FPGA-based dual motor control kit from Microsemi and TRINAMIC

The folks from Microsemi and the guys and gals at TRINAMIC have just announced the availability of a new motor control kit allowing designers to lower product-development costs and bring products to market quickly. The solution includes Microsemi's SmartFusion evaluation kit and TRINAMIC's motor control daughter board kit.

Microsemi's SmartFusion customizable system-on-chip (cSoC) combines three features crucial for successful implementation of complex motor control algorithms: an embedded microcontroller, programmable analog fabric, and programmable digital (FPGA) fabric. This integration creates an ideal platform to partition software and hardware architectural requirements.

SmartFusion's embedded ARM Cortex-M3 microcontroller is utilized for system layer task management, algorithm execution and system connectivity. The onboard programmable analog provides full sense and control for voltage, current and temperature monitoring. The flash FPGA logic enables hardware acceleration and math co-processing. In addition, computational/cycle intensive algorithmic routines can be implemented within the FPGA to execute extremely fast and efficient subroutines.

About the Motor Control Kit
Microsemi SmartFusion Evaluation Kit — Key Features

• A2F200M3F-FGG484ES device
• 200,000 system FPGA gates, 256 KB flash memory, 64 KB SRAM, and additional distributed SRAM in the FPGA fabric and external memory controller
• Peripherals include Ethernet, DMAs, I2Cs, UARTs, timers, ADCs, DACs and additional analog resources
• SPI-flash memory connected to SPI_0 on the device
• USB connection for programming and debug
• USB to UART connection to UART_0 for HyperTerminal examples
• 10/100 Ethernet interface with on-chip MAC and external PHY
• RVI header for application programming and debug from either Keil or IAR systems
• Mixed-signal header for daughter card support

TRINAMIC Motor Control Daughter Card — Key Features

• Parallel operation of BLDC & stepper motor (requires two power supplies)
• Hall sensor interface, ABN encoder interface
• Tightly connected to the SmartFusion analog IOs and analog computing engine (ACE)
• All signals of the mixed-signal header can be accessed via a pin header for test and measurement
• Independent voltage supplies for stepper and BLDC block

Other Kit Components

• 1 stepper motor with 1.8 degree step angle
• 1 brushless DC motor with Hall sensors
• 1 portable desktop power supply (24V/1A) with international plugs
• Example designs available for download

Pricing and availability
The SmartFusion Dual Motor Control Kit is available for ordering now. List price for the bundled motor control kit is $549. Contact a local Microsemi (www.microsemi.com) or TRINAMIC (www.trinamic.com) sales representative to purchase the kit.

---

If you found this article to be of interest, visit Programmable Logic Designline where you will find the latest and greatest design, technology, product, and news articles with regard to programmable logic devices of every flavor and size (FPGAs, CPLDs, CSSPs, PSoCs...).

Also, you can obtain a highlights update delivered directly to your inbox by signing up for my weekly newsletter – just Click Here to request this newsletter using the Manage Newsletters tab (if you aren't already a member you'll be asked to register, but it's free and painless so don't let that stop you [grin]).