Hello all,
I built a hexacopter and did wanted to check the motors, so in the terminal I ran:
# setup
# motor
(If I remember right)
I am talking about the test function who increase the PWM signals on the outputs, channel by channel.
The problem is:
Only one motor is working. on channel 3 (motor 3).
I switched motor 1 with motor 3, I mean, channel 1 -> motor 3, channel 3 -> motor 1
ran the setup again and this time only motor 3 is working...
First I thought the problem raises on the connection or ESC's so I connected all of the ESC's one by one directly to channel 3 on the receiver and with a little throttle I checked all of them and they all worked.
So what else it can be?
Thank you very much!!!
Replies
Test each motor subsection with your RC RX first (connected to the Throttle output of the RX -- TAKE OFF THE PROPS!)
When each ESC/Motor combination works, then reconnect all wiring to the APM for Hexa setup.
Try 'motors' command again.
Somewhere in this process, if you have a wiring error, you will find the solution.
Of course you must have Hexa loaded in Mission Planner. We have seen more than one new build have the wrong code loaded. It would be embarrasing to find you loaded Arduplane rather than Arducopter... ;)
-=Doug
Hi Nati- Ive seen that problem more than once, and never got a satisfactory answer here. From what i could tell it boiled down to a few things:
1. check all of your bullet's solder joints. You can test across the joint with a resistance test to help determine the quality of the solder joint. Also check resistance from the PDB to your end points, as you could have a cold joint at the PDB to the dean's connectors. If you are in doubt of all of this, simply solder all of your connections wire to wire. Its not a totally oneway trip as you can desolder when and if you need to. Id say this would be a last resort though. Make sure also all of your solder joints are shiny too. This doesnt guarantee that you have a solid connection, but if the solder is dull, it usually means that the joint was moved as it was cooling and is more likely to be problematic.
2. Make 100% sure you have the ESCs calibrated. I dunno why it would be, but were i to guess, if the bottom point is too high on the calibration, the signal from the APM during testing from CLI may not be sufficient to spin the motor. Bear in mind that this is a total guess, but sometimes correlation does equal causation. Also i have NEVER had luck with all-at-once calibration. NEVER. EVER. I use caps, because that alone has caused more hairloss than women and taxes combined. Calibrate them seperately and youll be better off. SOme other pilots here have switched to ESCs with external clocks and one guy in particular said he hadnt had to calibrate in over a year. id recommend doing this before all the resoldering.
http://diydrones.com/xn/detail/705844
3. Also, if you are using the yellow stock ESCs, you may want to flash them with the SimonK firmware as you will have a much more responsive throttle if you do. Plus, there's some other behaviours programmed in that really only apply to fixed wing aircraft. Its a PIA, but worth the effort if youre gonna do this hobby long term.
4. In the end, i did end up having a screwy APM, which DIYDrones agreed to swap out for a new one. Im not saying that is the issue, but it's possible.
good luck, let me know what ya find
Bart
P.S. I may be totally wrong on some of this, Im not an expert, but i can sure break stuff!