I love the Pimoroni gear and this looks like another nice little board! Looking forward to getting my hands on one I think I will use it to control crossing barriers on my model railway that seems like a practical application otherwise I tend to just put them in my box of cool hats and phats to fiddle with.
@pimoroni hello! I've purchase a couple of pimoroni servo2040, seems a cool board! It could be possible to connect it to Raspberry? Maybe using i2c protocol? 😊
In the video, the USB cable / PC port seems to power all the servos (as the external power of the servo board is not connected). Afaik, USB is only specified for 500mA, so isn't it dangerous for the PC?
Depends on your PC! We've not had any problems powering a Servo 2040 and a few small servos over USB - most modern USB controllers are designed to cope with higher powered USB-C devices being plugged in and will stop your USB ports if they try and draw too much current. If you want to be totally safe you can cut the trace on the bottom of the board and provide external power to the servos.
I see that there are time.sleep instructions. Does that means that when you need slow movement, you have to put the rp2040 in wait? No parallel control on this to allow the rp2040 to process other stuff during those moment (like sensors)
Servo 2040 dev here. Our servo library doesn't have any built in support for background movements like would be needed in your example. I did look into it, but wasn't happy with some of the compromises it would introduce. Maybe I will revisit it in the future. The best solution currently is to set up a Timer object in C++ or Micropython to call one of your own functions at a regular interval, and use that to update your servos (and anything else that needs to be synchronised), leaving your main loop free. I'll add it to my task list to write an example of this.
I just ordered the servo2040! Is it also possible to use wifi on this board? Has anyone any suggestions? For my project I use a raspberry pi that controlls 7 servo's with API data as input. Is this also possible with this board?
So how do I go about getting those libraries so I am able to use the modules. I am very new to this and I cant seem to find any kind of set up for micro python on the servo 2040 anywhere. If anyone could help I would really appreciate it.
Hi Josh! The servo drivers are baked into our batteries included MicroPython build available here: github.com/pimoroni/pimoroni-pico/releases . You might find this tutorial useful if you're new to RP2040! learn.pimoroni.com/article/getting-started-with-pico . Feel free to drop support a line if you're still stuck!
Do you have a US-based retailer? Edit: Found one - Chicago Electronics Distributors. I have no association with them other than being a satisfied customer. I buy Adafruit items there because they don't charge the unjustified high postage (and handling) Adafruit does.
The LED pins won't work for SPI as these go through the multiplexer, but you could wire up to the three ADC pins on the bottom edge connector, as these give A0 / GP26 : SPI1 SCK A1 / GP27 : SPI1 TX (MOSI) A2 / GP28 : SPI1 RX (MISO) Then the CS could come from INT / GP19 (if that feature of I2C breakouts is not required).
Very nice! As an estimate, how much memory does it have in terms of lines of code? I know a lot of circuitpython supports around 250 lines of code (give or take based on libraries and datastructures).
I love the Pimoroni gear and this looks like another nice little board! Looking forward to getting my hands on one I think I will use it to control crossing barriers on my model railway that seems like a practical application otherwise I tend to just put them in my box of cool hats and phats to fiddle with.
Might think about getting one of these, it seems pretty useful
This is awesome!!!
I just got my first order from you guys last week, argh! Time to abuse the wallet again...
@pimoroni hello!
I've purchase a couple of pimoroni servo2040, seems a cool board! It could be possible to connect it to Raspberry? Maybe using i2c protocol? 😊
The robot frame at the end looks cute, could you share a link to it?
In the video, the USB cable / PC port seems to power all the servos (as the external power of the servo board is not connected). Afaik, USB is only specified for 500mA, so isn't it dangerous for the PC?
Depends on your PC! We've not had any problems powering a Servo 2040 and a few small servos over USB - most modern USB controllers are designed to cope with higher powered USB-C devices being plugged in and will stop your USB ports if they try and draw too much current. If you want to be totally safe you can cut the trace on the bottom of the board and provide external power to the servos.
Interesting with rp2040. Btw how to expand this 18 ch to 30 or more, any sample?
I see that there are time.sleep instructions. Does that means that when you need slow movement, you have to put the rp2040 in wait? No parallel control on this to allow the rp2040 to process other stuff during those moment (like sensors)
Servo 2040 dev here. Our servo library doesn't have any built in support for background movements like would be needed in your example. I did look into it, but wasn't happy with some of the compromises it would introduce. Maybe I will revisit it in the future. The best solution currently is to set up a Timer object in C++ or Micropython to call one of your own functions at a regular interval, and use that to update your servos (and anything else that needs to be synchronised), leaving your main loop free. I'll add it to my task list to write an example of this.
@@ZodiusInfuser I forgot I could use Timer with micropython. That could do the trick in most cases. Thanks.
I just ordered the servo2040! Is it also possible to use wifi on this board? Has anyone any suggestions? For my project I use a raspberry pi that controlls 7 servo's with API data as input. Is this also possible with this board?
Sir, Have you tutorial using Arduino IDE?
We don't, sorry about that.
So how do I go about getting those libraries so I am able to use the modules. I am very new to this and I cant seem to find any kind of set up for micro python on the servo 2040 anywhere. If anyone could help I would really appreciate it.
Hi Josh! The servo drivers are baked into our batteries included MicroPython build available here: github.com/pimoroni/pimoroni-pico/releases . You might find this tutorial useful if you're new to RP2040! learn.pimoroni.com/article/getting-started-with-pico . Feel free to drop support a line if you're still stuck!
Do you have a US-based retailer? Edit: Found one - Chicago Electronics Distributors. I have no association with them other than being a satisfied customer. I buy Adafruit items there because they don't charge the unjustified high postage (and handling) Adafruit does.
Does this board support the SPI protocol?
Yep, the servo pins can be used for SPI.
What if we are using all 18 of them? Can we use the 6 pins next to the LEDs?
The LED pins won't work for SPI as these go through the multiplexer, but you could wire up to the three ADC pins on the bottom edge connector, as these give
A0 / GP26 : SPI1 SCK
A1 / GP27 : SPI1 TX (MOSI)
A2 / GP28 : SPI1 RX (MISO)
Then the CS could come from INT / GP19 (if that feature of I2C breakouts is not required).
Is there a pinout diagram for the Servo 2040 similiar to this? smittytone.files.wordpress.com/2021/07/tiny-2040.png?w=1024
Drop us an email at support@pimoroni.com and we'll see what we can find!
Very nice! As an estimate, how much memory does it have in terms of lines of code? I know a lot of circuitpython supports around 250 lines of code (give or take based on libraries and datastructures).