Stepper Motors

A stepper motor is a brushless, synchronous electric motor that can divide a full rotation into a large number of steps, for example, 200 steps, to ensure precision movement. Stepper motors are most commonly controlled by microprocessors or custom controller ICs and the current is often switched by stepper motor driver ICs. Stepper motors consist of a permanent magnet rotating shaft, called the rotor, and electromagnets on the stationary portion that surrounds the motor. Stepper motors are used in floppy disk drives, flatbed scanners, printers, plotters and a variety of other products and applications. Stepper motors operate much differently from normal DC motors, which simply spin when voltage is applied to their terminals.