3 stepper motors

[waspinator]

Hi,

I'm looking at using 3 phase stepper motors, but I can't find much information about them. How much harder are they to drive? I've only found $100 CNC type drivers online, but they're not mentioned much in hobby community. Allegro makes a SI-7600 3 phase stepper driver, but there doesn't seem to be stock or breakout boards. Where should I be looking to find more information?

http://www.alldatasheet.com/datasheet-pdf/pdf/38283/SANKEN/SI-7600.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stepper_motor#Higher-phase_count_stepper_motors

Thanks

[ebclr]

Driver

http://www.onsemi.com/PowerSolutions/evalBoard.do?id=STK673-010GEVB

[rstofer]

Stepper motors come in a lot of sizes and one thing that distinguishes them is motor current.  You didn't say which motor you are using so it is impossible to help select a driver.  There's a reason that large commercial drivers tend to be used on CNC milling machines.  The motors are drawing somewhere between 5 and 10 amps and we also want a bunch of microsteps.

OTOH, if microstepping isn't required and motor current is modest, you can drive the motor with some MOSFETs hung off the side of an Arduino.  Or maybe just an L293D driver chip (or similar):

https://learn.adafruit.com/adafruit-arduino-lesson-16-stepper-motors/overview

http://arduino.stackexchange.com/questions/20503/can-an-l293d-motor-driver-shield-do-microstepping

[ebclr]