Interfacing Arduino with Pixhawk

Hi everybody,

I'm working on a project with a Pixhawk on a DJI Phantom. We substituted the proprietary NAZA controller with the Pixhawk because we want to edit the firmware, adding new sensors and changing the way to control it. We need to interface the Pixhawk with an Arduino, because we're trying to automate the landing through ultrasonic sensors and Pixhawk seems to be limited on the number of sensors. So our idea is to read the sensors through the arduino and send data to Pixhawk through the serial port.

At the moment I just found how to hardware interface them ( http://forum.arduino.cc/index.php?topic=188222.5;wap2 ) and what to write on the Arduino to let it send data through serial (TX, RX pins), but I have no idea about what to write on the Pixhawk firmware and, above all, where.

Hope someone can help me, once the landing system will be ready I'll post all the codes and the documentation I can.

Thanks

Marco

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PW2501 December 23, 2015 at 12:49am

Hi, I would be much interested by the result aswell, please share.
Jason Webber April 25, 2015 at 10:14pm

Hi Marco,

I am currently working through converting my Phantom 2 over to a Pixhawk and was wondering if you managed to get yours up and running?

I was thinking of using the DJI battery but it wont stay on, did you have any luck with this?

I have found this site with the circuit diagram for the ESC and main board

http://www.phantompilots.com/threads/wip-phantom-2-pcbs-schematics-...

and this shows the (and also testing) that the ESC is a direct connection through the main board so that is nice and easy.

If the smart battery can't be used then I was thinking of removing the main board and putting a in just a power distribution board.

Has anyone made any progress or thoughts on the Phantom to Pixhawk mod?
- Alex B > Jason Webber July 21, 2015 at 6:21pm
  
  I am just starting this process of connecting the pixhawk to the Phantom 2... any pointers would be great!
  
  cheers
  
  Alex
Todd Massey April 2, 2015 at 2:42pm

Did you use a phantom 2 with a smart battery? Im building a phantom 2 with a pixhawk and I'm not sure were to plug in the 2 pin wire coming out of the battery.
BertoMora February 2, 2015 at 1:13pm

Hi Marco did you have any success with arduino to pixhawk communication? Im currently trying to read data from arduino with pixhawk through tx rx ports but I have no luck. Any pointers on how make this work?
- Sj > BertoMora September 15, 2015 at 11:42am
  
  Hey BertoMora, did you manage to achieve the above? I am trying to do something similar
James Overington October 13, 2014 at 7:01pm

Hi Marco,

Definitely possible to do. I have interfaced a number of sensors to the APM and Pixhawk both directly attached and via an external Arduino. There are a number of I/O pins available on the Pixhawk as well as serial ports - TELEM2 can be used with alteration to the code (Mavlink by default)

http://diydrones.com/forum/topics/custom-sensors-and-real-time-logging

http://diydrones.com/forum/topics/using-a-drone-to-measure-light-ov...
- Marco Arena > James Overington November 6, 2014 at 4:34pm
  
  Hey James, you said to use TELEM2 as serial port to let the pixhawk communicate with the arduino, but I cannot even enable this port. I mean, I set from the mission planner: BRD_SER2_RTSCTS param to 1 (i.e. enable) but I still don't get anything from this port. What should I alter on Mavlink code?
  Thank you so much.
- Marco Arena > James Overington October 14, 2014 at 10:22am
  
  Thank you so much James, I'm starting immediately to work on it!
Joshua October 8, 2014 at 10:19pm

You may have already seen this (I'm not sure how many sensors you're looking to use), but 3DR does sell an I2C splitter which allows for an additional 4 sensors (whether they be GPS, compasses, range finders, etc).

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Interfacing Arduino with Pixhawk

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