Under LabVIEW environment, PCI-7342, Edmund Optics MOTORIZED STAGE, and CP-68LP Wiring Board work well?

[karohe]

I'm going to control two motorized stages (which each of them consists of a stepper motor). I have a PCI-7342 motion control card which I think it is suitable to control two stepper motors as well as a CP-68LP wiring board. I have two questions.

1. To the best of my knowledge, I may not connect stepper motors to the wiring board directly. I would like to know what kind of board I may use between wiring board and stepper motors. Or, may I design an amplifier circuit or even use buffers to amplifiy output current of the board (the motors maximum continuous current is 300mA)?

2. Which version of Labview is recommended? I have access to v6.0 and v8.0. I have to choose between two of them. I have some experice with v7.1 and v8.0.

Thank you in advance.

[JB]

Depending on its mode, the motion interface generates one of these two signals pairs :

• pulse and direction
• up and down

A PCI-7342 has two axes and is thererore able to control two motors. If you plan to control only stepper motors you could also use a cheaper PCI-7332.

But obviously a power drive is needed to convert the signals from the motion controller to the power signals for the motors. Here is an example of such an amplifier but there are several models from different suppliers around the world.

I would recommend to use the last available version of LabVIEW.