Developer

ArduCopter-3.2 beta testing

Warning #1: PX4/Pixhawk users upgrading from AC3.1.5 (or earlier) may need to re-do their compass and accelerometer calibration because AC3.2 also uses the backup compass and accels.  Pre-arm checks have been added to ensure this has been done.

Warning #2: on the APM2.x the logs must be downloaded using MAVlink instead of the terminal.

AC3.2-rc14 is now available for BetaTesters through the mission planner’s Beta Firmwares link.  The full release notes can be found in ReleaseNotes.txt and changes from -rc13 can be seen below.

     Feel free to raise issues found during testing on this discussion or in the new support section in the APM Forum.

     It’s a big release with “the onion” restructure and a bunch of new features (including these 57 closed items) so we need to re-test almost everything including all flight modes, all mission commands and all the new features.  Marco and I will be maintaining (and adding to) this testing list.  Issues reported will first be checked by Jonathan, Marco and I and then confirmed bugs/issues will be put on the github issues list (and then hopefully fixed).

     Thanks especially to the beta testers who put their copters at risk testing each release.  Enjoy!

Changes from 3.2-rc13
1) Safety Features:
     a) fail to arm if second gyro calibration fails (can be disabled with ARMING_CHECK)
2) Bug fixes:
    a) DCM-check to require one continuous second of bad heading before triggering LAND
    b) I2C bug that could lead to Pixhawk freezing up if I2C bus is noisy
    c) reset DCM and EKF gyro bias estimates after gyro calibration (DCM heading could drift after takeoff due to sudden change in gyro values)
    d) use primary GPS for LED status (instead of always using first GPS)

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      • Thanks for your reply, Randy. Soooo, are you telling me you have a life beyond Arducopter? All along I've been thinking this Randy guy was a bodiless brain. Kidding aside, I'd love to see this implemented so please do pass it on and let me know who might be interested in working on this and I'll gently prod. I've done a fair bit of C coding but I need two more lifetimes to complete what I've started so all I can offer is to help test it.  

  • I still have rc9 loaded on mine and reset everything and tried auto tune again. It did about the same thing it did to me before. It finished the roll tuning just fine, as soon as it started pitch it tipped the front way too far and started going down. I was able to flip it to stabilize and save it. I have the log file attached.

    2014-09-21 18-53-19.log

    https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/3701835388?profile=original
    • Developer

      Hi George,

      I am glad you didn't crash!

      What happened here is on your first pitch test in autotune you lost sink in your front left motor, motor 3. Luckily it seems to resink and corrects itself before you switch to Stabilize (however autotune is in alt-hold at this point so the roll pitch controller doesn't change when you switch to stabilize).

      I am guessing you are running simon K on your esc's. It also looks like you have an offset cg.

      If you drop your pid's down to the defaults your may not get the same problem but it is likely to happen again so you may be better off doing a manual tune.

      Sorry for the bad news.

      • I am running blheli and haven't had any sync issues ever since switching all my esc's to blheli and changing motor timing to high. I have done quite a few hours of bench testing with it strapped to the table and couldn't get it to go out of sync. 

        There is a chance that it could be the motor going bad. I believe it is the one that took a hit when it flipped after trying to land in alt hold. 

        I do believe the cog is off a little bit. I need to see about repositioning the battery. It is a TBS Discovery and I have the Pixhawk on the bottom plate and there isn't enough room to put the FC right on the center of gravity. I may end up moving it to the top plate. Just don't like having it all exposed up there and I like the clean look.

        I flashed it back to 3.1.5 and ran the auto tune again and it completed it as normal. It did however have some front to back movement while doing the roll tune which may have something to do with that front left motor. I need to get better with reading the logs. I have two more motors as spares so I will swap it out.

      • Hi George,

        This Simon K thing scared me so a week ago I reflashed the Afro 30's I have (there was a newer version) and ran some static tests. I wish I'd have tested before I reflashed to compare but after the the reflash no matter how hard I thrashed the throttle there was no way I could loose sync. Try a static test on yours to see if you are loosing sync and then reflash.  

  • How does a person, such as my self, roll back to RC 7 from RC 9? is there a respository some where of the builds? i didnt see it on Github?  thanks in advance

    • Developer

      Thor,

          I'm afraid you'd need to rebuild the binaries yourself.  We keep "latest", "stable" and "beta" on firmware.diydrones.com but we don't keep backups of the beta versions.  The list of changes between -rc7 and -rc9 is actually very small though, the list of commits is here (it's changes between "Copter: version to AC3.2-rc7" and "Copter: version to AC3.2-rc9".

      • thanks Randy, i'll give the RC9 a go then, i didnt think it was so minimal as changes go.

  • Guys would it be worth switching back to 3.1 untill this has become more stable. The only reason for switching was due to the rssi volt parameter. Will i need to re-do all my settings if i switch back. Seems like there's alot of issues on this beta version dont think its worth the risk untill this new version is stable enough to fly safe
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