Dual Motor Shield for vibration motor control?

[justsam]

Hey!

I'm doing a small PoC project with TinyDuino which requires control of 2x small vibrational motors. The ones I'm using are this ones: https://www.digikey.ch/product-detail/de/adafruit-industries-llc/1201/1528-1177-ND/5353637

Now since this shield integrates seamlessly with other components I'm thinking of using it, I would like to use it to control the vibration patterns and produce different vibration patterns.

So, what I'm wondering is:

1) Is it possible to use this shield for this use case?
2) Do I need to attach additional power supply for those 2 small motors or can I reuse the battery?
3) Is it possible to control the strength of vibrations?

Thank you for support.

[lennevia]

Hello,

I would advise you to use a different chip than the DRV8837 on the Dual Motor TinyShield since it sounds like you want multiple vibration patterns and the Dual Motor TinyShield is intended for brushed motors/DC loads as stated in the product description. The DRV2605 chip, however, is meant to be used with ERM and LRA motors like the one you are looking to use.

We have a Wireling that uses the DRV2605 chip and has an LRA motor attached: https://tinycircuits.com/collections/wireling-input-output/products/lra-wireling-drv2605
The library with the chip includes over 100 built-in vibration patterns that might be a good place to start. If you're set on using an ERM motor, we could look into adding an option of the board without a motor attached by default.

I hope that helps!

Laveréna

[lennevia]

I have an update on the topic!

It looks like we are looking to add a motorless option of the board at $7.95 sometime soon on the website. You can email info@tinycircuits in the meantime if you are interested in that as an option!

Réna