Adafruit Motor/Stepper/Servo Shield for Arduino v2 Kit - v2.3

The upgraded Adafruit Motor Shield kit builds on the success of the original, making it the best and easiest way to drive DC and stepper motors for robotics projects. It retains the ability to control up to 4 DC motors or 2 stepper motors, but with several important enhancements:

• Improved Drivers: Instead of the old L293D Darlington driver, it now uses TB6612 MOSFET drivers, providing 1.2A per channel with up to 3A peak current for about 20ms. This upgrade reduces voltage drops across the motor, delivering more torque and making your motors run more efficiently. Additionally, built-in flyback diodes ensure smoother performance.

• Dedicated PWM Driver: The new design includes a dedicated PWM driver chip that controls motor speed via I2C, freeing up your Arduino's PWM pins. Only two data pins (SDA & SCL) along with power (GND & 5V) are needed to control all motors. Since it's I2C-based, you can easily connect additional I2C devices or shields, ensuring compatibility with any Arduino model like the Uno, Due, Leonardo, and Mega R3.

• Stackable Design: The shield is designed to be stackable with 5 address-select pins, allowing you to connect up to 32 shields, controlling up to 64 steppers or 128 DC motors! This makes it perfect for ambitious projects that require multiple motors.

• Polarity Protection & Prototyping Area: The shield includes a polarity protection FET on the power pins and a protoboard area for custom components, making it even more versatile.

This motor shield is pre-assembled and tested by Adafruit, so you can easily integrate it into your projects by simply soldering on the provided headers and terminal blocks.

Key Features:

• 2 connections for 5V hobby servos with high-resolution dedicated timer (no jitter)
• 4 H-Bridges with TB6612 chipset, each providing 1.2A per bridge (3A peak for 20ms)
• Up to 4 bi-directional DC motors with 8-bit speed selection (0.5% resolution)
• Up to 2 stepper motors (unipolar or bipolar) with various stepping options (micro-stepping supported)
• Motor disable on power-up for safety
• Big terminal block connectors for easy wire connection (18-26AWG)
• Polarity protected terminal block for external power (separate motor and logic supplies)
• Compatible with Arduino UNO, Leonardo, Mega R3, Due, Diecimila, and Duemilanove (with 2 wire jumpers for Mega/ADK R2 and earlier)

The kit includes an assembled and tested shield, terminal block, plain header, and jumper. Some soldering is required to attach the headers, and stacking headers are sold separately if you want to stack multiple shields. Arduino and motors are not included, but Adafruit offers a variety of motors that work seamlessly with the shield.

Specifications:

• Voltage range: 4.5VDC to 13.5VDC
• Thermal shutdown protection and internal kickback protection diodes
• Compatible with Arduino platforms: UNO, Leonardo, Mega R3, Due, and more

For quick integration, simply download the Arduino software library, check out the examples, and get started with your robotics projects! The terminal block included may be either blue or black.