Levelling APM & Calibrating APM Accelerometers with a ZII
How do you go about doing the level & gyro calibrating your APM when its installed in a Ritewing ZII ?I spent several hours with a spirit level and a bunch of shims to orient my ZII to perform the LEVEL CALIBRATION, and I was really just guessing how much pitch up the nose needed for level flight based on some photos taken of my ZII while I was flying it manually. I just can't imagine being able to do the gyro calibration with this style of plane.I'm sure that mission planner would time-out…
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where should I put my APM 2.6? I've read somewhere it shouldn't be in the top compartment near the motor because of vibrations, what about using something to lower the vibrations?
Hi guys! How did you overcome a huge throws in non-manual modes problem? No matter how I calibrate - I always get huge throws in stab and other modes =(
Can we start a collection of tuning files? I think it would be great to have a starting point for everybody.
Dudz,
If you have never flown an RC plane, you might invest in a flight trainer before you fly a plane such as a Zeph2. Unless of course you have significant $ for repair or replacement. RealFlight Expansion Pac 6 even has one of Chris's (Ritewing) wings. This is what he suggested for me :) It appears to be a very fast plane - gets out of sight in a few seconds - ha... not much time to recover :)
Even then, it might be cost effective to learn to fly with a slower trainer - That is what I am doing :) Actually, even though I have years of flying slow gliders, I still purchased the flight trainer with Chris's wing AND I'm currently building a slower Skyflyer from ReadyMade RC mostly for FPV :) I too have a very nice ZephII almost complete hanging on the wall. I'm probably going to put the APM2 in the inexpensive slow Skyflyer just for practice before I launch the rocket (ZephII).
Hope this helps,
Rick
Dudz, personally, I would avoid trying to fly the plane without "knowing" how to fly the plane. This could be a recipe for disaster. From my experience over the last several months, the APM is far from perfect out-of-the-box and often needs to be tuned and tuned again over several flights. Even then, it screws up from time-to-time (or I screw something up). The feature to fall back on is that you can always turn the APM off and simply fly the plane. If I hadn't had this ultimate failsafe, I would have surely crashed my wing trying to get the APM tuned. When you think you have it setup pretty well, flying in stabilize mode might help you get more comfortable and switching to manual from time to time to get practice. Also, you will want to make sure your wing itself is flight worthy (COG, reflex, etc.) before expecting the APM to fly it. You'll get the hang of it quickly, and then move on to APM flight LOS. In no time, you'll probably be ready for FPV using the APM, and actually get your plane back for another flight. If you just jump in, it might be a one flight plane. :)
I have built 90% of my Zephyr II with apm2. I have up until now only ever flown a quadcopter. I use it mainly in Auto. In FPV I keep throwing the goggles off whenever I loose video quality in fear of crashing. Question is, can I finish the zephyr, and only use it in Auto without actualy flying it in manual ?.... what are the chances of it flying as it should with the standard parameters straight away ?
Mike - here are my parameters for my Zephyr II. I don't think it will correct your RTL situation though.
Bret CAgEagle%20ZII%20BretChilcott%20031113.param
Can someone upload a full parameter list for the ZII?? I have done some tuning but my fly by wire does not level out, RTH is not working.
Thanks!
Mike
ZXL + APM meet world. The Zephyr Xtra Large, 81 inches, 3" elevons... I have it dialed as far as the ground, now to check to see if it flys at all in stabilize mode. I have some concerns with how the throws in stabilize mode go beyond the max I set in the options, but hey.... she's at least pretty.
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