Warning #1: an issue has been found with Tower's Pause button which can cause the vehicle to fly to an old position if the vehicle has not sent a position update to Tower in some time.
Warning #2: Copter-3.3.2 fixes a bug found in Copter-3.3.1's desired climb rate initialisation which could lead to a sudden momentary drop when switching from Stabilize or Acro to AltHold, Loiter or PosHold.
Warning #3: Copter-3.3.2 fixes an issue found in Copter-3.3.1 which could lead to hard landings in RTL or AUTO if the WPNAV_SPEED_DN was set too high (i.e. >400 or 4m/s) and/or the WPNAV_ACCEL_Z was set too low (i.e. <100 or 1m/s/s).
Warning #4: a bug was found in Copter-3.3 which could cause a sudden crash if you abort a Take-off initiated from a ground station. Video description is here. The bug is fixed in Copter-3.3.1 so we recommend upgrading.
Note #1: AC3.3-rc8 corrected a long standing bug in the HDOP reporting. HDOP values will appear about 40% lower than previously but this does not actually mean the GPS position is better than before.
Note #2: if upgrading from AC3.2.1 the vehicle's accelerometer calibration needs to be done again.
Note #3: set SERIAL2_PROTOCOL to "3" and reboot the board to enable FrSky telemetry like in previous versions.
Note #4: the wiki will be updated over the next few weeks to explain how to use the new features
Copter-3.3.1 is available through the mission planner. The full list of changes vs AC3.2.1 can be see in the ReleaseNotes and below are the most recent changes since AC3.3.
Sadly this version (and all future versions) will not run on the APM2.x boards due to CPU speed, flash and RAM restrictions.
Changes from 3.3:
1) Bug fix to prevent potential crash if Follow-Me is used after an aborted takeoff
2) compiler upgraded to 4.9.3 (runs slightly faster than 4.7.2 which was used previously)
Changes from 3.3-rc11:
1) EKF recovers from pre-arm "Compass variance" failure if compasses are consistent
Changes from 3.3-rc10:
1) PreArm "Need 3D Fix" message replaced with detailed reason from EKF
Changes from 3.3-rc9
1) EKF improvements:
a) simpler optical flow takeoff check
2) Bug Fixes/Minor enhancements:
a) fix INS3_USE parameter eeprom location
b) fix SToRM32 serial protocol driver to work with recent versions
c) increase motor pwm->thrust conversion (aka MOT_THST_EXPO) to 0.65 (was 0.50)
d) Firmware version sent to GCS in AUTOPILOT_VERSION message
3) Safety:
a) pre-arm check of compass variance if arming in Loiter, PosHold, Guided
b) always check GPS before arming in Loiter (previously could be disabled if ARMING_CHECK=0)
c) sanity check locations received from GCS for follow-me, do-set-home, do-set-ROI
d) fix optical flow failsafe (was not always triggering LAND when optical flow failed)
e) failsafe RTL vs LAND decision based on hardcoded 5m from home check (previously used WPNAV_RADIUS parameter)
Thanks for your testing!
Replies
@Leonard
Attached is link to Auto Tune files. It seems to be pretty good, but while using Follow Me, it over corrects quite badly when pitching. Maybe that's normal?
quadcopter
KDE 515 motors
APC 14x4.7 SF props
650 size frame
16000 mah 4s battery
AUW 2.7kg
Thanks.
https://www.mediafire.com/?7a8co2555u7mjts
re- b) smart battery support
Could anybody elaborate what this does and how it works?
Smart battery like the new 3DR Solo has. It's basically a normal battery with the 3DR Power module built in, but also charging circuits and fancy indicators showing battery capacity and so on. The battery communicates to the pixhawk with i2c i think (or another one of the protocols), so support had to be added for it.
I'm hoping 3dr will release a mounting bracket of some sort so that we can use the Solo batteries in DIY projects.
Thanks. Boy that seems like a waste to have a power module inside every one.
There was a photo here somewhere of the internals of the battery, it looked almost like a DJI one (i mean that it had chipset taking care of all the charging and leds and so on as well as battery info back to the controller). Wouldn't be to hard to just take the Solo battery apart and have some extensions for xt60 and balance plug, and just use any cheapo battery from hobbyking.
I can't find the photo of the internals, but here you can see the prongs that do the actual battery connection, and the middle pin might be something like a USB with multiple copper lines for data...
I really hope it is possible to take the battery case apart and solder in a new battery. You can't do this on a DJI they intentionally go out of their way to make sure the circuit sees this intrusion somehow and renders the unit / battery useless. The 'smart battery' is mostly for revenue generation for DJI I think. My brother lost a phantom because the stupid battery wigged out and thought it was low and landed itself in a lake. Meanwhile it was fully charged before flight and his HUD display clearly showed an %80 charge remaining. I also heard they automatically discharge themselves aka 'storage' after a certain amount of time with no use. So you finally get time to go fly only to discover that fully charged battery isn't anymore. Or maybe you don't realize 'IT' discharged itself and you crash because you didn't realize it did this. Anyway.... I'm no fan of a 'smart' battery I have a brain and a charger I've been fine with it I don't need any help. If the solo battery is like this I'll not be buying a solo for this reason alone. But... I do like how it just plugs in. Very nice.
I did Auto Tune on rc5 again yesterday trying different props and larger battery with AUW 2.7kg.
The stab roll/pitch seem quite diverged. Also, is it normal to see Rate Yaw D value of 0? I notice when the quad takes off it yaws a few times before settling to the heading.
One more question. Does lowering the roll/pitch sensitivity help with Follow Me mode?
Testing 3.3RC5 using PIXHAWK and latest mission planner Beta: Flight modes have disappeared!
I mean the "drop down boxes" letting you select what mode for various value of channel 5 aren't present any more.
I think it is a MP beta problem as re installing latest stableversion (1.3.28) did fix the "undocumented feature"
Henri
PID Help..?
I updated the firmware on my QAV 540 to 3.3rc5 and did my first test flight yesterday. I like the audio tones for feedback that have been added and the flight was ok, the PosHold was very steady on 11 SATS with a HDOP between 1.9 -1.8
It was a bit windy and it held position pretty well. However, it was loose in the pitch axis, when adding throttle to go up or decreasing throttle to descend, it would get into a rocking mode like a seesaw. not very extreme, and I only had to stir the stick a little to break it out. But it had a definite tendency to rock, also the yaw seemed too sensitive. The PosHold kept the heading very well, but when in stabile mode, I had to work the rudder a little to keep a good heading. Probably the wind was causing that.
This is a heavy build, QAV 540 with extended arms, 380KV motors, has a tarot gimble for GOPRO, carrying 2 3S, 5100 MAH battery packs in series for 6S, the CG seems fine with my Gopro in the front and battery packs toward the rear.
I assume the PID values need to be adjusted. I don't have a screen capture of my current settings, I may need to post that before anyone can help me, but in general can someone tell me which PI value or values I should changing?
Thanks
Richard- Kd5zzl
Hi Richard,
To help you I need to know what size prop you are running.
We also have some motor linearisation code in there that compensates for battery voltage drop over the flight.
To get the most out of your copter you will probably have to do an autotune or a full manual tune. I can help you with either.
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