user71714: I have an Arduino Mega 2560 and I want to control four 23-frame steppers same speed/direction for a conveyor application. I want these to be synchronized exactly as possible for smooth operation.

Can four TB6600 drivers be daisy chained to the same Arduino GPIO pins?

Is there a limit to how many number of drivers I can daisy chain?

I'm wondering about current draw from the 5 volt Arduino GPIO, spread out over many drivers.


Thanks for your help!
Bob

user4143: Those devices use opto-isolated inputs. To all intents and purposes they look just like an LED with a resistor in series.
The built-in resistor looks like it sets the current to "between 8mA and 15mA" and typically 10mA, though it's impossible to say what it actually is.  So we'll take the worst-case scenario of 15mA.
The Arduino has an absolute maximum of 40mA, and a recommended maximum of 25mA from each IO pin, with a maximum of 200mA in total through all pins.
That means you ideally can't really have more than one TB6600 per IO pin, but you could get away with 2 per pin, certainly no more.
To run lots in parallel you would need a separate set of drivers that can "fan out" the low-current signal to either a single high current signal or a parallel set of low-current signals.
It looks like you provide 5V to one pin of each input (the anode of the opto-isolator) and sink the current through the other pin (the cathode of the opto-isolator) to ground through your IO pins. That means you could use a single large N-channel MOSFET to sink all of the cathodes in parallel and invert your IO logic in software.

71714: <p>I have an Arduino Mega 2560 and I want to control four 23-frame steppers same speed/direction for a conveyor application. I want these to be synchronized exactly as possible for smooth operation.</p>
<ul>
<li><p>Can four TB6600 drivers be daisy chained to the same Arduino GPIO pins?</p>
</li>
<li><p>Is there a limit to how many number of drivers I can daisy chain?</p>
</li>
<li><p>I'm wondering about current draw from the 5 volt Arduino GPIO, spread out over many drivers.</p>
</li>
</ul>
<p>Thanks for your help!<br />
Bob</p>
 4143: <p>Those devices use opto-isolated inputs. To all intents and purposes they look just like an LED with a resistor in series.</p>
<p>The built-in resistor looks like it sets the current to &quot;between 8mA and 15mA&quot; and typically 10mA, though it's impossible to say what it <em>actually</em> is.  So we'll take the worst-case scenario of 15mA.</p>
<p>The Arduino has an absolute maximum of 40mA, and a recommended maximum of 25mA from each IO pin, with a maximum of 200mA in total through all pins.</p>
<p>That means you ideally can't really have more than one TB6600 per IO pin, but you could get away with 2 per pin, certainly no more.</p>
<p>To run lots in parallel you would need a separate set of drivers that can &quot;fan out&quot; the low-current signal to either a single high current signal or a parallel set of low-current signals.</p>
<p>It looks like you provide 5V to one pin of each input (the anode of the opto-isolator) and sink the current through the other pin (the cathode of the opto-isolator) to ground through your IO pins. That means you could use a single large N-channel MOSFET to sink all of the cathodes in parallel and invert your IO logic in software.</p>
