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Trinamic drivers

Stepper motors in a 3D printer are controlled by a variety of driver chips such as the common A4988 and DRV8825. These provide signals to the stepper motors to control the magnets and move them by micro-steps. Typically the motor is divided into 3200 steps per revolution, with 80 steps per millimeter of motion. At the movement rates of 3D printers, and due to the ringing produced by stepper motors, the vibrations from these steps can be very loud to the human ear.

Trinamic stepper drivers control stepper motors with greater finesse and interpolate the micro-steps to produce extremely quiet motion. Through SPI or serial control, you can change how the drivers manage motor current as well as the manner of current delivery. These drivers can even detect when a motor hits an obstruction, so they can act as endstops for simplified wiring. You can also set the driver current with Marlin G-code commands, removing the need to adjust physical trimpots.

Supported TMC drivers and features

Driver Control StealthChop Sensorless
homing/probing		 Driver monitoring Hybrid threshold Notes
TMC2100 none yes no no no Standalone mode only
TMC2130 SPI yes yes yes yes  
TMC2160 SPI yes yes yes yes  
TMC5130 SPI yes yes yes yes  
TMC5160 SPI yes yes yes yes  
TMC2208
TMC2225		 UART yes no yes yes UART RX line requires an interrupt capable pin.
Software UART isn’t supported on all platforms, such as DUE based boards.
TMC2209
TMC2226		 UART yes yes yes yes  
TMC2660 SPI no not implemented yes no  

All configurable Trinamic stepper drivers can also be operated in standalone mode if they are pre-configured in hardware, either by hard connections or jumpers.

Installing the library

The TMC stepper drivers require an external library that allows Marlin to communicate with each driver.

For PlatformIO

PlatformIO will automatically download all libraries it requires, so skip directly to Wiring below.

Installing from Arduino IDE library manager

  • Open up the Arduino IDE
  • Go to Sketch -> Include Library -> Manage Libraries…
  • Marlin 1.1.9 and up:
    • Search for TMCStepper
  • Older versions of Marlin
    • Search for TMC2130Stepper or TMC2208Stepper
  • Click Install

Installing from a zip file

  • Marlin 1.1.9 and up:
  • Older versions of Marlin
  • Click Clone or download -> Download ZIP
  • In Arduino IDE and go to Sketch -> Include Library -> Add .ZIP Library…
  • Navigate to the downloaded file and click the Open button.

Wiring

TMC drivers (except in standalone mode) require some extra wiring (Serial or SPI) to communicate with and configure the drivers. Boards like the SKR from BigTreeTech actually integrate this wiring directly into the motherboard.

SPI Control

The SPI bus requires 4 wires for communication. The SCK, MOSI, and MISO wires can be shared across all the drivers, while CK must be wired to a separate pin for each driver. These pins are labeled differently on the motherboard versus the driver:

Motherboard Driver
SCK SCK
MOSI SDI
MISO SDO
CS CS

Software SPI

You can use pins other than the HW SPI pins by enabling TMC_USE_SW_SPI and defining the required pins:

TMC_SW_MOSI
TMC_SW_MISO
TMC_SW_SCK

UART (Serial) CONTROL

A 1K resistor is required between TX and PD_UART.

Motherboard   Driver
RX   PD_UART
TX (1kohm) PD_UART

The serial port on master is selected in the pins file for your board. Alternatively you can use the slower software serial by not selecting any of the hardware serial ports. Typically one port per one driver is needed.

Software UART

You can use free pins for UART by disabling all of the hardware serial options in your board’s pins file and by defining the _SERIAL_TX_PIN and _SERIAL_RX_PIN pins.

Note: The receive (RX) pins must be interrupt-capable pins. Transmit (TX) pins don’t have this limitation.

FYSETC drivers

As of this writing, we recommend getting the original Watterott drivers or the revised FYSETC v1.1 drivers to avoid additional headaches.

The FYSETC v1.0 drivers come pre-configured in standalone mode. So the drivers should work for moving the axes but you won’t be able to configure them or take advantage of their extra features. For full-featured drivers you’ll need to modify three solder bridges on the driver PCB.

FYSETC_TMC2130

Some versions of the FYSETC v1.0 drivers come with a solder bridge left of the chip, some come with a bridging resistor. This connection needs to be opened for SPI connection to work. The two smaller bridges need to be configured as shown.

Features and configuration options

Several Trinamic-specific technologies are supported by Marlin.

  • stealthChop is a technology that drives the motors using PWM voltage instead of current. The result is nearly inaudible stepping at low velocities. StealthChop has a lower stepping speed limit and if you need to move faster, for example travel moves, you may want to use spreadCycle or configure Hybrid Mode.
  • spreadCycle is an alternative stepping mode. The driver will use four stages to drive the desired current into the stepper motor. SpreadCycle provides greater torque which might be useful if you’re experiencing skipped steps. The downside is slightly higher noise levels.
  • stallGuard measures the load that is applied to the motor. If the load is sufficiently high, Marlin can react to the event. Such an event can be when we drive an axis to its physical limit and the signal provided by the driver can be detected just like an endstop. That way you can use the driver itself as an axis sensor negating the need to an additional endstop and the wiring needed. StallGuard is only active when the driver is in spreadCycle mode.
  • Hybrid Mode: Marlin can configure the driver to automatically change between stepping modes using a user configured switching velocity. If the velocity is lower than the threshold the stepper is in quiet stealthChop mode. When the axis velocity increases the driver will automatically switch to spreadCycle.
Option Description
R_SENSE The current sense resistor used in your product.
* Watterott SilentStepSticks typically use 0.11ohm values.
* Ultimachine Archim2 board has 0.22ohms.
* Panucatt TMC2660 BigFoot drivers use 0.1ohms.
HOLD_MULTIPLIER After the stepper hasn’t been moving for a short while, the driver can decrease the current and let the driver cool down. The multiplier is expressed as a decimal value in the range of 0.0 to 1.0.
INTERPOLATE TMC drivers can take lower microstepping inputs, like the typical 16 and interpolate that to 256 microsteps which provides smoother movement.
CURRENT Driver current expressed in milliamps. Higher current values will need active cooling and a heatsink. Low current values may warrant lower acceleration values to prevent skipping steps.
MICROSTEPS Configures the driver to divide a full step into smaller microsteps which provide smoother movement.
SOFTWARE_DRIVER_ENABLE Some drivers do not have a dedicated enable (EN) line and require the same function to be handled through software commands.
STEALTHCHOP Default state for stepping mode on supporting TMC drivers.
CHOPPER_TIMING Fine tune the spreadCycle chopper timings to optimize noise performance.
A set of presets has been provided according to used driver voltage level, but a customized set can be used by specifying
{ <off_time[1..15]>, <hysteresis_end[-3..12]>, hysteresis_start[1..8] }
MONITOR_DRIVER_STATUS Periodically poll the drivers to determine their status. Marlin can automatically reduce the driver current if the driver report overtemperature prewarn condition. The firmware can also react to error states like short to ground or open load conditions.
CURRENT_STEP Reduce current value when Marlin sees OTPW error.
REPORT_CURRENT_CHANGE Report to the user when automatically changing current setting.
STOP_ON_ERROR If Marlin detects an error where the driver has shut down to protect itself, it can stop the print to save both time and material.
HYBRID_THRESHOLD Configure the axis speed when the driver should switch between stealthChop and spreadCycle modes.
SENSORLESS_HOMING Use the TMC drivers that support this feature to act as endstops by using stallGuard to detect a physical limit.
SENSORLESS_PROBING Use stallGuard on supporting TMC drivers to replace a bed probe.
Recommended to be used on delta printers only.
HOMING_SENSITIVITY The Sensorless Homing sensitivity can be tuned to suit the specific machine.
A higher value will make homing less sensitive.
A lower value will make homing more sensitive.
TMC_DEBUG Extend the information M122 reports. This will give you a lot of additional information about the status of your TMC drivers.
TMC_ADV You can use this to add your own configuration settings. The requirement is that the command used must be part of the respective TMC stepper library. Remember to add a backslash () after each command!
AUTOMATIC_CURRENT_CONTROL Replaced by MONITOR_DRIVER_STATUS.
Marlin will poll the driver twice a second to see if the driver is in an error state. Such an error can be overtemperature pre-warn condition (OTPW) or short to ground or open load. Marlin can react to the temperature warning and automatically reduce the driver current. Short to ground error will disable the driver and Marlin can terminate the print to save time and material.

G-codes

Command Configuration
required		 Description
M122 none Test driver communication line and get debugging information of your drivers. TMC_DEBUG adds more reported information.
M569 TMC2130 or TMC2208 Toggle between stealthChop and spreadCycle on supporting drivers.
M906 none Set the driver current using axis letters X/Y/Z/E.
M911 MONITOR_DRIVER_STATUS Report TMC prewarn triggered flags held by the library.
M912 MONITOR_DRIVER_STATUS Clear TMC prewarn triggered flags.
M913 HYBRID_THRESHOLD Set HYBRID_THRESHOLD speed.
M914 SENSORLESS_HOMING Set SENSORLESS_HOMING sensitivity.
M915 TMC_Z_CALIBRATION (Deprecated in Marlin 2.0.)
Level your X axis by trying to move the Z axis past its physical limit. The movement is done at a reduced motor current to prevent breaking parts and promote skipped steps. Marlin will then rehome Z axis and restore normal current setting.

Troubleshooting

  • Some SilentStepSticks with variable 3-5V logic voltage (VIO) might get damaged if only powered over USB.
  • Test driver communication status with M122.
  • Test Marlin’s bugfix branch (on GitHub) to see if your issue is fixed.
  • Test the latest TMCStepper library to see if your issue is fixed.
  • Check all wiring and wire crimps.
    • SPI: Use a multimeter to check connectivity all the way down the chain on all the communication lines.
    • SPI conflict with the SD card? Solutions vary.
    • UART:
      • Make sure your receive (RX) pin is interrupt capable
      • Check the resistance value between receive (RX) and transmit (TX) lines. You should see 1kOhm.
      • Check connectivity from RX to the TMC chip
  • Check 12V (24V) power in the Vm pin and 5V (3.3V) in the Vio pin.
  • Check that configured pins match your firmware configuration.
  • Enable TMC_DEBUG and send M122 to see further debugging output.
    • Reported register values of either 0x00000000 or 0xFFFFFFFF are bad responses.
  • Try the examples provided by the respective library. Please detach any belts beforehand however, as the examples will not respect any endstop signals or physical limits. You may need to change the pin definitions.
  • If you’re experiencing skipped steps there are a few things you can try
    • First check for mechanical obstructions and that the parts move freely and do not bind
    • Check that your nozzle doesn’t bump into your print if it starts curling upwards (cooling issue)
    • Lower acceleration and jerk values
    • Increase driver cooling
    • Increase motor current
    • Disable INTERPOLATE

External resources