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French micro plane fast forwards to hover

Hope this is not a duplicate post (I've seen it before somewhere)



A mere 30 centimeters long, the MAVion combines fixed wings with two counter rotating propellers, allowing it to operate with high aerodynamic efficiency--even in adverse conditions, according to the professor.





thought this might be of… Continue

Added by isobot on October 18, 2009 at 4:59pm — 1 Comment


Developer My UAV helicopter - vibration problems

Hello All,



Like a few others, I've been working on a UAV Helicopter but I've hit a bit of roadblock and I'm looking for some helpful advice from the community. At the moment, when I try to fly the helicopter (so far as high as 4 inches off the ground), it tries as hard as it can to bank left because it thinks it's leaning at >40%. The problem is vibration and I'm looking for any advice I can get on how to overcome this problem.



Below is some slightly massaged data from… Continue

Added by Randy on October 17, 2009 at 10:58pm — 14 Comments

Above Sunnyvale

Found a few safe landing zones in North Sunnyvale to lift off from. 1 area is closer to the subject of interest, but with higher risk of getting jammed.









Had a day job here in 2000, in a building which has since been destroyed

& replaced. Our old man worked across the street in the 80's.





He… Continue

Added by Jack Crossfire on October 17, 2009 at 10:30pm — 3 Comments

Best way to calibrate a pitot / Good way to estimate wind?

I just added a pitot to my ezstar (http://bordelon.net/ezstar) and did a flight. Naturally the plots of the airspeed sensor and GPS velocity (projected onto the X axis... straight thru the nose) did not seem to match. But should they? I figured any wind would skew the results, so how do you know you're calibrated?



I first tried to make a "manometer" with a tube of water but that seemed to just make a mess and was off by 50% in the end.



I finally just flew with the… Continue

Added by Tj Bordelon on October 17, 2009 at 4:06pm — 12 Comments


Moderator MikroKopter - HexaKopter

I like what I see, but it's a very expensive "toy".

Starting at: $1,549.95USD



RTH.

Hold pos.

Over 1 kg of payload.



See the video it's pretty nice.





Info: Google translate in… Continue

Added by Hooks on October 17, 2009 at 10:30am — 12 Comments

Telemetry testing

I spent some time on the software for the ground control station lately and did some telemetry flights with my UAV Flying Wing.

Nothing special but I thought I'll post this anyway so people know that I'm still alive. The software is a… Continue

Added by jaron on October 17, 2009 at 4:12am — 8 Comments

10Hz Venus GPS Module + antenna ~ $62

Just came across a "new" module from Sparkfun, that promises 10Hz update rate and has a binary protocol. Does anyone in the community have any experiences working with one of these?





Venus GPS Module



SMA… Continue

Added by Pekka Ahola on October 17, 2009 at 3:11am — 10 Comments


3D Robotics Last weekend for the T3 Contest!

Just a reminder that entries are due at 12:00 midnight PST on Sunday for the current T3 contest. Right now we've got six entries, and it would be great to get a few more in today or tomorrow. I'd hoped to enter an ArduPilot and AttoPilot, but I had three straight bad… Continue

Added by Chris Anderson on October 17, 2009 at 3:11am — No Comments

Connecting an ardupilot card with a datalogger?

I'm currently trying to connect a Sparkfun logomatic v2 serial datalogger (WIG-08627) to the ardupilot card. I understand how to do it using anolog connections ,but I can't figure out how to do it through a serial connection. Does anyone know how to connect the ardupilot with the datalogger using a serial connection?

Added by Nathan Woody on October 16, 2009 at 7:13pm — 4 Comments


3D Robotics High school students developing autonomous blimp

This team of 17 years olds designed this RC blimp from scratch, and learned a lesson in weight control and using optimal components, since this seems to be based on heavy Vex parts. Next up: autonomy. If they want a Blimpduino, we'd be happy to send them… Continue

Added by Chris Anderson on October 16, 2009 at 3:57pm — No Comments

Laser rangefinder with RS232 output

See: http://www.opti-logic.com/industrial_rangefinders.htm Pricing from $495 for the 100 yard unit to $595 for the 400yard one.



7-9VDC conditioned required and Current draw @ full power (~ 1.8W)



Range (Minimum 4 Yards)

Resolution 0.2m

Dimensions: 32x78x84mm

Weight: < 8oz…



Continue

Added by Sarel P. Wagner on October 16, 2009 at 3:58am — 6 Comments


Moderator Balloon Boy



Priceless



http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1220702/Boy-6-trapped-homemade-aircraft-floating-thousands-feet-air.html?ITO=1490



http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/feedarticle/8757668…



Continue

Added by Gary Mortimer on October 16, 2009 at 1:34am — 5 Comments

The dry Stanford lake bed

is a long long long drive from the east bay on 25mph roads. Then on weekdays you're greeted with permit parking only, anywhere within 1/2 mile of the lake bed. Fortunately, U can park in the golf course parking & walk 1/2 a mile to get in.



It has scattered tall weeds, making landings tricky.









It's a very large area with spectacular views from 400ft,… Continue

Added by Jack Crossfire on October 16, 2009 at 12:00am — 5 Comments

Someone has GOT to remember seeing this!

SOme time back (within the last two or three months) I recall seeing a ground station setup where a guy was using a graphical LCD module similar to the one proposed for the NEW ArduStation Mega, and he had a very cool interface, even had an artificial horizon on the screen - DOES ANYONE ELSE REMEMBER SEEING THIS?? Wa it here or on some other forum??

Added by Scott Plunkett on October 15, 2009 at 10:29pm — 4 Comments

"tube" plane

here are some pics of a plane I helped design and build

greg w/tube



tube



tube in xflr5

if you look closely you can see all the specs for the… Continue

Added by wayne garris on October 15, 2009 at 9:23pm — 38 Comments


3D Robotics Sparkfun Autonomous Vehicle Competition open for entries

Sparkfun has just announced that registration is open for its second annual Autonomous Vehicle Competition (which we won last year). It will be held on April 17th. New this… Continue

Added by Chris Anderson on October 15, 2009 at 9:00pm — No Comments

F1E

I am looking to make an electronic steering system for my magnet steered free flight model aircraft. GPS is not allowed by the rules. A gyro compass seems to be the answer, but I have not found any at a reasonable price. A gyro updated by an electronic compass to correct drift would also work I think. The aircraft dynamics are too much for a tilt compensated magnetometer.

Added by Thomas G. Ioerger on October 15, 2009 at 4:31pm — 5 Comments

Autonomous Landing

Can anyone give any advice on an autonomous landing setup. What should I use to sense change in altitude and do you think it could possibly work to land on water. Do you think laser or ultrasonic will work over water?

Added by James Greenhorn on October 15, 2009 at 2:30pm — 9 Comments

Two words...

u-Blox rocks.
More to follow....

wait, that's five words.... I mean nine words...that is to say thirteen words.......oh poo

Added by Brian Wolfe on October 15, 2009 at 9:47am — 4 Comments


Developer IMU nose Dive problem/solution

In Bill's recent pod cast he talked about how the imudevboard experienced a random nose dive or extreme over estimation in the pitch (theta) axis. His theory was that the noise due to engine/aircraft vibration was causing the gyros to give inaccurate readings. He said that he put the imu in foam and the problem went away. I don't know how repeatable his experience was or how many test vehicles this "technique" was run on, but I find it no… Continue

Added by Ryan Beall on October 14, 2009 at 3:30pm — 45 Comments

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