Monday evening.

Thank you, @noorbeast so much for looking after us so nicely.

The electrical part of the system is already working.

Kind regards

The class of 3BFE3

you have another set of gearmotors - were the old ones too weak ? what was the power and gear ratio ?