Texas Instruments Incorporated (www.ti.com) is pleased to introduce its all-new DRV8412 evaluation kit (DRV8412-C2-KIT) – a new line of scalable evaluation platforms intended for spinning motors. The kit includes all of the software and hardware needed to spin a single stepper motor or two brushed DC motors out of the box. It also speeds up development time for stepper and brushed DC motors running up to 6A continuous/12A peak at 50V. Applications include gate openers, medical pumps, textile manufacturing tools, stage lighting, and consumer or industrial robotics.

Among the kit’s features are out-of-the-box motor control and driver solution, which includes motors, the DRV8412-C2-KIT, a quick-start GUI, full development source code, Code Composer Studio (CCStudio) fitted with development environment (IDE), and a real-time control C2000 Piccolo microcontroller (MCU) controlCARD module. Modular control architecture provides flexibility to choose the suitable level of processing performance for the application. Additional TI MCU options will also be available next year.

The DRV8412 motor with integrated MOSFETs offers up to three times lower Rdson than other solutions, allowing up to 97% efficient operation, and delivers 6A continuous/12A peak current at 50V, eliminating the need for a costly heat sink. The motor driver also incorporates advanced on-chip protection such as under-voltage protection, over-temperature, and cycle-by-cycle over-current, to reduce design board space and complexity and ensure higher system reliability.

C2000 Piccolo MCU can perform communications, debug and control. The 32-bit C2000 MCU incorporates the most advanced CPU capability and control peripherals in an embedded MCU device family. This includes open-tooled reference designs through free controlSUITE software, real-time debug capabilities and access to the most systematic set of motor control software modules.

Easy-to-use GUI and C source code demonstrate current and voltage control of one or two brushed DC motors, as well as index and speed, which include up to 128 microsteps, of a stepper motor.