Having purchased a bulk lot of 4 Nm Motors, for a good price, from one of the suppliers listed. I then spoke to Zap Automation about which stepper drivers would suite me best. As with most things there lots of variations and its difficult to make the best selection.

 

In passing, I described my project and asked what experience they had with small systems , particularly with the problem of lossing steps.

 

They recommended the new Leadshine motor drives. , These were new to the market and use optical feedback sensors to correct any errors. Amazing ! So I bought some.

 

See https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZMZdCcLQc4M

 

If you try and turn the motors out of position they resist and return, before finally raising an error on the driver controller. This is just what you need for a small home system, to avoid crashes ,should you push your luck on the feed rates.

 

My only problem then was how to add 1000 part optical encoders to my motors I had already purchased. 

 

You can buy Leadshine motors already with them. I would recommend this, it saves mounting the encoders, which you can purchase optical encoders separately from Zap Automation, if you need them.