Easy PID Motor Controller (EPMC) User Documentation

Imagine sending actual angular speed commands (not PWM commands) to your DC motor and seeing it running at that commanded speed. This is exactly what the Easy PID Motor Controller (EPMC) helps you to accomplish.

It is an easy-to-use digital PID motor controller system for controlling the angular speed of geared DC motors with quadrature encoders via angular speed commands in rad/sec rather than the traditional PWM commands. It consists of a motor driver (i.e. L298N Driver IC or any other motor driver that can be controlled using the Arduino PWM), an ATmega328 microcontroller, and a GUI Application that enables one to control motors easily and set up motor PID parameters.

It also provides a USB serial and I2C communication interface with ROS2, Arduino, Python, and Cpp libraries for easy interfacing with one's preferred project.

L298N EPMC ROS2 TEST VIDEO

Note

L298N EPMC Module is the main EPMC product. It consists of the L298N Driver IC and an ATmega328 microcontroller.

Custom EPMC Interface Board can also be made for other motor drivers (as long as they can control motor speed using the Arduino PWM). This may be due to the higher current requirement of the motor you intend to use for your project which the L298N (i.e. L298N EPMC Module) cannot provide. If you need a solution like that you can contact me: visit the robocrea8

It can easily be used by robotics or ROS hobbyists, students, learners, researchers, engineers, etc.

L298N EPMC MODULE

THE COMMON MOTOR SPEED CONTROL PROBLEM (The Traditional PWM Approach)

Whether you are a hobbyist, maker, engineer, student, or researcher, you usually would opt to control the speed of a DC Motor using PWM Commands from a microcontroller (e.g. Arduino UNO, etc.) using a motor driver like the L298N Driver Module (or any other motor driver module).

While this control method is simple and easy, the only drawback of this control style is that it is an open-loop control and does not allow you to command a desired angular speed easily. This generally poses a lot of limitations in their uses, especially in more advanced robotics (e.g. wheeled mobile robotics) projects requiring precise speed controls.

To achieve precise angular speed control with this traditional PWM control style, one would need to understand quite a bit of control theory and signal processing calculations, write more control and signal processing code, and possibly add an extra layer of circuitry, all of which can become cumbersome and might not be easy to integrate into one’s desired project. All these require a good level of control expertise.

The Easy PID Motor Controller (EPMC) easily solves and abstracts all these problems so you can focus more on building your projects with good controls being made readily available.

Important

In summary, the Easy PID Motor Controller (EPMC) provides the following:

• Easy interfacing with a geared DC motor with a quadrature encoder.
• Easy setting up of PID control parameter gain for the interfaced motor via its GUI application - epmc_setup_application.
• Easy motor angular speed commands in rad/sec (not PWM) and getting feedback on the motor’s actual angular position and angular speed.
• Easy integration with ROS2 (microcomputer or PC) projects with its ROS2 control package - epmc_ros2_control.
• Easy integration with Arduino projects with its I2C library - epmc_arduino.
• Easy integration with a microcomputer-based (Python or Cpp) project with its epmc_python and epmc_cpp library.

The Easy PID Motor Controller (L298N EPMC MODULE) SPECIFICATION

• Recommended Supply Voltage – 7v to 12v
• Motor Output Supply Current (Max) – 2A (i.e. should be used with geared DC motors whose stall current is not greater than 2A or 2.5A)
• Communication Interface - USB Serial and I2C
• Easily integrates with ROS2 and Arduino (as well as Python and Cpp) projects.
• Angular speed commands are in rad/sec.
• Angular speed feedback in rad/sec.
• Angular position feedback in radians.

L298N EPMC OVERVIEW

Easy PID Motor Controller APPLICATIONS

• Robotics (Arduino, ROS2, Python, and C++)
• Precise Motor Speed Control

Easy PID Motor Controller USAGE GUIDE SUMMARY

• Get/Purchase the L298N EPMC MODULE (or a Custom EPMC Interface Board)

Note

The L298N EPMC MODULE (or a Custom EPMC Interface Board) is available on Pre-order. Please reach out to me - check robocre8 for mode of contact.

• Interface the geared DC motors with quadrature encoder to the L298N EPMC MODULE (or the Custom EPMC Interface Board).
• Download and run the EPMC Setup Application to set up the encoder parameter and PID gains for the interfaced geared DC motor with quadrature encoder. You will be able to visualize the result - tutorial
• Use it in your ROS2 project - tutorial
• Use it in your Arduino project - tutorial
• Use it in your Python project - tutorial
• Use it in your Cpp project - tutorial

LIBRARIES THAT MADE THE Easy PID Motor Controller PROJECT POSSIBLE

Check out these Github repos of libraries that went a long way in developing the Easy PID Motor Controller ATmega328 microcontroller computational system. You can use them in your projects also (Ensure to star them).

• simple_pid_control - PID Arduino library based on the PID control series by Prof. Kelvin Lynch of Northwestern Robotics, developed by samuko-things.
• l298n_motor_control – Arduino library that helps you easily control with PWM the l298n driver module (or any other driver module with a similar control style), developed by samuko-things
• adaptive_lowpass_filter - Arduino code for implementing one and two-order lowpass filter in your Arduino signal processing project/code by Curio Res. Adapted by samuko things.
• quadrature_encoder_velocity_and_position_calculation - sample Arduino code on how to compute rotational velocity and position with a quadrature encoder, developed by samuko-things.
• Serial_comm_pyserial_and_arduino - a backend-API-style serial communication code between Pyserial and Arduino that can be adapted to any project, developed by samuko-things.