MS101 Makerspace
2024-25/I Autumn
Expt 5:Remote Control of BO Motors
September 20, 2024
Objectives:
• To control the speed of two BO motors remotely through Arduino Nano, Node MCU and ESP-
WROOM32 microcontrollers.
List of components:
Arduino Nano, Node MCU (ESP8266 MOD), ESP-WROOM32, LM1117 Voltage Regulator,BO
motors, L298 motor driver card, potentiometers.
Introduction
The Drone project requires the use of a gadget to send data remotely to the drone so as to control
its various parameters, such as throttle, pitch, roll and yaw. The Drone used in the MS101 project has a
Node MCU (ESP8266) which receives data over Wi-Fi for controlling four BLDC (brushless DC) motors
through an Arduino Nano and motor driver cards.
In 2023-24/Spring semester a mobile app, viz. Remote XY was used to send drone parameters over
Wi-Fi so as to emulate a joy stick. In the current semester students are required to build a ESP-
WROOM32 based Joy Stick to control the drone parameters.
Experiment 5 has been designed to give a good background for remote speed control of BO motors.
It is expected that after performing Expt 5, students will have the sufficient background to implement
ESPWROOM32 based Joy Stick for the Drone project.
This experiment has three parts as detailed below:
• Part A: Interfacing two BO motors through Arduino Nano board and L298 driver card.
• Part B: Controlling the speed of two BO Motors through Arduino Nano with control from a Node
MCU (ESP8266 MOD) board.
• Part C: Remote speed control of two BO motors using ESP-WROOM32, Node MCU (ESP8266
MOD) and Arduino Nano boards.
In Expt 4 one BO motor was run through Arduino Nano and the L298 driver card. In Part A we
shall interface one more BO motor. These two motors will be run using the given Arduino sketch.
In Part B we shall extend the circuit of Part A so as to add a Node MCU (ESP 8266 MOD) card.
Two potentiometers will be connected to the Node MCU, such that their voltages can be read using the
inbuilt ADC and then mapped to obtain a PWM waveform to control the direction and speed of two
BO motors. This is very similar to Expt 4A-4 – Analog Input, Serial Output, where the voltage from
the potentiometer was used to control the intensity of an LED. In Expt 4 only the intensity of the LED
was varied. Here we shall control both speed and direction. The mapped values of the Node MCU will
be sent over SPI to the Arduino Nano. SPI (Serial Peripheral Interface) is a synchronous serial data
protocol used by Microcontrollers for communicating with one or more peripheral devices quickly over
short distances. Here SPI is used for communication between Node MCU and Arduino Nano, with Node
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MCU as the controller and Arduino Nano as the peripheral.
In Part C we shall introduce one more microcontroller card, viz. ESP-WROOM32. The two poten-
tiometers used in Part B will now be connected to ESP-WROOM32 so as to read their voltages using
the inbuilt ADC. In this case the mapped values will be sent from ESP-WROOM32 over Wi-Fi to the
Node MCU, which in turn will pass on these parameters to the Arduino Nano.
Part A - Interfacing two BO motors through Arduino Nano board
and L298 driver card
A.1 Procedure
i) Place the Arduino Nano on the breadboard such that pins are seated on the opposite sides of the
central dividing line of breadboard, ensuring that the gap prevents any short circuit between pins.
ii) Connect the pins of Arduino with the Motor driver as below:
Motor driver L298 Arduino Nano
ENA D3
IN1 D4
IN2 D6
IN3 D5
IN4 D8
ENB D9
Figure 1: PartA- Circuit Diagram
iii) Verify that Keithley Power Supply CH1 is set to 10V. Ensure that the power supply outputs are
disabled (or OFF). In the OFF mode, the green LED of the ‘Output On/Off ’ button will not
glow.
iv) Connect the Powersupply CH1 output to the 12 V pin of Motor driver L298 and GND of CH1 to
GND of Motor driver Card.
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v) Connect First Motor to the OUT1 & OUT2 and Second Motor to the OUT3 & OUT4
pins of the Motor driver L298.
vi) Connect CH1 and CH2 DSO probes to the D3 & D9 pins of Arduino Nano. Make sure that DSO
GND pins of the CH1 & CH2 are connected to the common Ground of the Arduino Nano.
vii) Connect Arduino Nano to your PC and upload the PartA Arduino from Arduino IDE. Observe
PWM pulse signals of both channels in the DSO. Sketch the PWM Waveforms for one time instant.
viii) Power Supply output should be made ON only after your TA checks your Circuit.
Observations
1. After your circuit has been verified by your TA, put the Keithley Power Supply Output in the ON
mode by pressing the ‘Output On/Off’ button. (In the ON mode, the LED will glow).
2. Now you should be able to see the motor rotating in one direction. After some time (depends on
delay specified in the code) it will stop and will start rotating in the opposite direction.
Part B - Controlling the speed of two BO Motors through Ar-
duino Nano with control from a Node MCU (ESP8266 MOD)
board
B.1 Procedure
i) Turn OFF the Keithley Power Supply outputs.
ii) This experiment extends the work you completed in Part-A. Maintain the Connections between
the Arduino Nano and L298 Motordriver that were established in Part-A.
iii) Place the Node MCU(ESP8266MOD) alongside Arduino Nano on the breadboard such that pins
are seated on the opposite sides of the central dividing line of breadboard.
iv) Place the 10 kΩ Potentiometer on the breadboard.
v) Connect Keithley CH1 output to the 12V pin of Motor driver card and GND of CH1 to GND of
Motor driver card. Set CH1 output to 10V.
vi) Connect CH2 output to Pin VIN of Arduino Nano and GND of CH2 to Pin GND of Arduino
Nano and set the CH2 to 5V.
vii) Connect CH3 output to Pin Vin of ESP8266MOD and GND of CH3 to Pin GND of ESP8266MOD
and set CH3 to 3.35V.
Note: The operating voltage of the ESP8266MOD module may range from 3.3V to
3.5V, depending on the specific hardware. If the motors fail to operate after the power
supply is activated, please incrementally adjust the voltage, beginning at 3.35V.
viii) Connect the Pins of Arduino Nano with Pins of ESP8266MOD as below
Arduino Nano ESP8266 MOD
D10 D8
D11 D7
D12 D6
D13 D5
GND GND
ix) Connect the wiper (center pin) of the 10 kΩ Potentiometer to the analog input pin (Pin A0) of the
ESP8266MOD. Connect one of the outer terminals of the potentiometer to the 3.3V (Pin 3V3)
supply pin and the other outer terminal to the ground (Pin GND) of the ESP8266MOD.
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Figure 2: PartB- Circuit Diagram
x) Connect Arduino to your PC and Upload the PartB Arduino Code to the Arduino from Arduino
IDE. Ensure that you select ”Arduino Nano” as the board type in the IDE.
xi) After uploading is done, connect your PC to ESP8266MOD and upload the PartB ESP8266MOD
code to the ESP8266MOD. Ensure that you select ”Generic ESP8266” as the board type in the
IDE and turn off the Power Supply while uploading.
Note: If the port is not detected after connecting to the ESP8266 module, please
follow these steps: Click here to download and install the CP210x driver. Extract
the downloaded folder. Navigate to the marked folder as shown in the Figure 4 and
proceed with the installation.
xii) After your circuit has been verified by your TA, put the Keithley Power Supply Output in the
ON mode by pressing the ‘Output On/Off ’ button.Ensure that the correct supply settings are
configured for all three channels before turning the output on.
Observations
(a) After turning on the power supply, you should be able to observe the motors beginning to
rotate in one direction. The speed and direction of the motors can be controlled by adjusting
the potentiometer.
Figure 3: PartB-NodeMCU to Arduino Nano connections
Note:There may be a parallax error in the Figure 3 regarding the connections. This
circuit image is provided for reference purposes only. Please follow the steps outlined
in the procedure for correct pin connections.
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Figure 4: CP210XVCP installation
Part C-Remote speed control of two BO motors using ESP-
WROOM32, Node MCU (ESP8266 MOD) and Arduino Nano
boards
C.1Procedure
i) Turn OFF the Keithley Power Supply outputs.
ii) This experiment builds upon the work completed in Part B. Disconnect and remove the 10 kΩ
potentiometer from the circuit assembled in Part B, while keeping the power supply settings
unchanged from those used in Part B. The existing circuit configuration will be utilized for
this section. However, do not remove the motor connections, as they will be used in this
experiment.
iii) Position the ESP-WROOM32 on the new breadboard. Then, place the two 10 kΩ potentiome-
ters on the same section of the breadboard as shown in Figure 6, where the ESP-WROOM32
is located.
iv) Connect the 5V output from the CH2 of Keithley power supply to the top horizontal row
labeled as 5V in the figure3.
v) Connect the 5V from the top horizontal row to the INPUT pin of the LM1117 voltage regulator
and to the VIN pin of the ESP-WROOM32. Connect the GND from the top horizontal row
to the GND pins of both the LM1117 voltage regulator and the ESP-WROOM32.
vi) Connect the 3.3V output from the LM1117 voltage regulator to one terminal of each of the
two potentiometers. Connect the ground (GND) to the remaining terminals of both poten-
tiometers.
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Figure 5: PartC- Receiver Circuit Diagram
vii) Connect the wiper (center pin) of the one of the potentiometer to Pin D34 of the ESP-
WROOM32.Connect the wiper (center pin) of the Other potentiometer to Pin D32 of the
ESP-WROOM32.
Figure 6: PartC- Transmitter Circuit Diagram
viii) Connect Arduino Nano to your PC and upload file named PartC Arduino code to the
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Arduino Nano.
ix) After the upload is completed, connect your PC to the ESP8266MOD(Node MCU) and open
the file named PartC ESP8266MOD. In this code, update the the SSID and serverAd-
dress fields with the assigned values. Replace the ZZ in the SSID field with your Table No
(Ex:D2,K3,...) and Y in the serverAddress field to your assigned value given by your TA.
Upload this updated code to ESP8266MOD.
Figure 7: ESP8266MOD serverAddress and SSID
x) Upon successful completion of the upload to the ESP8266MOD, connect your PC to the
Eand select the board ESP32-WROOM-DA-Module and open the PartC ESP32 code.
Update the IP address and SSID fields with the assigned values. Replace the Y in the IP
address field to your assigned value given by your TA and Replace ZZ in the SSID field
with your Table No (Ex:D2,K3,...) and upload to ESP-WROOM32. Once the code has been
successfully uploaded to all devices (Arduino Nano, ESP8266MOD, and ESP-WROOM32),
disconnect your PC from all devices.
Figure 8: ESP-WROOM32 IPAddress and SSID
Note:Replace ”Your password” with any 8-digit numeric value, without including
alphabetic characters or special symbols.Ensure that these values are consistently
matched in both the ESP-WROOM32 and ESP8266 code configurations. Make
sure that you select the correct board and port settings before proceeding with
the upload.
xi) After your TA verifies your circuit turn on power supply.
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Observations
i. After turning on the power supply, you should observe that the motors begin to rotate.
To control the motors, use the potentiometers connected to the ESP-WROOM32. By
adjusting these potentiometers, you should be able to control both the speed and direction
of the motors.
