Hi guys. My APM is not working and I wanted to ask you guys about it while waiting to hear back from 3DR support. I have an APM 2.0 with built-in GPS. It has flown 4 or 5 times with each each flight having greater success (ArduPlane firmware). The previous couple flights were almost perfect. However, last weekend I could not get a GPS lock. After waiting several minutes I tried pressing the reset button. Then after waiting about 20 minutes, I unplugged the UBEC power to reboot the APM. (UBEC with a separate battery is powering the APM and the BEC/ESC is powering the servos.) Upon turning the APM back on, nothing happened. No lights, nothing. I checked the connections and the UBEC and it was correct/working. At home I plugged the APM into the computer via USB, and the lights did come on (and Windows' Device Manager saw it), but failed to connect in Mission Planner. There was an error message, "No Heartbeat Packets Received".
I've set this unit up by the book and been very careful to have it correctly powered. Nothing unusual that I know of happened to cause this.
Is there anything I can check or do to fix this?
Replies
Thanks Søren, I'll give this a try tonight. To answer your second question, no nothing was changed. It was working (except for the GPS locking in), I unplugged it, plugged it back in, and it was dead.
-Parke
Hi,
Check again that you have the right port selected in MP. Try open the port in a terminal emulator program, such ass HyperTerminal or TeraTerm, suing the correct speed 115200 bits/s. Do you see data?
Did you change any of the solder jumpers on the APM board?
And finally - does flashing new firmware work in AP? You should select the port but not connect before you do this.
Regards
Soren