Gareth Branwyn is a freelance writer and the former Editorial Director of Maker Media. He is the author or editor of over a dozen books on technology, DIY, and geek culture. He is currently a contributor to Boing Boing, Wink Books, and Wink Fun. His free weekly-ish maker tips newsletter can be found at garstipsandtools.com.
MAKE contributor and robotics author Tod Kurt put up this short video and how-to on hacking tiny, cheap servo motors for continuous rotation. Anyone who’s done a lot of miniature robotics building probably knows the hardware hack to turn a regular servo motor into a continuous-rotation gearmotor, by removing the mechanical stop and the servo control PCB. Here, Tod is removing the stops (two here) and swapping out the potentiometer for 2 resistors on the PCB. What you end up with is a full-rotation, bi-directional gearmotor, with positional control, sort of like a low-precision stepper motor.
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Gareth Branwyn is a freelance writer and the former Editorial Director of Maker Media. He is the author or editor of over a dozen books on technology, DIY, and geek culture. He is currently a contributor to Boing Boing, Wink Books, and Wink Fun. His free weekly-ish maker tips newsletter can be found at garstipsandtools.com.
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