Configure the Plink for PiHat mode

To operate as a PiHat, the Plink must be flashed with the PiHat firmware. The Pi can do this automatically through the motorgo command line tool, which is a part of the motorgo Python package.

Connecting the Plink to the Pi

Connect the Plink to the Pi using the 40 pin GPIO header. The Plink should be mounted with 11 mm standoffs to ensure proper spacing. You may need longer standoffs if your Pi has a heatsink.

Installing the motorgo python package

The motorgo package is available on PyPi and can be installed with pip.

pip install motorgo-python

Manual Installation

If you would like to install the package manually, you can clone the repository and install it with pip.

git clone
cd motorgo-python
pip install .

Flashing the PiHat firmware

Installing the PiHat firmware is as simple as running the following command:

motorgo flash

This will automatically pull the correct version of the firmware and flash it to the Plink via the GPIO pins.

Custom Firmware

The PiHat firmware is open source and can be modified to suit your needs. The firmware is available on GitHub and can be found here. The firmware is written in Arduino and can be flashed using either PlatformIO or the Arduino IDE. Follow the standalone setup to configure your development environment.

Next Steps

Once you have completed these steps, jump to the Python API guide to learn how to control the Plink and for example code.