• Position control

    Alan Kilian • 05/28/2014 at 00:41 • 0 comments

    I got to lab #13c and I can now do position control will a brushless DC motor and an incremental optical encoder.

    I'm very impressed by the performance of the motor in the evaluation kit. I can run it at 9,000 RPM, and can run it at 0.01 RPM.

    The labs are fairly involved, and I needed to go through them about every-other one in order so that I could understand what was going on.

    I've got "step-by-step" motion going on and I'll be testing settling time and overshoot this week.

    Then I've got to go on and see if I can get it to vary its speed b yits rotor position.

    So While it goes around once, I want it to change from 240 RPM, to 160 RPM, to 240 RPM to 160 RPM to 240 RPM all in one revolution.

  • Installing Code Composer Studio.

    Alan Kilian • 05/20/2014 at 18:56 • 0 comments

    Installing CCS from the CDROM asks what components you'd like ton install: Everything or "You pick the right things".

    Since I didn't know what the right things were, I chose  the "Everything" box.

    Big mistake.

    Everything installed (after a Looooong time), and I could import Lab #1 "Hello World!" Blinking light.

    It compiled and ran on the hardware and I was off to the races.

    Loading Lab #2 told me that I didn't have a recent enough compiler for the project. :-( 

    OK, no problem. Eclipse-based IDEs have a "Check for updates" feature which, sure enough, told me I had updates. So do it.

    After about 15 minutes, it told me it couldn't find some dependency or other.

    I messed around for a few hours selecting partial updates, uninstalling things like the MSP430 development pod support bits and had no luck.

    So I uninstalled the whole mess (which took another 90 minutes or so) and I reinstalledfrom the CDROM checking just the things I thought I needed. The C2000 compiler and things with C2000 in their name.

    Then I had a working setup that, complained about lab #2!

    But now the Eclipse update feature got me a new compiler and lab #2 compiled and ran.

    What a mess for such a good product.