ESP8266 NodeMCU interfacing with stepper motor 28BYJ-48 with ULN2003 driver board on Aduino IDE

Powering stepper motor using ESP 8266 NodeMCU

In this tutorial, we will learn about most widely used by beginners as low cost stepper motor 28BYJ-48 5VDC. Stepper motors are used in applications where rotation angle/step is critical for accomplishment of a task. As in a vending machine where the coil holding product must rotate for a fixed angle to dispense the product any less product wont be dispensed any thing more will dispense multiple products. 

We will now learn about 28BYJ-48 stepper motor and ULN2003 driver board.
This stepper motor has 5 wires and works both full step and half step. Read more here.


ULN2003 driver board has DC 5-12V pins along with on/off short terminals, it has 4 input pins for connecting to a micro controller. In our case it would be esp 8266/NodeMCU.

Hardware requirements


1. NodeMCU
2. Multi Voltage Output Power Module
3. ULN2003 stepper motor driver board
4. 28BYJ-48 5VDC stepper motor
5. Jumper wires

Connections

1. Stepper motor in ULN2003 driver board slot. 

2. Power module 5v to ULN2003 +pin , GND to -pin.

3. Use jumper wires to connect NodeMCU D1, D2, D3, D4 in same sequence to IN1, IN2, IN3, IN4. NodeMCU GND to power module GND.

4. NodeMCU 5v to power module 5v, GND to power module GND 


Software Requirements

We will be using AccelStepper library. You can see complete list of functions and usage here.

Goto Sketch -> Library Manager -> Search AccelStepper


Once Installed go to File -> Examples -> AccelStepper -> AFMotor_ConstantSpeed
// ConstantSpeed.pde
// -*- mode: C++ -*-
//
// Shows how to run AccelStepper in the simplest,
// fixed speed mode with no accelerations
/// \author  Mike McCauley (mikem@airspayce.com)
// Copyright (C) 2009 Mike McCauley
// $Id: ConstantSpeed.pde,v 1.1 2011/01/05 01:51:01 mikem Exp mikem $

#include <AccelStepper.h>

AccelStepper stepper(AccelStepper::FULL4WIRE, D1, D3, D2, D4);

void setup() {
  stepper.setMaxSpeed(4000);
  stepper.setSpeed(200);
}

void loop() {
  stepper.runSpeed();
}
I made one modification to use D1,D2,D3 and D4 as input pins.

Once uploaded to NodeMCU, you should see the stepper motor moving at a constant speed.



There are many other examples of this library, please explore them to better understand the functions like acceleration, moving to a position, angle etc.,

Troubleshooting

1. USB port not visible on Aurdino IDE after connecting to NodeMCU. This happens when you use charging cable instead of data cable. I had to spend 4 hrs trying multiple cables all of which are charging only cables. Please check if the cable you are using is charge only or data cable. You can check by connecting your mobile using hte cable to laptop/raspberrypi and see if mount is successful. I had a time when all 4 cables i tested are charge only cables.

2. Motor is not running smoothly. Check your input connections are correct and your speed configurations are within limits.

3. Donot add delays to code. run() of this library takes care by evaluating if step is needed else does nothing.

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