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Parallax Standard Servo KickStart (#900-00005)
What It Can Do
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Moves to any position between 0 and 180 degrees
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Keeps its position as long as power is applied
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Motorizes most anything, such as a robot or mechanical puppet
Servo motors are made for hobby radio-control tasks, like model airplanes and model racing
cars. They’re also very popular in such things as robotics and animatronics.
R/C servos are made to spin in a limited circle, no more than about 180°. You set the precise
position of the output shaft of the servo motor by using a timing signal; this signal is provided by
a microcontroller. Once the signal is applied, the motor moves to that position, and stays there.
The control signal for a servo is a stream of pulses. The exact duration of these pulses, in
fractions of a second, is what determines the position of the servo. Each pulse is nominally from
1000 to 2000 microseconds (μs) in duration — one microsecond is one millionth of a second.
The pulses repeat about 50 times each second.
