Hi @EzAng,

We appreciate your help, I can't speak for @ptp but I think that what he's getting at is to try and work with what @Bullseye already has.

Since @Bullseye has 3-wire Brushless (BLDC) motors for the tank an L298 based motor driver is not ideal to use, it can be done but gets really messy. It doesn't seem like they have regular DC gear motors.

You simply cannot use an single L298 to drive a brushless motor. You need 3 H-bridges to in order to control each of the 3 coils.  A L298 has only 2 H-Bridges in it and can only control the 2 of the 3 coils. You would need 3 L298 motor drivers to control all 6 coils which can be done but practically generating those signals yourself would be painful.

In my humble opinion the easiest method to control the BLDC motors would be to, configure the Electronic speed controllers (ESC) to be in forward/reverse mode, send a continuous servo signal from the EZ-Bv4 to the orange servo wire on each ESC, hook up the 3 BLDC wires from the motor to the ESCs, hook up power to the ESCs and EZ-Bv4 and hopefully it should all work. (Always remember a common ground is needed)

Note the red and brown wires on the ESC servo cable come from the BEC (Voltage regulator) on the ESCs and are not needed, they are used to save on wiring and power RC receivers, but are not needed in this case.

Bullseye,  listen to Jeremie,

Bullseye said "quote"- I am pretty new to this, so please don't assume I know anything : )"

Thanks Jeremie,

Here is where I got my information  https://dronebotworkshop.com/dc-motors-l298n-h-bridge/

check it out if you get a chance

I deleted all my help advice

what you said sounds correct - I hope he understands

You think a person that said "quote"- Bullseye said  I am pretty new to this, so please don't assume I know anything : )"

Bullseye  said "quote" Or is there another solution?  understands?

thanks again

EzAng

Well, I will tell you I have built over 50 RC helicopters/ RC cars (Fuel and Electric) I own two 3D printers and have built over a thousand computers. I can solder, make control boards, and am very adept at the Raspberry Pi. I just need some help with connecting Brushless motors to my 564 piece 3D printed tank base I have been working on for over 3 months. The tank is 2 1/2 feet long by 1 1/2 feet wide and has 8 RC shock absorbers (I will post pics when done). I know how to set this up using an RC controller but wanted to go full ARC with this build as I wanted to make a functioning robot with tread design. Even if I end up using an RC radio I will use the EzRobot setup for the top for cameras and other fun robot stuff.  With that said, I am not poor so if there is an option I can purchase to make this work please let me know. I am set on brushless and yes it does have forward and reverse.  If someone has any experience with this please reach out to me, I would love to have a discussion with what you used and how it works.

Thanks, Bullseye

@Bullseye:

I don't own an ESC controller, before the covid I attended a few regular meetups and some members used ESC controllers, and it was easy to get access to the hardware and do some tests, unfortunately I don't see that happening anytime soon, so...

Jeremie's solution:

Quote:

the easiest method to control the BLDC motors would be to, configure the Electronic speed controllers (ESC) to be in forward/reverse mode, send a continuous servo signal from the EZ-Bv4 to the orange servo wire on each ESC, hook up the 3 BLDC wires from the motor to the ESCs, hook up power to the ESCs and EZ-Bv4 and hopefully it should all work. (Always remember a common ground is needed)

Note the red and brown wires on the ESC servo cable come from the BEC (Voltage regulator) on the ESCs and are not needed, they are used to save on wiring and power RC receivers, but are not needed in this case.

High level steps:

1. you will need to program/configure each ESC controller, the easy solution is to use the following device: https://hobbyking.com/en_us/turnigy-trackstar-turbo-and-waterproof-esc-programming-box.html

you need to setup: Forward / Reverse mode, adjust the PWM frequencies to the EZB  servo PWM range frequencies. I believe the default is 1000 us - 2000 us, EZB pwm operates in a different interval.   and maybe a deadband interval (stop position)

2. Connect the 3 wire cable to a digital port, because the middle wire carries 5V (BEC) you need to disconnect that cable, so you connect 2 wires only (Black) GND, and the signal to an EZB digital port.

3. Connect the battery, and the motors to the ESC controller you need to follow the ESC controller instructions.

4. Connect a power source to the EZB you can use 2 cells (7.4v) or a 3 cells (11.1v) battery.

Then you can control the ESC controller as continuous servo (speed backward/forward).

The most important part is to disconnect the middle wire (5V) otherwise you can damage one or both controllers.

Hey is this still hot gossip? Its kind of easy to control a brushless motor via ARC, all you need is the ESC and an Arduino...let me know!

Wow, that seems loud. It it this loud in real life?

It was actually pretty loud...the idea was just to see if the whole thing works while waiting for the Odrive! Now that I configured the motor and its all hooked up using the Odrive, the noise is a lot better!

It might take a bit of time before I can post my progress on the new robot arm I am building, but hopefully I will be able to show some progress soon!!