@iSkyMaster wrote:

It appears there are different PixHawks out there with different FMU types.

FMUv2: Single board with STM32427VI processor (Pixhawk 1, HKPilot32, Pixfalcon, DroPix)
FMUv3: Identical to FMUv2, but usable flash doubled to 2MB (Pixhawk 2,Pixhack v3,mRo Pixhawk, Pixhawk Mini (Discontinued))
FMUv4: Increased RAM. Faster CPU. More serial ports. No IO processor (Pixracer)
FMUv4-PRO: Slightly increased RAM. More serial ports. IO processor (Pixhawk 3 Pro)
FMUv5: New processor (F7). Much faster. More RAM. More CAN busses. Much more configurable.(Pixhawk 4,CUAV v5,CUAV V5+,CUAV V5 nano)

Is there a command inside Mission planner that can be used to determine what type of PixHawk you have?

Is there any other way to determine if one has PixHawk 2.4.6 or PixHawk 2.4.8?

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@Hong_Phuc_Le wrote:

Hello guys, I have just recently encountered a strange incidence with Mission Planner 1.3.70 (build 1.3.7277.34800).

I managed to setup a Joystick (simulator controller) to override the RC Controller to control the drone via a TCP link. Managed to did it successfully over a span of few days for our bench testing.

However, it just decided to stop working one day. The Joystick setup window still recognizes the input from the “joystick”, all channels assigned properly, but it just does not pass on the signal to Mission Planner. The Radio Calibration window does not react to the “joystick” at all.

All settings remain stock, also SYSID_MYGCS = 255 (default).

Has anyone encountered this before ?

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@luke_e_h wrote:

Hi Everyone,

I’m sending imu data from a cube black to a companion computer being used for navigation purposes (Using the RAW_IMU mavlink message). I would like to characterise the maximum delay between APM Copter reading the IMU data (at 400Hz) and the values being sent via mavlink.

Does the mavlink loop also run at 400Hz?
What is the maximum rate I can request a message to be sent? (via REQUEST_DATA_STREAM or SET_MESSAGE_INTERVAL)

Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks

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@Matt_C wrote:

I have run out of serial ports and am looking to use the debug port for my esc telem. does anyone know what the connector for the cube mini carrier board is? On a side not can the power 2 be used as esc telem.?

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@praveen_khm wrote:

Hi,

I have designed a 4wd robot chassis and need to control it using a Pixhawk. The setup I have is a Pixhawk 2.4.8 and an arduino based motor controller. I need to get data from Pixhawk. Kindly suggest on the following:

1. There is an Arduino based motor controller with both I2C and UART ports. However I prefer using I2C since there is only one UART port on Arduino Uno. Should I use I2C or UART?
2. How to send signals from the Pixhawk to Arduino to drive the motors?
3. This the first time I am connecting the two. Are there any libraries to communicate between the two?
4. What setup should I make in Mission Planner for the setup?

Kindly Help!

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@manreg wrote:

Hi guys,

The FS_SHORT_TIMEOUT parameter does not work. Although I increase the FS_SHORT_TIMEOUT time, FS_SHORT_ACNT does not wait that time to act.

I have installed the version plane 4.0.5 in a pixhack 2.8.4

Is the same thing happening to you?

Regards

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@AnJu wrote:

Hello all.Has anybody managed to use c94 RTK as secondary GPS only ? As soon as i switch to secondary i get EK2 error.
Rover Gps has Rtk fix locked and Pixhawk shows Dgps lock, but with Gps switch to “best” i dont get satissfactory precision.I have set rate to 5hz on Rover gps so that should not be a problem. Serial speed 115200.I have set up Lora link thanks to @ktrussell’ s instruction and code and that part works well, it just seems that pixhawk is not using rtk gps properly.What parameter should i analyze to find out what is going on ?Please help

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@White wrote:

Hello guys. I have a drone Octa Quad. Engines: Mad 8108 170kv. ESC: T-Motor 60A FLAME HV.
The drone holds well in the YAW axis without wind - Yaw does not rotate, it holds the drone in one place, but during gusts of wind (5-7m / s) it turns suddenly in the YAW axis, then it returns and it is good again.
Does anyone know what it is caused by? I put logs and parameters.

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@Ipirk wrote:

Hello,
is there any reason why i can find the BCN_Parameter on a normal Pixhawk Cuble Black but not on a Kakute F7 Board (the same Firmware 4.0.4dev)?
I need the BCN_Parameters because i want to setup a Pozyx Indoor Navigation System.
Is there any way to get it running on the Kakute F7 Board?
BR Ipirk

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@George wrote:

Hello everybody, I have quad, 16 kg, span 1680mm, with P80 motors. Arms are 40 deg from main axes. It means it is not clear x. I did try to set up it like X and also V. Settings of NEW Pixhawk is from scratch, esc calibrated… But drone is unstable. It is oscilating on roll and pitch axes. And Up and down. During several seconds of flight the amplidude is growing and I have to land. I am fighting with it it more than months. Log is added. Please could you help me somebody?
Thanks George2020-04-02 14-08-19.tlog (318.1 KB)

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@elisa wrote:

Hi friends! I hope everyone is staying well during these crazy times! I just wanted to share a vehicle designed by our friends at JM Robotics and Bravo Marine… introducing the C-RAY!

Aquaculture is one of the largest sub-cultures of the marine robotics industry with many of our friends, partners, and distributors focusing heavily on fish farming. ROVs are often used to visually monitor the farms while manipulators and other rigs are used for mortality extraction and maintenance. One area of aquaculture where there is much room for innovation is the cleaning of nets and pipes, inspiring lots of creative projects and robots.

When Bravo Marine had an idea for an ROV based underwater cleaning system but needed some help with the ROV base, they reached out to our friend and distributor, JM Robotics, for a collaboration. The resulting ROV, C-Ray, consists of Bravo Marine’s design, cleaning rig, and frame, coupled with JM’s ROV platform, Modular ToolCarrier, utilizing ArduSub software. The C-Ray is in its Beta1 stage and cleans using high water pressure, rotating discs, and 5x HD cameras displayed simultaneously on 2 curved LED screens at the pilot station. Check out the demonstration video below!

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@Hooyeop wrote:

Hi, Everyone
To check the time information received from GPS satellites, I want to get information from the GPS_RTK message.
I connected my odroid xu4 and 3DR pixhawk with a usb cable and simply wrote the code below.

from pymavlink import mavutil 
import time

connection = mavutil.mavlink_connection('/dev/ttyACM0')
connection.mav.command_long_send(
    connection.target_system,
    connection.target_component,
    mavutil.mavlink.MAV_CMD_SET_MESSAGE_INTERVAL,
    0,
    127, 10000000, 0, 0, 0, 0, 1)
try:
    message = connection.recv_msg().to_dict()
    print message
except Exception as e:
    print(e)
    exit(0)

However, I failed to read the detailed information from the GPS_RTK (# 127) message and the following error occurred.

odroid@odroid:~$ python RTKGPSTest2.py 
{'mavpackettype': 'BAD_DATA', 'reason': u'Bad prefix', 'data': bytearray(b'5')}
odroid@odroid:~$

It didn’t work with the RTK GPS because I executed the code indoors, but I think there is a problem with not getting any data from the pixhawk. Tommorrow, I’m going to install the base station of the RTK GPS outdoors and run the code again, but I want to see what’s wrong before that.

BR,
Hooyeop

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@Giorgio_Rinolfi wrote:

ArduBee, a Ready-To-Fly Micro drone for Education and Swarming

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Ciao community!

We have a vision and we would like to bring you on board to make it happen!

Let’s build the smallest integrated ArduCopter with outstanding flight time! We call it ArduBee.

This tiny ArduPilot UAV will enable initiatives of education and research or just everyone who wants to play with state-of-the-art technology and to explore the field of aerial applications.

We really believe it could be a great opportunity for our beloved ArduPilot community to get the best possible drone dev kit.

[direct link to ArduBee micro drone project page]

Our Story begins long ago…

We have been learning with ArduPilot since our first DIY flying quad and our first RC piloting experience and since then, the idea undergoing this first flying solution was realized in 2014.

start 2014800×650 303 KB

Clearly it was pushing the limits of a small size ArduPilot copter.

This vision keeps inspiring us in our hardest work to craft the lightest and perfectly integrated full-featured ArduCopter.

We couldn’t imagine working in urban space with large copters and we couldn’t sleep peacefully with the idea of having just a poor flight time, as often happens in this class of super small copters.

Our best 5” full-featured ArduCopter

Last year we finalized our best 5” class ArduCopter quad, ready to be driven by our inhouse swarm GCS for drone light show.

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Our fleet of light performing copters is based on our optimized and finest design that every day has proven its abilities at work. We continue to do our best to enhance the tools and improve the quality and performance of our swarming choreography.

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this is the final weight with battery and indoor localization addon (212g)

This extreme lightness gives to the luminousbee4 so relevant flight times and vibrant flight characteristics that we built our complete ecosystem for indoor and outdoor swarm applications around it.

Hover time:
2 x 18650 3600mAh 45 min small battery pack
2 x 21700 5000mAh more than 1h big battery pack

May 2019, state of the art outdoor solution

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GPS RTK Ublox F9 perfect integration

Indoor positioning system

During our journey we also developed an UltraWideBand indoor localization to fulfill our needs of precision and scalability to be able to fly a swarm of drones.

Our solution is not as good as a motion capture system, BUT it is

• precise, starting from a 10cm error that can be tuned down to 3-5cm
• scalable, has no bottleneck on number of trackable objects
• light, the payload is less than 8 grams
• flexible, it can be set up to track in non square rooms or around obstacles
• and last but not least, it is way more cheaper than a mocap system

We want to share this solution and to improve it further with your help. We are refining this technology with all the bells and whistles, from a software tool to setup the positioning system to a beacon holder design.

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Ground beacon and positioning tag add-on

Till now we grew up through this amazing journey with ArduPilot. Now we got the inspiration with what we think could be our best way to contribute back supporting the community with our latest platform.

Our newest 3”

We want to present our lightest copter in the family, ArduBee.

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October 2019, ArduBee-0.1 with plugin FC

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March 2020, ArduBee-0.2 weight test without and with battery (53g and 102g)

We imagine this could become an excellent 3” platform to enable everyone to start working fast on the more advanced ArduPilot capabilities without all the weakness of the standard frankenstein design and its associated weight and clumsiness.

We selected the best components available, optimized them at our best and manufactured in the finest single module, as small and light as possible.

doppio ArduBee800×301 144 KB

On board:

• MCU 32-bit STM32F427 Cortex M4
• 4xBlHeli32 Esc with telemetry, individual motor’s RPM and current
• DSHOT 1200 flying every day with ArduCopter, hardware compatible up to 2400
• Li-ion 18650 removable battery
• WiFi ESP8266 for ArduPilot telemetry
• SD card slot for log and Lua scripting
• IMU, barometer, compass
• downward facing rangefinder for low altitude height above ground measurements
• SBus RC receiver connector

We aim to contribute to ArduPilot community with ArduBee, improving the development in this small class size and creating new opportunities with a platform ready for swarm robotics research and new applications.

The other main goal is to support and innovate the educational sector, using tiny ArduBee to teach and learn robotics, hardware, software and science with the open and robust ArduPilot’s environment.

We are finishing the development of several add-on boards:

• external camera
• 8 rangefinder module for easy collision avoidance
• propeller guards
• GPS module
• optical flow sensor
• indoor positioning with UWB suitable for single and swarm
• RGB LEDs board
• Breadboard with connectors for I2C, CAN, SPI, servo signals and power supply

The heart of this initiative is to give quality tools to the community, the final design is not yet closed and we ask your support to bring it to life.

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Family portrait

We are going to launch a Kickstarter campaign in the next weeks, if you like this idea please share your suggestions or requirements and stay connected with ArduBee development.

https://forms.gle/ZjYc4HuLyF29zY8g6

If you have ideas and want to contact us at

luminousbees+ardubee@gmail.com

Development updates in this post and in the following page

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@vosair wrote:

I recently went from 4.0.3 to 4.0.4 and noticed a big difference in satellite count and HDOP. On 4.0.3 I was getting 20 sats and an HDOP of 0.6. On 4.0.4 I get 12 sats and an HDOP of 1.0. I’m using the mRo Location One over CAN. Has anyone else noticed a difference between 4.0.3 and .4?

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@iSkyMaster wrote:

So, it appears that the max # of channels inside a Futaba Receiver are 14 Channels.

e.g. Futaba R7014sb 2.4ghz FASST S.bus High Voltage Receiver

And when it comes to Taranis, Max are 8 per receiver unless you use two receivers to get 16 channels.

Am I right or wrong?

If someone wants to use all 8 MAIN OUTs and 6 x AUX Outs inside PixHawk simultaneously, you will need two receivers.

Is my understanding correct here?

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@iSkyMaster wrote:

I must be over looking something important so need some guidance. I am doing BENCH TESTING ONLY at this point.

1. I am using Pixhawk 2.4.8
2. I have loaded latest Ardu plane firmware.
3. I can arm the plane, by first pressing the safety switch (after GPS lock) and then pushing the throttle stick to the right.
4. A single motor spins fine when throttle is used.

The issue is, when I push the stick to the bottom left, PixHawk will not disarm. even if I try to disarm using the push switch, it stays solid RED.

What am I doing wrong here? Do i need to adjust some default parameter settings here?

I am using very simple basic channel mapping.

TX
Chan 1 = Aileron, Chan 2 = Ele, Chan 3 = Throttle, Chan 4 = Rud.

Mission planner exactly the same. See screen shot.

disarming issues1920×1080 193 KB

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@iforce2d wrote:

Recently I designed a small lipo-checker to practice PCB design and STM32 programming. The pins on the left side can be either UART or I2C output, which I was thinking would be useful to output the lowest individual cell voltage to Ardupilot while flying, since I’ve been caught out a couple of times by a bad cell that wasn’t apparent by just looking at the total pack voltage until too late.

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Seems like this could be done either by emulating one of those FrSky voltage sensors (UART), or by emulating an SMBus smart battery (I2C). I think I could figure out how to emulate SMBus by looking at AP_BattMonitor_SMBus*. For FrSky I looked at AP_Frsky_Telem* but there is no mention of individual cells (even though docs suggest this is supported https://ardupilot.org/copter/docs/common-frsky-telemetry.html).

Alternatively, since it’s not really necessary for Ardupilot to know all cell voltages, my sensor could send only the lowest cell voltage as a single value somehow - not sure if there’s any suitable protocol for that though…

As for displaying on the OSD, I’m thinking to set the overall pack voltage to the lowest cell voltage (by modifying my Arduplane build I mean), and I’m expecting the OSD will show that without any problems, ie. with fully charged lipo the OSD will show around 4.2v regardless of pack size. I know it’s not technically correct, but that’s outcome I will find most practical. Hmm… might be nice if the OSD could display two decimal places, if not I could just multiply the voltage by 10 to have it starting as 42.0v when fully charged.

Anyway, I was wondering if anyone had some useful tips about the best way to do this before I dive in and make something that could have been done much easier a different way.

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@iSkyMaster wrote:

There is no doubt that DJI Video TX system is one of the best systems out there for high quality video transmission and when it comes to FC, Pixhawk is my champion.

I saw a video on Youtube where one guy tried to get DJI Occusync to work with Pixhawk using MAVLINK and using Telemetry port 1.

I tried to give it a shot but so far I am not seeing any OSD data.

Below is my wring diagram for PixHawk 2.4.8.

Do I have to do anything inside mission planner to get the data out?

Yes, I have SERIAL1_PROTOCOL set to 1. Are there any other parameters that requires adjustments?

DJI Occusync1080×1440 158 KB

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@EnesSert wrote:

(topic withdrawn by author, will be automatically deleted in 24 hours unless flagged)

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@AM_AVT wrote:

Hello All,

I am starting to fine-tune a large hexacopter with 15 Kg payload capacity for spraying. I have previously worked on small multi-rotors and done Autotune multiple times, but never tried to tune a copter that carries such a significant payload, which is actually reducing in weight over the course of flight. So in need of expert guidance from the community.

The hardware/software setup is as follows:

HobbyWing X8 Pro Power Combo (100 KV Motor, 30x90 Prop)
12S 22000mAH Battery
Take-Off Weight No Payload: 20.5Kg
Pixhawk Cube Black
Arducopter 4.0.0

I started following the Tuning Instructions and set all the parameters as explained in this guide. After a couple of successful flights I was confident to try Auto-tune. I have completed Autotune on all three axis. As the guide suggested, Autotune was done in Most agile configuration with Fully charged battery and No Payload.

Here are the logs from a Manual Flight and Auto Mission after the Autotune. Both flights were done without any payload. Please comment on the current state of the tuning and suggest any improvements that can be worked on.

Now, i want to add 15kg payload (maybe in smaller steps of +5kg) and start spraying. As per the tuning instructions referred above, here is what it suggests to do for large payloads:

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@Leonardthall Is this the only change required to safely fly with added payload after tuning the copter without any payload? What about the PID gains, is there any need to re-adjust the PID gains or maybe even run the auto-tune again? How does arducopter manages to control a copter where the weight is constantly decreasing (From 38 Kg Fully loaded at Take-off to 22 Kg at Landing)?

Anyone with experience of tuning a similar setup please share your experience and findings on how to correctly tune such a system.

Thanks for the support as always.

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