CORRECTION: During this video I say GPS operates on 900mhz, which is not correct. According to Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GPS#Satellite_frequencies) GPS operates on 1.57542 GHz (L1 signal) and 1.2276 GHz (L2 signal). I apologize for the error.

Here are a few tips when mounting your APM to your RC craft.

This is a part…

I know, I know... after months of being away, I'm finally getting an airplane back in the air with the APM. It flew great and the APM, as always, was awesome. I'll be using the Raptor for a while and will start doing longer range flights via telemetry. Its also allowing me to complete the Beginner to Expert videos I'm making for the APM.…

On this video I demonstrate how to connect your APM to the mission planner so you can test the onboard sensor's functionality.

So far I've gotten positive feedback on these Beginner to Expert videos, so I'll keep churnin' em out in hopes that future DIYD'ers can be helped by them. Check out the dedicated page on MyGeekShow: …

Step by step process to load firmware to your APM. Actually not too difficult, finding the COM port is probably the hardest step.

Over the next few weeks/months I'll be doing a large set of videos like this one, see the full complete series here: …

A quick overview of the mission planner. When you consider what you're getting for FREE it's pretty impressive. Michael Oborne and team has done very well...

I'll be making a few dozen or so videos like this one to help others get started with DIYD stuff, hopefully someone finds it helpful! Here is a link to the complete video series: …

The next video for How-To APM that I'll be doing. Of course I'll move on to more advanced features over the next few days & weeks, but this should help someone who is totally new to DIYD get started.

Nothing too complex here, simply how to download and install the mission planner. Hopefully someone down the road who is totally lost will find this video via search and find what they are looking for.

Here is a link to…

It's my turn to give back! As a way of saying thank you to all of you who have helped me along the way, I'm going to focus the next dozen or so Beginner to Expert videos on the APM!

I've been doing free "Beginner to Expert" videos over the last few months where I focus on a single principle and do a tutorial or a how-to that hopefully, will help others along in the hobby.  The APM videos are specifically aimed at helping those who are brand…

I just streamed live via YouTube a "T-500 days until the start of the USA trip" update and took questions from those who could join. Thought you might like to see what was discussed.

Just skip the first 4 minutes, its a blank screen as I waited for the event to start.

In other news, the…

2013 is going to be an awesome year for the show, and the APM is going to be a critical component to it's success. I'll be building and proving airframes, electronics, avionics, mobile ground stations and processes that will allow me take an airplane further, faster and longer than ever before; across the united States of America.

2013, here we…

The USA trip is back in focus! (I had taken a few weeks off to do a side project)

I'm also announcing a new airplane, the Polaris; a combination of the Nova and Shrike. It will feature a longer endurance airframe and power supply, and, of course, full automation through APM.

I'll capture the build process while I build the Polaris, and present it as a build log for others to follow along.

More about the USA…

This a follow up to the blog post http://diydrones.com/profiles/blogs/autopilot-mayday

I was able to replace the motor and prop (which were both balanced) and it completely resolved the APM issues I was having before.

Now if I could just find a way to fly better…

So after a few flights of the APM just acting weird in general (fighting me while on stabilize, random tip stalls/dives, flying inverted randomly, etc) I finally recorded the telemetry screen while it was in flight (I was flying LOS as it was about to crash at any moment) and I noticed that the head's up display is showing a seriously wrong horizon, even the opposite at times.

I have a second APM that I'm going to try in the air while I try…

This week I added a joystick to our groundstation and flew via telemetry. It was pretty intense, and I was surprised how little the delay and control surface sensitivity loss impacted the flight. As is, the set up wouldn't allow you to do and crazy 3D flying, but it operated just fine.

The only questions I'd have is about the delay and seemingly "stuttery" control surfaces. Is this delay normal? Is the control surface skipping effect…

On this episode of MyGeekShow we tested a new airspeed sensor we installed on the Shrike. It allowed us to get our first cruise airspeed, max airspeed, and stall speed. Very cool!

See you…

 

On this episode of MyGeekShow we mobilized our ground station and took the Shrike for a fly and drive - Trent drove the car while Nick flew the Shrike. It went really well! We've got more improvements before we're ready to try our first flight where we take off and then fly to another location.

 

See you Wednesday!

See …

We started having problems keeping all the wires we were using for our ground station organized and safe, so we designed and built a power management module using car accessory electronics and other home and model parts. It took over three weeks to go through the process, but we're hoping it will reduce the chances of damage and speed up the set up time when we fly each…

We finally made it!

We successfully completed our maiden flight with the 3DR 900 Mhz telemetry module on board our Shrike, it was incredible to see it gathering, transmitting, receiving and displaying live information... we can't wait to use it on future flights.

Thank you DIYDrones and community! This is so much…

We've had dataflash card issues with one of our APM2's since day one, but our second APM2 worked fine until after a few rough landings (no repairs were needed, so they weren't that bad), we can't get the mission planner to identify logs or the APM2 to create them, not sure which.

We tried reformatting the card, removing it and reinstalling it, updating the firmware on the APM2 and the Mission Planner version, etc, but to no…

We wanted to start narrowing down the reason's for why we keep losing the Shrike! We are starting with understanding which materials placed over the GPS module affect reception.  We placed clear plastic, tape, a phone book, dow foam, aluminum foil, static brushless motor, powered and turning brushless motor, powered tx 2.4 GHz, and powered vtx 5.8 GHz…

This episode we focused on getting the APM's data logging feature working, as well as integrating the results with Google Earth and the Mission Planner. It works really well! We're looking forward to putting it on the Shrike and start recording our flights.

See you Saturday,



-Trent & Nick



--Raptor--

Tx: Flyer9x with er9x firmware by ParkeFlyer …