How is everyone else mounting their APM on there Skywalker?
Mine is mounted with Velco tap in main body under the CoG.
I'm using the Skywalker param, and I've reduced the Pitch P down from the default which is about 3.2 to 0.8 and the tail still quickly oscillates up and down when I go stabilise from straight a level flight.
I wouldn't expect to have such a large difference between the Skywalker param and my setup, and even as low as 0.8 its oscillating still. So maybe its my poor mount?
I've got soft foam either side of the APM, so the APM doesn't move any where.
Replies
I need a break from Skywalker + APM for a little while.
1. APM isn't stablising me, still getting tail up and down oscilations.
2. My Skywalker's flying like a pig, need to sort out CoG.
Trying to sort out both at the same time isn't fun. So i removed APM from the equation.
Fixed the CoG issues, trim and control throws. Manual mode is now acceptable.
And then for the first time ever, I successfully flew my Skywalker in stablized, loiter and RTL mode today. Unfortunately it wasn't with the APM. I removed the APM last night and installed the FY21AP II and AP117OSD. I dialed down the gains to 80% of max and without anymore configuration I flew level circuits just feeding in rudder to turn, other than that, the Skywalker maintained the same altitude during the flight. The FY21 made me look like a pro flying circuits.
Loiter mode worked well, did 5 orbits with hands off the stick, and tested RTL and it did a gentled left turn 180 degress and flew a straight line back to me.
I landed with stablise mode, and the landing was just perfect, I couldn't have landed so well myself.
Now I'm thinking of putting the APM and FY21 in series so I can switch between APM stablize to FY211 should I need assistance.
I mount the APM underneath the wing support structure in the main cabin, on the underside of it inside a plastic enclosure. This still gives lots of room in the cabin for gear and camera. I guess I am paranoid, but I want to try and protect the APM as much as possible. I had to cut a couple of access ports in the side to get to the USB port and the CLI switch, and I had do drill a hole in the wing to view the LED's and press the reset switch, but it now works pretty well, you can see the layout in the attached photos.
APMin_BUDpb-1575-tf.jpg
apm_inskywalker.jpg
I have my APM under wings on that upper area and mounted with velcro. Receiver is just below it and using 10cm 8 pin cable connector to connect it. Cable goes through that bigger hole between upper and lower areas. Nice and tidy packet.
Airspeed sensor with pitot tubes is also on wings. Been thinking to use D-9 connector or similar to connect all wires at once that comes from wings to main body. That way I could have even GPS mounted on top of the wing to have maximum exposure for the horizont.
Ah and I covered almost whole inside area with velcro so it will be easy to move stuff around and add/remove parts that are not needed while doing a lot of testing.
I mounted mine with velco under the detachable foam piece in the front. Not sure if is optimal but I got good access to the APM when I need to reset it, upload new waypoints etc.
When I ran with the standard PID settings found in Mission Planner I had no tail oscillations at all. It kept altitude really well (+/- 2 meters). Will try the Skywalker PID settings tomorrow. If it ever stops raining...