Well, I've gotten more than enough steppers to build my table...now it's time to design and build a control circuit. (Yes, I want to build my own!)
My steppers are unipolar, 6 pin...which means that there are 2 center tapped coils, making a total of 3 connections per coil. Now, here's my question...
From reading on the web, I've learned that bipolar steppers are more efficient, and provide more torque per unit of power, than unipolar steppers. I've also learned that it's possible to run unipolar steppers in a bipolar mode, by simply not connecting their center taps.
Would this be a good idea to do this? Run them in bipolar mode? Would there be a down side? In theory it should be no problem...in practice, theory is often thrown out the window.
I'll probably end up building 2 control systems, and just try it both ways...but that's double the effort. At the very least, I'd prefer to build the superior system (at least the one expected to be superior) first.
Help? Advice? Comments? I know I won't go wrong by building a unipolar driver...but the bipolar chips also support 3 bit microstepping, while the unipolar chips only support 1 bit microstepping, at most.
-- Chuck Knight