Electronic control system for a german equatorial telescopic mount

Task of this book is to describe a conceptually simple and cheap solution to design an electronic board in order to implement an open-loop (so without feedbacks such as inertial sensors or rotary incremental encoders) control for a german equatorial telescopic mount, guaranteeing common goto and sidereal tracking functions to the system. Equatorial mount used is a Fast Linear Reverse by Avalon Instruments, which mounts a stepper motor in celestial right ascension axis and a stepper motor in celestial declination one. We will talk about stepper motors (by Sanyo Denki), relative bipolar chip-drivers (L6208 by STMicroelectronics)and their embedded power circuitries (with a particular focus on working of full H-bridges), about digital/analogical converters (AD7305 by Analog Devices) and firmware required to implement a proper microstepping drive by exploiting a simple 8-bit microcontroller by STMicroelectronics. Electronic board discussed here is a product designed and sold by LTEC srl and it has been matter of work for the author of this book during his internship at LTEC.

Autorentext

Si è laureato in ingegneria elettronica nel 2010 presso l università di Pisa. È stato assunto dall azienda LTEC srl per la quale progetta schede elettroniche. Oggi si occupa di microcontrollori, motori elettrici, filtraggio digitale, sensori inerziali per applicazioni robotiche. Si interessa di fisica dei semiconduttori e di fotonica.