compass init error--test say not healthy

Diagnosing my new 3DR hexa, I noticed in the CLI, it reports COMPASS INIT ERROR.

Running CLI's compass test prints out  "not healthy". I also built a second APM1.x today, no issues and it too reports the same error. The 3DR magnetometer came with the kit. The other was pruchased a few months ago.

Checked my Y6 and coworker's hexa which I built and no issues, compass works fine and the test pass.

Do I have 2 defective magnetometers? Is there a way I can check it with the volt meter or some other tool? Both I received from the 3DR store.

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  • OK, now here's a possible board issue... but good thing is I got the second APM to work!

    Here's the story:

    I noticed the altitude was printing out -2147483648 for a value in MP, though GPS lat-long looked fine.

    Running the CLI test on compass--it showed not healthy (ok been there done that). But now, showing alt: it was the same as in MP: the alt was the large number (i.e. null, signed 2^32 basically), temp was 0, raw temp and press were 0. Weird I thought, so off I go to desolder the compass again to the point I just say s'd it just buy a new oil pan.

    Instead of a glob of solder on all 4 pins, the compass was still lightly soldered at this stage. By chance I hooked it back up to the USB and started the CLI and viola the compass initialized successfully and the baro was working fine!

    I re-soldered the 4 compass pins and bang: compass init error! slightly desoldered and success! Resoldered the gnd and Vcc and still works, so something is leaking voltage into the SDA/SCL pins. I did wiggle and probe tests and I'm pretty sure it's not a mechanical connection issue. Makes me want to use the i2c cable for all my compasses in the future rather than soldering directly.

    IMG_20120329_111039.jpg?t=1333044687&width=320(barely soldered at the top of SCL/SDA pins, noticed the amount of solder on Vcc/Gnd--having the same amount on the SDA/SCL pins caused the compass to fail initialization and likely shorted something out such that the baro stop working too)

  • Just got 2 new magnetometers. Tried one via i2C cable port (voltmeter shows power, continuity on i2c pins).

    Still get a compass init error in the CLI, test show 'not healthy'... on both APMs

    Everything else on both oil pan checks out. Is there anything else I can check? I cannot accept I had 2 bad APMs--one from the 3DR hexa kit and one purchase months ago.... Running APM firmware 2.5.3 on both. Now makes me think my original compasses were fine(!). 

  • 3D Robotics

    I'm not seeing any issues here. Did you solder on your compass yourself? If so, check those connections. 

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