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Pan Servo broken? no range of motion?

Pixy Hardware
#1

Just got my Pixy2 and Pan/Tilt kit. Hooked it up and ran the pan/tilt demo via pixymon and noticed the tilt seemed great but the pan was almost non-existant.

I wrote a small python program using the examples to test and it buzzes attempting to pan and wiggles slightly but not much motion to speak of, maybe a 5-10degree change. Tilt seems to work fine and has full range of motion.

pixy.init ()
pixy.change_prog ("video");

pixy.set_servos(500,500);
sleep(1)
pixy.set_servos(1000,500);
sleep(1)
pixy.set_servos(0,500);

I saw in other posts about removing power and testing if you can move it by hand, when removing power it moves freely, when powered it doesn’t want to move to the right, but moves almost with no resistance to the left.

#2

Hello,
It does sound like you might have a defective servo. Where did you buy your pan-tilt kit?

Edward

#3

Amazon.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07D1CWJTV/

#4

Hello,
We will have someone contact you via email.

Edward

#5

Hello, I am having an identical issue with my Amazon-purchased pixy & pan/tilt mechanism; ;my tilt servo only rotates +/- 10 degrees. Were you able to find where the issue lies?

#6

Will any micro servo work as a replacement? @edge

#7

Hello,
It could be that your servo is damaged somehow. Have you tried swapping the servos to see if the tilt servo behaves the same as a pan servo?

Edward

#8

Hey Edward,

Thanks for the response. I have changed out for metal gear servos with EMAX branding. Now it runs away straight up when it sees an object, and I console command inputs seem to just hang with no escape.

Once I get the console to work I’d like to zero out the servos before screwing down the servo horns.
I have gotten it to recognize a green laser pointer by changing many settings. Went back to restore defaults and still won’t accept servo commands.

Plan is to mount these to a zumo and get it working through that. Now that I have it trained for what I want, should I just leap into Arduino IDE? Are there commands indexes for the libraries posted?

#9

Hello,
I’m not sure what problems you’re having… You mention that console commands seem to hang? What commands?

Let’s consider this problem first, because the console should never hang. It might be caused by servos that are consuming too much current.

Note, if your servos consume more than 1.3A combined they are going to harm Pixy’s power supply and Pixy may stop working (e.g. hang). In order to get Pixy working again, you’ll need to unplug the servos, disconnect Pixy from power and apply power again.

What is the maximum current draw for the servos you are using?

Edward

#10

200mA/60° is teh best answer I could find, Edward.

I started with Arduino and couldn’t get it to perform after trying with knockoff, uno wifi, nor uno. So I went back to training it.

Is there a strong template class for using with arduino uno and zumo which you would suggest? What about for LED rings?

#11

Hello,
I don’t understand “strong template class”. Please check out the Pixy zumo examples in the Pixy Arduino library. These examples we all written using the Zumo robot and an Arduino Uno.

Edward

#12

@Captnwalker1,

I recently purchased the Charmed Labs Pan/Tilt2 Servo Motor Kit for the Pixycam2 from Amazon and the pan servo did not last very long before it began oscillating (hunting) right and left when under power. I disconnected the pan servo from the base and found that the servo was difficult to turn by hand when it should have turned smoothly. Obviously a defective servo. The tilt servo is fine.

I found that the Tower Pro SG90 servo is a close replacement for the original pan servo. It mounts in the same position as the original pan servo, however the SG90 servo’s drive shaft is bigger than the original pan servo and will not fit the original pan servo’s servo horn. Additionally, the hole spacing in the SG90 servo horns is not the same as the original pan servo’s mounting horn. Which means modifications are in order to use the SG90 servo in place of the original servo.

I took one of the SG90 servo’s servo horns and using a M2.5 machine screw I attached the original pan servo’s servo horn to the top of the SG90 servo’s servo horn so that I could align drill the holes in the original pan servo’s servo horn with the SG90’s servo’s servo horn with a no. 54 drill. I then attached the SG90 servo’s servo horn to the platform base and found that the servo horn was very close, within acceptable limits, to the center of the platform base hole.
I then applied power to Pixy2 though the USB connector to center the SG90 pan servo. Unfortunately the SG90 pan servo will not center where the original pan servo centered and will be slightly off to the right or the left depending on where the servo shaft is seated in the servo horn.
To get around this centering issue, I took and drilled an additional hole in an arc below one of the platform servo horn mounting holes and one above. Doing this allowed me to rotate the platform servo horn around the center hole of the platform to correctly align the SG90 servo to straight ahead.

Regards,
TCIII

#13

Hello,
We’re sorry for the all the troubles with the faulty servo. We’ll be contacting you via email.

Edward

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