Use DC motors instead of steppers

[abhijitp84]

I was disassembling my old printer to salvage Steppers from it. I was disappointed to see it only uses DC motors and no steppers were found in it.

It raised a question in my mind, if a printer can work so precisely without a stepper, why can't a cnc plotter work on the same logic? X-axis can move back and forth using a limit switch while Y-axis can move in steps with Arduino sending small signals on completion of every left to right movement of X axis. The Z-axis pen will lift up and down as required while moving to draw the image line by line.

Is there any library already available or someone already worked on such a project?

Any thoughts?

[lalo-uy]

Printers move the head from side to side , don’t come and go at random lengths. With a home switch and smooth move they are ok. For up to 350 deg you can use a servo circuit on a dc motor. El El vie, 24 oct. 2025 a la(s) 10:44, abhijitp84 ***@***.***> escribió:

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*abhijitp84* created an issue (gnea/grbl#1285) <#1285> I was disassembling my old printer to salvage Steppers from it. I was disappointed to see it only uses DC motors and no steppers were found in it. It raised a question in my mind, if a printer can work so precisely without a stepper, why can't a cnc plotter work on the same logic? X-axis can move back and forth using a limit switch while Y-axis can move in steps with Arduino sending small signals on completion of every left to right movement of X axis. The Z-axis pen will lift up and down as required while moving to draw the image line by line. Is there any library already available or someone already worked on such a project? Any thoughts? — Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#1285>, or unsubscribe <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/ACXBW4OAOI7SHPSUA4WVAQL3ZIUKTAVCNFSM6AAAAACKDX6HDCVHI2DSMVQWIX3LMV43ASLTON2WKOZTGU2DSNJYGA2DONI> . You are receiving this because you are subscribed to this thread.Message ID: ***@***.***>