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Electronics => Electronics => Topic started by: davidthefat on April 01, 2010, 08:12:50 PM

Title: Question On Gyros and Multiple Microprocessors
Post by: davidthefat on April 01, 2010, 08:12:50 PM
So can anyone explain the ±300° / s? Does that mean that it can register up to 300 degrees towards both ends? Is it more accurate to get a lower degree gyro or a higher one? Also how would I connect several microcontrollers together? Like one board does the sensors, the other one does the motors and stuff based on the data from the sensor board.

http://www.robotshop.com/SFE-Single-Axis-MEMS-Gyroscope-300s-LISY300AL.html (http://www.robotshop.com/SFE-Single-Axis-MEMS-Gyroscope-300s-LISY300AL.html)
Can this just be soldered directly onto the board and be used as a sensor?


Oh and are motor controllers needed? Can't I just plug it into PWM outputs directly?
Title: Re: Question On Gyros and Multiple Microprocessors
Post by: waltr on April 01, 2010, 09:39:25 PM
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So can anyone explain the ±300° / s?
Well, 360° is one rotation so the maximum rotational spped this gyro can measure is just less than one rotation per second.

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Is it more accurate to get a lower degree gyro or a higher one?
A gyro with a smaller rate may be more precise but easier to exceed its measurement range.

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Can this just be soldered directly onto the board and be used as a sensor?
Yes with the addition of a few more components like this:
http://www.robotshop.com/sfe-single-axis-300s-gyro-breakout-board-lisy300al.html (http://www.robotshop.com/sfe-single-axis-300s-gyro-breakout-board-lisy300al.html)

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Oh and are motor controllers needed? Can't I just plug it into PWM outputs directly?
If you mean the PWM outputs from a uController than no, most motors draw too much current for any uController putput pin. You need a motor Driver is the uController is doing the PWM motor control.

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Also how would I connect several microcontrollers together?
Simply connect an output from one uController to the input to another uController (assuming they both are powered at the same voltage).  This gets them connected but then you need to send some sort of information from one to the other I presume. There are many, many ways to 'communication' between two digital devices. Usually this is done with one of the standard physical protocols like IIC, SPI or Async. Then you create the logical protocol, the command structure, for the two uControllers to pass useful information.