A BeagleBone Tutorial - Getting Started With Motor Bridge Cape

This project is a tutorial which can teach you how to use the Motor Bridge Cape on BBB or BBG, and I’ll show you a demo that can drive six servos two DC motors and one Stepper motor at one time.

The Motor Bridge Cape features bi-directional motor control using two TB6612FNG integrated dual H-bridge, so it can control two stepper motors or four brushed DC motors with 6~15V DC power and about 1A current draw per motor. The cape provides 5V regulated power to BBG or BBB with a max input voltage of 15V. It also has six servo control interface and six expand IO. All the features are provided by the on board STM32F0 coprocessor. The coprocessor can communicate with BeagleBone by I2C or UART interface.

By the time you’re done with the project you will reap the following experience:

• Be familiar with BBG/BBB;
• Be able to use Motor Bridge Cape.

Now, let’s get started.

Stepper Motor *1

DC Motor* 2

Servo* 6

As the picture shows, the Motor Bridge Cape has a strong ability to drive motors. It’s very appropriate that you make an automation devices such as robots with it.

If this is your first time to use BBG, maybe you can follow this link to get started with your BBG trip.

I assume that you’re already familiar with the Cloud 9 IDE. You should create a new Python file such as motor.py

Input the following command in the terminal

$ git clone https://github.com/Seeed-Studio/MotorBridgeCapeforBBG_BBB

And then copy the code to “/var/lib/cloud9”

$ cp MotorBridgeCapeforBBG_BBB /var/lib/cloud

And open the “MotorBridgeTest.py” file

Run the code, and you’ll find the motor is beginning to turn.

If you want to know more info about Motor Brige Cape, please click here.