pump control [hardware]

[dingens]

No description provided.

[albertMgarcia]

To control the pump we thought to turn on and off the USB, if it isnt a good idea, what can we do?

[jcarrano]

How does the pump work? Are you planning on driving the pump with the 5V supply off the usb port? That's not going to work:

• The USB port can only supply power if the MCU is a host (i.e., the MCU must support USB OTG to act as host).
• The current and power is very limited, pumps draw quite some power.
• There are big current spikes when turning the pump on and on, as well as electrical noise when the pump is running.

What kind of pump will you run? Voltage? Power? AC or DC? If you only need ON/OFF control, the easiest route for you is to get a relay and toggle the relay using a GPIO. If you want to throttle the pump it depends on the pump you use.

The relay option will give you the least trouble, and you get galvanic isolation between the pump and the board.