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ArduCopter Traditional Heli (was: "600-size heli")

Posted by malcolm churn on June 30, 2011 at 9:14am

I have just bought the ArduPilot Mega 2560 Full Kit... plus the Triple Axis Magnetometer HMC5883L. I should have it built over the weekend.. then i'm off to a my mates machine shop, and i'll make the splitter plate for the lower frame onto which i am going to fit the Ardupilot. the magnetometer i'll put on the tail as suggested. I am going to use my X-cell Razor 600E. For those that dont know its around the 50 size nitro heli.

Do i need to buy any other sensors i.e. the Sonar... i can fly a helicopter all day long but this is my first time flying one with stabilisation so any tips would be gratefully appreciated.

If this works well then i am going to try and use it on my x-cell gasser. i can get up to 20 minute flights with this. But i think for the time being a battery 600 is the way to go.

i'll post some pictures when i have it all together.

 

 

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Replies

  • Amycyrus June 23, 2017 at 7:44pm


    Woah!!! 
    Rob_Lefebvre said:

    I have just started this thread:

    http://www.diydrones.com/forum/topics/arducopter-2-9-for-tradheli-d...

    I would like to try and segment the Trad Helis discussions a bit since this monster thread has become a bit unwieldy and makes it harder for people to find info.  So please carry on any discussion about 2.9 over there.

  • Amycyrus June 21, 2017 at 6:42pm

    I NEED HELP SO BAD!

     

    I'm so confused because I downloaded file APK so that I can enjoy the game I like without feeling nervous of being regional blocked, BUT...after I finished downloading, I'm stuck in finding it in my phonne?

    Can you tell me?

    By the way, I want to find something that prevents me from being regional blocked by Google play?

    Recommend me, ok?

  • Developer
    Randy January 1, 2013 at 7:51pm

    Happy new year.

    2.9 is getting close to being released.  It would be great to get some more trad heli people trying it out before we push it to the mission planner.  The discussions can be found at the end of the ArduCopter 2.8.1 release thread.

     

  • Rob_Lefebvre September 26, 2012 at 6:27pm

    Hey guys, I've been holding out on you a few days.  I filmed some cool stuff on Monday, planning to do a comparison between a quad and a heli in a stiff breeze, put it in a blog posting.  But frankly the quad flight is so bad that it'll just make people sick. ;)

    So here you go, check it out:

  • Rob_Lefebvre September 16, 2012 at 2:36pm

    If any of you guys have flybarless and would like to test my Acro mode, we might be able to solve this "too snappy" problem.  I've flown it a little bit, and it's OK, and I know how to make it better.  But my FBL heli is in pieces at the moment.

    Are you proficient flying manually?

    Then we can work on it together.  Once we have a working "acro" mode, we can try putting the stability controller on top of the rate controller, just as the quads are now.  It will make it fly smoother in stab mode.

    What do you think?

  • Rob_Lefebvre September 9, 2012 at 4:31pm

    I just did it!  I successfully loitered for about 2 minutes with no circling! Winds are light, about 10 km/h, but just eliminating the circling is huge!  Normally it would circle as soon as you engaged the Loiter, even with no wind.

    Two key things.  First and probably most important, I've had my Stab P terms too low.  0.7, it flew nice and gentle, but was not responsive enough for the Loiter control.  I tuned it up to 2.4 on roll, and 1.4 on pitch, just to give you an idea.  I've had to split the pitch/roll, which makes sense if you think about the extreme non-symmetry of a helicopter. When I have pitch at 2.4, I get a good wobble out of it when I do a quasi-step command.  Now it's much more snappy on commands.  
    Then, I thought I would need to use softer settings than the quad for Loiter, but in fact, more aggressive.  LoiterP 5 in the quad, 6.5 in the heli.  I is .2 in the quad, .1 in the heli. And D is .5 in the quad, .7 in the heli.  I think it makes sense that the I term is lower, because is has more mass, and the flybar dulls the responses a bit, so it needs to be slower on the I term.  I dunno... I'll keep playing with it.  This was literally the last 2 minutes of my 3rd set of packs.
    I'll put a quick video shortly.  Too bad I don't have any more batteries left!
    Here's my param file so you can see where I'm at:

    Rob600.param

  • Rob_Lefebvre September 8, 2012 at 8:06am

    Here's some video I shot last night.  I wanted to demonstrate the yaw control.  This is with no external gyro.

    Again, sorry about the Max Headrom effect.  One of my computers does this, the other doesn't.  I don't get it.  This is put together on Windows Movie Maker.  i7-2600 processor on this one, so it's got tons of power, but it does this for some reason.

  • Rob_Lefebvre September 7, 2012 at 5:39pm

    I just had a great 3 flights with the 600 after changing the bearings on the tail drive shafts.  I didn't do anything else, balance anything, dampen anything or change any gears, just changed those little 4mm bearings, and it's good as gold!  The yaw control is simply awesome with the built in gyro and the new yaw controller!  I can yaw it quick and simply <snaps> to a stop with no overshoot or bounce.

    Goes to show how easy it is to throw off the DCM.  The bearings weren't even that bad, just a little crunchy.
    Overall, it's rock-solid.  I put it in manual acro mode and spooled it up, watching the HUD, it really doesn't even move when passing through the spool-up wobbles. It seems it's just the high frequency vibration that really hurts it.
    Unfortunately my flying club apparently is closed for 2 weeks because the land owner is hunting geese on it.  So I'm really limited in what I can do.  I just flew in my back yard to drain the packs and test it out.  All I can really do is hover.  I tried a bit of Loiter, but it didn't go well.  I think my Stab P is way too low, so that wouldn't help.  After giving up on loitering in a small space, I started tuning up the Stab.  I've already doubled it and it's getting better.
    The thing with the flybar is, this can way too low and it doesn't matter, because it's self stabilizing.  It makes the controls soft, but it's really not a problem.  But I imagine it doesn't help Loiter.
    I do wonder what sort of effect it has, the fact that the APM is actually hanging under the disk. The disk is what actually moves and creates thrust, which isn't exactly related to the angle the frame currently takes.   How will that affect the auto piloting modes?
  • Rob_Lefebvre August 27, 2012 at 3:54pm

    Well, I think I have found the source of my vibes causing my leans.  The front and rear tail shaft bearings have failed again.  This time after only 3 flights.  When I did the rebuild, I noticed they had failed which I thought was weird.  So I replaced them, and then as I say, 3 flights and they're done again.

    I know I set the belt tension tight.  I had it skip a while back which is freaky, so I put more tension on. But I guess this is too tight, though frankly, it wasn't THAT tight!  So I dunno.  Replace them again.

    This does sound exactly like what I've heard of people with some of the other controllers (SK720?) where a bearing starts to go, so they lose stabilization.

  • Rob_Lefebvre August 27, 2012 at 4:44am

    Hey guys, here's a video of my flights yesterday.  Did my first really high speed flying with the heli.  Pretty cool!

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XFVfx90rVro&feature=youtube_gdata

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