Developer

ArduCopter-3.0.1 released!

ArduCopter 3.0.1 has been released and is now available in the Mission Planner, firmware.diydrones.com, GitHub and the new Downloads Area.

Warning #1: Compass calibration and reducing interference is far more important than with 2.9.1b

Warning #2: GPS glitches can cause sudden and aggressive position changes while in loiter mode.  You may wish to reduce the Loiter PID P to 0.5 (from 1.0) to reduce aggressiveness (see image below of where this gain can be found in mission planner).

Warning #3: optical flow is not supported but will be back in the next release (AC-3.0.2 or AC-3.1.0).

Warning #4: loiter turns does not maintain altitude.  This bug will be fixed in AC-3.0.2.

Warning #5: This release has only been lightly tested on Traditional Helicopters.

Improvements over 2.9.1b include:

  • Inertial Navigation for Loiter and Auto meaning much more accurate control (Randy,Leonard,JonathanC)
  • 3D navigation controller follows straight lines in all dimensions between waypoints (Leonard,Randy)

         WPNAV_SPEED, WPNAV_SPEED_UP, WPNAV_SPEED_DN, WPNAV_ACCEL allows configuring speeds and acceleration during missions

  • "compassmot" to compensate for interference on compass from the pdb, motors, ESCs and battery.  (Randy,JonathanC) (Set-up video here)
  • Safety improvements:
    • simple Tin Can shaped Geo Fence
    • pre-arm checks to ensure all calibration has been performed before arming (can be disabled by setting ARMING_CHECK to zero).  (video description here)
    • GPS failsafe - switches to LAND if GPS is lost for 5 seconds
    • stability patch improvements to stop rapid climbs in very overpowered or overtuned copters
  • Circle mode improvements including "panorama" when CIRCLE_RADIUS set to zero (Randy,Leonard)
  • SONAR_GAIN parameter added to allow better tuning of sonar surface tracking
  • CH8 auxiliary switch (same features as CH7)
  • works on PX4 (some minor features still not available) (Tridge,PatH)

How to upgrade:

1. Make sure you are using Mission Planner 1.2.59 or newer (get it here)

2. Click on the MissionPlanner's Hardware, Install Firmware screen.  The version numbers should appear as "ArduCopter-3.0.1", then click the appropriate frame icon and it should upgrade as per usual.

3. Reduce the Loiter and Alt Hold PIDs if you have modified them from the defaults.  The modified PID values for the 3DR frame can be seen in the image below.

Note: Nav parameters have been combined with Loiter so do not be concerned if you can't find them.

4. Although not directly related to this release, if you purchased an APM prior to March of 2013, update your PPM encoder to the latest firmware (instructions here).

5. Try out the new version in stabilize mode first, then alt-hold, then loiter and finally RTL and Auto.

Numerous How-To videos are available:

Special Thanks to Marco, DaveC and the large number of testers on the pre-release thread who put their copters at risk during the extended testing period.  Some of their videos can be found here, here, here, here, here and here.  Thanks also to MichaelO for the MP changes required for this release.

All feedback welcome.  Please put your questions, comments (good and bad!) below.

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Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Jay Galleno on December 8, 2013 at 7:15am

Dragu, what DO_SET_ROI parameter you use here?

  • MAV_ROI_NONE = 0: Yaw will hold it's current angle
  • MAV_ROI_WPNEXT = 1: Yaw will point at next WP
  • MAV_ROI_WPINDEX = 2: Yaw will point at the desired WP at the index #
  • MAV_ROI_LOCATION = 3: Yaw will point at the indicated location (The location in the command)
  • MAV_ROI_TARGET = 4: Not implemented
Permalink Reply by Alex O. on December 8, 2013 at 8:55am

I think that would be a good addition. 

and not only for the RTL. It would be good for any way point as well (if not done already).

It would make it very obvious that the copter is reaching the way/home point...

Permalink Reply by Alex O. on December 8, 2013 at 8:58am

Robert, how would one hack password during a firmware update? It is a wired connection. How would they hack into it?

What am I missing?

Permalink Reply by Alex O. on December 8, 2013 at 9:06am

Randy during a motor/esc out, can we not give full opposite rudder to stop or reduce the yaw during the recovery?

I always think that when (hope it never will) this happens to me one day, I will give full opposite rudder and try to bring her down while holding the the rudder stick in that position all the time.

Would this not help?

Permalink Reply by Dragu Mihai on December 8, 2013 at 10:33am

no, is AC3.1 rc3, but is no difference in Circle function

Permalink Reply by Dragu Mihai on December 8, 2013 at 10:36am

regardless what you configure on Do_Set_ROI, in Mission Planer you should add SET ROI command after each WP.Why? because when next WP is executed, previous Set ROI is overwritten with options you wrote above

Permalink Reply by Brian Stott on December 8, 2013 at 11:57am

???

Is there a released 3.1 now too? I've been seeing Randy refer to 3.1 but, knew it to be the next pending rolled revision. Yet others posting keep referring to their using 3.1 with revisions (rc1-7) and not 3.0.1 with revs.

So - confusing....

Permalink Reply by Steve Cain on December 8, 2013 at 1:00pm

3.1 is not released yet.  RC is short for releade candidate.  I.e rc1 through rc7.  Eventually one of the release candidates will become 3.1

Permalink Reply by Dragu Mihai on December 8, 2013 at 1:34pm

i hope you didn't sign anything about that :) you don't know how difficult is to lift 5Kg safely on a long range fpv trip. 


DeveloperPermalink Reply by Randy on December 8, 2013 at 6:27pm

The official release should happen in about a week.  I'm pushing out -rc8 today which is just -rc7 with some minor changes.  I don't think there are any more coding changes that need to be made before the official release, just preparing the wiki and actually one of the major problems is getting a decent video together which uses the APM, PX4 or Pixhawk.


DeveloperPermalink Reply by Randy on December 8, 2013 at 6:53pm

I have some good snippets.  The bits that I want to highlight in the AC3.1 video are:

    1. motors spin when armed

    2. take-off and land in loiter

    3. auto-tune

    4. drift (Jason has provided a video of this)

    5. general loiter and auto performance (I have a loiter in the wind video which partially fills this requirement)

    6. ROI (I have Dragu's video)

Permalink Reply by Bill Isenberger on December 8, 2013 at 7:18pm

Cool! Great timing, I'm on the road and will be home in about a week. Looking forward to running auto-tune on my quad.

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