Toshiba Electronics Europe (TEE) announced a pre-configured development board for rapid implementation of motor control applications using its ARM Cortex-M3 family of microcontrollers. Developers can use the low-cost ‘SigmaBoard’ as a starter kit, reference design or a standalone solution for field-orientated control (FOC)/vector control of brushless DC (BLDC) motors with ratings to 36V and 2A.
The SigmaBoard is a double-sided 2.5cm x 5cm PCB featuring a ‘digital side’ and an ‘analogue side’. The digital side incorporates a Toshiba TMPM373 microcontroller; a USB-to-serial interface with a default transmission rate of 115kbps; a USB connector for a host PC; an RGB LED to indicate motor phase; interfaces for U, V and W motor phase outputs; and high-side MOSFETs. The analogue side comprises: gate drivers; a current measurement circuit with a 50mΩ shunt resistor and amplifier for current sensing; an overcurrent comparator; and low-side MOSFETs.
