Pancake Vibrating motor

Hi,

I am trying to get a pancake vibrating motor and an LED to turn on when detecting a bluetooth device. However im trying to be cautious when adding components to my breadboard as I’m new to this and dont want to break any pins on my argon board.

I’ve created a fritzing model before adding anything and just want to know if this would be correct:

Also, i have done the blink an LED example and it seems that the Vibrating motor and LED would pretty much be the same code and would be in the same if statement so i believe i have that covered.

My main worry is that i add the vibrating motor incorrectly and then break my board.

Thanks in advance.

Devin

@Devinm501, assuming your vibration motor is rated for 3.3v operation, the problem is that an Argon GPIO output is no rated for a lot of current (< 10mA). These vibration motors can take up to 80mA so you could easily damage the GPIO circuitry on the pin.

Typically, you would instead drive a small transistor (eg. 2N2222 NPN transistor) which in turn drives the vibrator motor, powered directly via the 3.3v pin with an optional current limiting resistor (e.g 47ohms will limit current to 70mA). Also important, since the motor is a coil, is to add an inductive kickback protection diode across the motor.

Here is a good example for an Arduino which applies to the Argon as well:

4 Likes

Thank you for the response,

I have done some reading on this and understand the concept now, however can’t get my head round assembling it. Would you be able to give me a push in the right direction through fritzing or another model?

Thank you for your time

@Devinm501, I don’t use Fritzing and the “other model” is to learn to read and build from a schematic diagram directly. Perhaps someone else can help?

Hey Devin, can you state where are you struggling to connect this?
Name the first blocking issue you have, then we could try removing it together, then the next and so on so forth. Easier said than done, of course.

Is it breadboard knowledge that you are currently need? Perhaps this post can help.

Please tell us more
Gustavo.

Hi PK, this resistor, does it go in the collector in series with the vibrator motor?
Thanks

@gusgonnet, it is optional and likely not needed. However, if it is used, it can be placed on the Emitter side of the transistor.

1 Like

This topic was automatically closed 182 days after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.