Balboa 32U4 Control Board
This is primarily intended as a replacement part for the Balboa 32U4 Balancing Robot, but it can also be combined with the Balboa Chassis with Stability Conversion to make your own Balboa 32U4 robot. This product consists of the Balboa 32U4 control board PCB shown in the main product picture along with the following additional parts:
- one buzzer
- jumper wires for soldering motors to the board
- two magnetic encoder discs
- one single flat and one single spring battery contact
- four 3/16″ #2-56 screws and nuts for mounting the board to a Balboa Chassis
Documentation and other information
Pololu Balboa 32U4 Balancing Robot User’s Guide (Printable PDF)
User’s manual for the Pololu Balboa 32U4 balancing robot.
File downloads
- Pololu A-Star 32U4 drivers for Windows (version 1.3.0.0) (7k zip)
- This download contains the Windows drivers for the A-Star 32U4 and the rest of our 32U4 family of boards.
- Schematic diagram of the Balboa 32U4 control board (587k pdf)
- Pinout and power distribution diagrams of the Balboa 32U4 control board (2MB pdf)
- Dimension diagram of the Balboa 32U4 Control Board (471k pdf)
- 3D model of the Balboa 32U4 Control Board (27MB step)
- Note: this model includes an LCD and headers that are sold separately from the Balboa 32U4 Balancing Robot Kit.
- Drill guide for the Balboa 32U4 Control Board (285k dxf)
- This DXF drawing shows the locations of all of the board’s holes.
- LSM6DS33 datasheet (1MB pdf)
- Datasheet for the ST LSM6DS33 3D accelerometer and 3D gyroscope.
- LIS3MDL datasheet (2MB pdf)
- Datasheet for the ST LIS3MDL 3-axis magnetometer.
Recommended links
- Balboa 32U4 Arduino library
- The Balboa32U4 library for the Arduino IDE helps interface with the on-board hardware on the Balboa 32U4 control board.
- Balboa 32U4 library documentation
- LSM6 library for Arduino
- An Arduino library for interfacing with the LSM6DS33 accelerometer and gyro.
- LIS3MDL library for Arduino
- An Arduino library for interfacing with the LIS3MDL magnetometer.
- Forum post: Correcting the Balboa magnetometer
- Pololu forum user Jim Remington has shared a technique for compensating for hard iron distortion of the Balboa’s magnetometer. After corrections, he was able to create a compass program with a basic accuracy of ±2°, sufficient for navigating the Balboa around the room.