[Oblarg]

Originally Posted by Scott Kozutsky

Steppers are really hard to use effectively, it would just widen the gap between the better engineering teams and the less experienced.

I do not think this is really the case. If you choose the wrong stepper for the job, yes, you are going to have problem with skipped steps and accumulated errors. But it is not that hard to pick a stepper with the appropriate torque for a given mechanism.

For many manipulators which require small, precise movements, I think a stepper is far easier to use than a DC motor in a closed control loop. Less complexity, fewer failure points.