Greetings!
I have been trying to get a quad working--having bought hardware both from DIYdrones and 3Drobotics--but I just can't seem to get the ESCs to auto-calibrate. Everything else seems to be working fine; I've calibrated my (Futaba T6EX) radio and reversed the channels as needed, I´ve calibrated the compass and accelerometer and I can even arm the motors. I've tried manual calibration N times and everything seems fine there, but the motors won't spin when armed and auto-calibration just doesn't work. My best guess is that the APM is not receiving the radio signal as full throttle but EPAs and trims don't seem to do anything.
Basically, when I try to auto-calibrate, I never get the signal messaging that APM is routing the radio commands straight to the ESCs, I always get the exact same beeps (three-tone melody, then three single tones, then cycle) and lights. The motors never spin up, even when armed, but they all twitch ever so slightly every time the ESCs beep. I have the newest software and firmware and I've done a CLI setup/erase on several occasions. This seems to me like something with such a simple fix that I've tried every single avenue to figure it out myself from manuals, forum posts, FAQs and such, but it's been a couple of months now (seriously) and I'm no closer to a solution.
Any ideas? Is there a thread here covering this that I have completely missed somehow? Is there no way to use the CLI to force the APM into auto calibration mode? Is this purely a radio issue?
For the record I have a "3DR ArduCopter Quad-C" with Ardupilot 2.5 and 3DR 20A ESCs. My radio is a Futaba T6EX. My batteries are 3S LiPo, 5Ah, 50c discharge, 100c bursts. Any help would be profoundly appreciated.
Humbly,
Gisli "GB" Brynjolfsson
Replies
You mention that manual calibration works fine. If that's the case and everything else is setup fine, the motors should spin when armed ( I am assuming you see "ARMED" in Mission Planner on the artificial horizon to verify you are actually armed.) Do you see this when connected? If not, the APM is not armed, and its probably a radio issue. Check the reversing for throttle and yaw. As a quick check, try arming with left rudder AND/OR full throttle. NO PROPS! My gut says this is the problem, throttle or rudder is backwards.
Thanks for the advice, Chrisses--I wasn't expecting any replies nearly this quick and I like the sound of those suggestions. I'll try them as soon as I get up tomorrow morning (it's 5am in my time zone) and will return with the results. I'm sure I'll have this overpowered amputee-maker figured out and flying in a jiffy with the help of you good people. Salutations!
-GB
Sounds like it might be a cabling issue. Are you sure you've got the signal cable to the PDB plugged in right, and the ESCs cable not plugged in upside down? You'd be surprised how often that happens.
As a check, you can plug the ESCs straight into to APM output rail and see if they work then.
Do the three LED's on APM light up sequentially as stated in the wiki manual step #2 ?
If not ... Then confirm that the RX is getting power when then USB cable is not plugged in.
Maybe try to connect one ESC directly to the RX to throttle output to see if it the ESC will properly respond to your radio, then try to perform a manual calibration on that ESC.
You could also try the auto calibration with only one ESC, that is , disconnect three ESC's and try it with only one of them connected.
-
1
-
2
of 2 Next