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
Thanks for looking Paul. What should I be looking at hardware wise? How can I shield the GPS from jamming?
2015-05-04 16-16-43.bin
Andrei,
We've seen these "whiskers" in a few logs including on one of my IRISs. They only appear on the MPU6k accelerometers and only on AC3.3 (i.e. not on AC3.2.1). There's a growing sense in the dev team that we've got either a software bug or a weird physical effect. We're going to need to get to the bottom of this issue before we release AC3.3.
Thanks for these logs.
Randy, thanks for reply. I'll try to switch to 3.2.1 and test again same frame, same hardware. Now 3.3rc3 flies not so good for me. I get huge waves (like out of control) when I want to rotate (normal or fast yaw). Also on Alt-Hold I got little jerking up-down-left-right - also looks like out of control.
I'd say something is loose due to all 3 axes exhibiting vibration same order harmonics, also high Z compass offset. Note high RCout as well.
This morning I tested 3.3-rc3 in Guided mode for the first time. I used dronekit-python and an Iris+. I was able to arm and takeoff, however, despite giving an altitude of 5m in the takeoff command, the Iris climbed to only about 10cm. On a second attempt, it climbed to about 1m.
We then reverted to 3.2.1 and ran the same script. During takeoff, it climbed to ~5m as instructed (and as it always had before when testing).
Any ideas why it isn't climbing properly using 3.3-rc3? I should mention that all three tests were done in the same location with a clear view of the sky and large numbers of sats.
Our need for 3.3-rc3 at the moment is the SET_POSITION_TARGET_LOCAL_NED message which isn't supported in 3.2.1. We would really like to get this figured out so we can move on with our project.
Thanks for any insights.
David,
I'll answer this over on the drones-discuss or gitter threads 'cuz you've posted there as well and it's really more of a developer question,
Mike
Parachute function test results 1:
I uploaded latest 3.3 RC3 to Pixhawk and setup parachute to use servo and altitude check is disabled.
Sometimes I receive "altitude: too low" message and sometimes parachute is ejected. I noticed that if throttle is carefully raised, altitude too low message appears. But if throttle is raised fast, is parachute ejected. Throttle position doesn't seem to do any difference, only how aggressively throttle is raised matters. On another test attempt I received only too low messages and couldn't eject.
Any idea why eject altitude check is inconsistent?
I have a video to be uploaded if it helps. Terminal doesn't want to connect Pixhawk and therefore logs are not available. MP is 1.3.25.
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