XBEE Problem with APM2.0

Hi, 

I am facing problem to communicate XBEE with APM2.0. 

I did several tests before:

1. Configure both XBEE (the one at PC and the one at APM2.0) using X-CTU. And it works, both XBEE can communicate each other. 

2. I tested my APM2.0 with normal serial communication via USB, and it works I can read all the sensors data. 

But when I am connectiong APM2-XBEE and XBEE-PC, seems like the data cannot be sent or receive wirelessly. 

Here are my configurations on the hardware:

APM2.0 port UART0/2 (I did tried on other UART0, 1, 2 but still did not work)

TX APM connected to RX XBEE

RX APM connected to TX XBEE

5V APM connected to 5V XBEE

GND APM connected to GND XBEE

See below on the XBEE-APM connection:

3690942060?profile=original

The power source I connect using USB to the PC from APM2.0 USB connection. 

I have searched all the way in wiki and google but seems it cannot help. Can somebody please advise me on my problem ? 

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Replies

  • From what I read, XBEE cannot be connected to the PC with USB attached. It was causing conflict. What I did to read the XBEE reading is to use serial port 2 which is different port from USB port. 

    It is capable of reading XBEE data. For my case, I am using Realterm software to read the XBEE data and serial terminal from Arduino to read the USB data. It works well for me. 

    I am not sure if anyone else got any good idea that can be shared here. 

    Aizzat. 

  • There seems to be fwe of these issues on the forum.

    I am using the Adafruit XBee adaptor board with a Series1 XBee PRO and originally I got some comms but stopped. This was because the modem control lines are not used on the APM2 board. I use a USB ground station XBee adaptor as well as anothe Adafruit adaptor.

    I bought some Series 2 XBee modules and disabled the CTS lines in the X-CTU software and it appeared to work. I have comms from the APM2 in the Terminal tab on the Planner. But when I connect to the APM board from the Planner to receive the data it does not connect. It seems that the data does not go through fast enough to request the parameters. Error says "serial link isn't fast enough".One thing is I have to disconnect the USB cable for this to work, otherwise the MUX switches the data by default to the USB and not SERIAL2.

    I suspect there is an issue with timing here. The XBee is so busy sending data from the APM to the ground station that it doesn't get a chance to receive the requests from the ground station. This could be XBee issue or a firmware issue on the APM. The fact the serial link works in the terminal seems to indicate an issue with the handling of message or maybe the retries needs to be set to something other than 0 to get the ground station messages through.

    One thing I had to do to improve the transmission speed was to configure the XBee modules to only send to the one module and not use broadcast messages. Otherwise it sometimes took up to 10 seconds to send data. This was something I found on the Digi forum with the slow response times. This is only really true for the Coordinator side which has to probe the network for end devices and routers for broadcast messages.

  • If I read the note correctly below:

    http://code.google.com/p/ardupilot-mega/wiki/APM2Wireless

    You cannot bench-test the XBEE your APM2 is connected to a PC via USB. Unless you do the modification on your board.

    Actually, I am trying to find a solution without hacking the board.

    --Rasit

  • Already solved my problem; see the link here where I connect the XBEE to serial port 2. 

    http://aizzat2.wordpress.com/2012/06/22/apm2-0-wireless-gps-data-tr...

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