Inadvertently I recently used a 12v brick as the external power supply to a PCA9685 PWM board and since then I have been unable to get a response from the connected servos.
There turned out to be no voltage to the V+ rail so I installed a jumper between the external supply socket and the V+ rail. Terrific, 5V at V+ but still no servo movement.
Has anyone else had this experience and if so is it cooked or fixable?
Cheers
Toni
If you applied +12v at J1 then that would have cooked the servos, but not the module. AFAICT the servo supply (5.0V) and the module logic supply (VCC) are separate.
Thanks Jeff
I had thought about the servos so am using a new one for my testing.
As I mentioned the on board external power connection to the servo bus is no longer hence I have installed a temporary link. All to no avail.
I was just wondering if there is anything else that could have been damaged.
Just to be safe I have also ordered some replacements to make sure it is not something else as well
Cheers
Toni
PS what is AFAICT
switch modes in general dont like running switch modes…depending on a few variables over time they destroy one or the other or both…specially power to power…E.G… i had several buck regs running off a 200w switch mode after a while they failed one by one over time… the supply was more robust…
over what time span was it running for if i may ask …???
Hey Toni,
Haven’t used this particular servo driver myself, although typically the datasheet states both your logic level voltage and often depending on the manufacturer instructions for use. In this case, they both appear to be around the 5V level.
It may be worth grabbing a multimeter and checking whether you’re getting any voltage out to the pins headed to your servos to see whether the issue is that the servos got fried, or whether the driver itself has failed (or possibly both). Did you notice any magic smoke when the power was applied?
P.S. AFAICT is As far as I can tell
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