Pigpio With Pi 3 Controlling Two Servos

Question

I am brand new to using the GPIO pins on the Raspberry PI and I'm having a lot of trouble trying to control two continuous rotation servos using pigpio with python and a keyboard.

Servos here: https://www.amazon.com/Parallax-Inc-Continuous-Rotation-Servo/dp/B00B886KSE

The problem is that the servos only seem to be responding half of the time.

This is the only code that I'm running.

#!/usr/bin/env python

import sys, tty, termios, time, pigpio, RPi.GPIO

#motor 1 = GPIO 4 (pin 7) = left motor
#motor 2 = GPIO 26 (pin 37) = right motor

servos = [4,26]

dit = pigpio.pi()

def getch():
    fd = sys.stdin.fileno()
    old_settings = termios.tcgetattr(fd)
    try:
        tty.setraw(sys.stdin.fileno())
        ch = sys.stdin.read(1)
    finally:
        termios.tcsetattr(fd, termios.TCSADRAIN, old_settings)
    return ch

def motor1_forward():
    dit.set_servo_pulsewidth(servos[0], 1600)

def motor1_reverse():
    dit.set_servo_pulsewidth(servos[0], 1400)

def motor1_stop():
    dit.set_servo_pulsewidth(servos[0], 1500)

def motor2_forward():
    dit.set_servo_pulsewidth(servos[1], 1600)

def motor2_reverse():
    dit.set_servo_pulsewidth(servos[0], 1400)

def motor2_stop():
    dit.set_servo_pulsewidth(servos[0], 1500)

while True:
    char = getch()
    print "          " + char
    if(char == "w"):
        motor1_forward()
        motor2_forward()

    if(char == "s"):
        motor1_reverse()
        motor2_reverse()

    if(char == "a"):
        motor1_stop()
        motor2_forward()

    if(char == "d"):
        motor2_stop()
        motor1_forward()

    if(char == "x"):
        print("STOPPED")
        motor1_stop()
        motor2_stop()
        dit.stop()
        break

char = ""
dit.stop()

My questions are:

• Why are the servos only starting and stopping when they want to?
• Why do the motors keep spinning even if no key is being pressed?

Answer 1

Some things to note.

• motor2_reverse() and motor2_stop() were changing motor1
• servo pulses continue at the set pulse width until you either stop the pulses (pulse width 0) or change the pulse width.
• continuous rotation servos normally stop when you set a pulse width of 1500 µs. Some have a recessed tuning screw to fine tune the stop pulse width.

I have edited the code as follows.

#!/usr/bin/env python

import sys, tty, termios, time, pigpio

servos = [4,26]

dit = pigpio.pi()

def getch():
    fd = sys.stdin.fileno()
    old_settings = termios.tcgetattr(fd)
    try:
        tty.setraw(sys.stdin.fileno())
        ch = sys.stdin.read(1)
    finally:
        termios.tcsetattr(fd, termios.TCSADRAIN, old_settings)
    return ch

def motor1_forward():
    dit.set_servo_pulsewidth(servos[0], 1600)
    print("motor1=1600")

def motor1_reverse():
    dit.set_servo_pulsewidth(servos[0], 1400)
    print("motor1=1400")

def motor1_stop():
    dit.set_servo_pulsewidth(servos[0], 1500)
    print("motor1=1500")

def motor2_forward():
    dit.set_servo_pulsewidth(servos[1], 1600)
    print("motor2=1600")

def motor2_reverse():
    dit.set_servo_pulsewidth(servos[1], 1400)
    print("motor2=1400")

def motor2_stop():
    dit.set_servo_pulsewidth(servos[1], 1500)
    print("motor2=1500")

while True:
    char = getch()

    print("          " + char)

    if char == "w":
        motor1_forward()
        motor2_forward()

    elif char == "s":
        motor1_reverse()
        motor2_reverse()

    elif char == "a":
        motor1_stop()
        motor2_forward()

    elif char == "d":
        motor1_forward()
        motor2_stop()

    elif char == "x":
        print("STOPPED")
        motor1_stop()
        motor2_stop()
        time.sleep(1)
        for s in servos: # stop servo pulses
            dit.set_servo_pulsewidth(s, 0)
        dit.stop()
        break

dit.stop()