CNC/GRBL controller board? Other alternative cheaper parts?

[dosman]

[Edit: moved to hardware]

Firstly, my apologies if this is covered elsewhere and I missed it. Here is a 3-axis CNC GRBL controller board for $10 US:

Geekcreit® CNC Shield V4+ With Nano 3.0 A4988 3 Axis Stepper Motor Driver Board...

Has anyone attempted to run the satnogs-controller-firmware on one of these boards? Obviously the 3rd axis is not needed, that should free up some I/O ports for other uses. Maby it’s easily hackable to support DC motors too. Mainly curious because this could help bring the cost of a rotator down significantly if it’s usable. Thanks!

[dosman]

I’m going to hijack my own thread to note cheaper alternatives to parts for the reference platform. This is in no way a knock against the V3 reference platform, it was a necessary step up from the V2 design to support higher duty cycles. However I feel the cost of the ground station can still be brought further down without sacrificing too much quality. Otherwise it seems that a complete ground station is in the same cost ballpark as a Yaesu G-5500.

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• The reference controller, excluding the enclosure and cable glans I expect to round out at around $100. That’s a rough guesstimate, and I would be happy to be corrected if someone has built one.
• Alternative: $10 shipped, includes three stepper drivers (to be discarded for DC motor operation) and an Arduino clone:
  https://www.banggood.com/CNC-Shield-V4-With-Nano-3_0-A4988-3-Axis-Stepper-Driver-Board-For-Arduino-p-1250215.html?akmClientCountry=America&rmmds=cart_middle_products&cur_warehouse=CN

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• The Pololu reference motor specs: $30, 200RPM, 170oz-in/12kg-cm, 12V, 300mA free-run, 5A stall.
• Alternative: $17.33 shipped, 200rpm, 20kg-cm, with mounting bracket, stall current 5.5A:
• https://www.banggood.com/CHIHAI-MOTOR-DC-12V-200rpm-Encoder-Motor-Hall-Encoder-Motor-with-Mounting-Bracket-p-1247549.html?rmmds=search&cur_warehouse=CN

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• The Pololu reference DC motor driver specs: $30, 3A (5Apeak) to EACH channel, 5-28V
• Alternative: $8.99 shipped, 3A (6Apeak) to each channel, 10-30V:
• https://www.banggood.com/3A-75W-DC-PWM-Speed-Adjustable-Motor-Driver-Module-LMD18200T-For-Arduino-p-1278639.html?rmmds=search&cur_warehouse=CN

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[azisi]

Hey,

@dosman

Has anyone attempted to run the satnogs-controller-firmware on one of these boards?

Take a look here:

RAMPS 1.4 Board for Satnogs Rotator

Currently building a Satnogs Rotator and wanted to make the electronics from existing parts I had laying around from old 3d printer experiments. I’ve ported the Satnogs rotator firmware to platform.io to make it easy to install on an Arduino Mega and also changed and tweaked a few things to make it work for the RAMPS 1.4 board that most 3d printers use. Naturally this will only work if your building the stepper version of the rotator. I haven’t finished building my rotator yet so I can’t vou…

[dosman]

Thank you!

So I went ahead and ordered the parts I referenced earlier for testing. I’m comfortable enough with the Arduino platform that I’m hopeful I can make the SatNOGS firmware run on this board, assuming the cpu has enough memory. Fingers crossed.

[quartapound]

Yep I’m running mine on an Uno and a CNC v3 Shield. Should have no problem as long as you can get your pin out set properly

[g7kse]

Me too . A few minor tweaks and it is running nicely.