Hi, I am considering buying a 3DR Solo but I am not sure about what is open source and what is not.
Is buying the 3DR Solo the same as buying a RTF frame with a pixhawk flight controller? Or is there some code which cannot be reprogrammed? I would like to buy the 3DR solo as it is RTF and would be easier to use then spending time combining a frame with a pixhawk controller.
If the SOLO is not completely open source, are there any suggestions of quadcopters which are fully open source but are shipped as RTF?
My aim is to program my controller using what I learnt at control theory on a quadcopter. Therefore I am not interested in the functions of Solo such as waypoints, navigation and smart shots (photography). Any help would be appreciated. Thanks
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Solo is being discontinued, they are on sale now, buy one immediately as they are a big bang for the buck at the moment!
No it's not completely open source. The flight controller is open source but the onboard companion computer which is responsible for a lot of the cool shots and video isn't.
Solo has a Pixhawk 2, which runs the ArduPilot flight control software. Yes, you can change the software as you wish and update the Pixhawk.
oops www.megapirateng.com
open source on wiki Unfortunately, open source software on a flight controller is a never ending game of enhance and fix. The ArduCopter code (used in the Solo) is a prime example of never ending mission creep.
Try spending $40 on a Crius all-in-one flight controller and then build up your own copter. It uses a PID state machine. It can be loaded with the MegaPirate derivative of ArduCopter open source code which is the pre-Pixhawk version of ArduCopter. www.megapirate.com It is much less complex since it can be compiled and loaded in the Arduino IDE. I have it loaded into Atmel Studio (a derivative of MS Visual Studio) using the Visual Micro add-in.
The problem with the Pixhawk is its disjointed heterogeneous amalgam of software components required to make it work.
If you have any inking of an education then you know about wiki. Do some research and don't be lazy. Have fun!