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Ardupilot 2.7 Beta

Posted by Jason Short on July 23, 2010 at 11:30pm

I was going to call it 2.6.3, but so many changes have been made, updates added, I think it requires a full point. Also, the header file has been streamlined a bit and some defines have changed. The PID gains have not, so if your plane flew well with 2.6 it will fly well, or even better with 2.7. BTW, this is the first release that has only been tested via HIL. I've never flown it for real because of the strong winds in the bay area right now. We'll see, but I think this will be the most stable release yet.

What's changed:

I've included a folder for connecting your ardupilot hardware to X-Plane. There are PNG files showing the configurations to make in the menus.

X-Plane supplies IMU data and airspeed data to Ardupilot so you must select the GPS_IMU option to connect.

New altitude estimation - Thanks to Ryan Beall for this one. This smooths out noisy altitude readings from GPS.

Takeoff and landing are now full features. Their use has been simplified and are assigned full flight modes which can be seen with a ground station.

New Fly by wire throttle command by Christof Schimd.

Updates altitude hold for those with airspeed sensors. Airspeed is now recorded in m/s instead of air pressure value. Since calibration for your particular pitot tube setup could be needed there is now a calibration value in the header file.

Improved stick mixing response for all modes.

Waypoints will be skipped if you miss them after one loop around. The number of degrees can be changed in the code so let me know how many is good.

Loiter hold has been improved.

Cross track gain now on by default.

Numerous bugs are gone.
Old, unused code and vars have been removed. Code has been reformatted and commented.
If you have any issues, please comment here and I'll get them fixed in the final release.

Jason




Tags: 27, ardupilot, beta
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Comments

  • Recmaster July 30, 2010 at 11:42am
    Yello everybody,

    Does anyone try to make this simulation without radio?
    I mean just set a ArduPilot in AUTO mode by default and emulate full fly (taking-off, flying and landing)
    What I have to change in code 2.7 to do that?
  • Developer
    Michael Oborne July 29, 2010 at 5:38pm
    Also as for the refresh rate eg 50hz you can change that to whatever you want, so long as they are both the same
    Michael
  • Developer
    Jason Short July 29, 2010 at 5:14pm
    Very Cool Michael!
  • Developer
    Michael Oborne July 29, 2010 at 5:09pm
    Hi,

    updated my exe again (Here), this time it uses almost no cpu time, ive been testing on a core i7, so i never noticed it.
    also as requested the source you can get from here http://vps.oborne.me/Ardupilot2Xplanes.zip , its a c# 2010 project.

    Michael
  • Earl July 29, 2010 at 3:22pm
    OK I am back.
    I have my XBee hooked up and looks ok on regular GCS
    Earl
  • John C. July 29, 2010 at 3:05pm
    I got 2.7 up in the air today with thermopiles. FBW_A seemed to work pretty good. My roll is MUCH better now. I'm still lacking authority in pitch, but I just need to test some more.

    Is the XBee corruption fix working in this version?

    Thanks for the hard work!

    JC
    1984 hosting
  • Earl July 29, 2010 at 2:50pm
    Thanks Jason.
    We have a bad thunderstorm at the moment so I need to shut the PC down. Already tripped the UPS twice !
    Earl
  • Developer
    Jason Short July 29, 2010 at 2:27pm
    Hi Earl,
    Just found a type overflow error in the altitude code. I'll post an update soon. Maybe it's also the source of your problem.
  • Richard Green July 29, 2010 at 1:51pm
    I have just loaded 2.7 beta 2 onto my Easystar.

    If I set SET_RADIO_LIMITS to 0 and input the limits for CH1 and CH2 then all appears well and the serial output is what I expect.

    However if I set SET_RADIO_LIMITS to 1 the serial output is

    Init Ardupilot 2.6.3 Beta
    GPS: EM406

    Init Ardupilot 2.6.3 Beta
    GPS: EM406

    Init Ardupilot 2.6.3 Beta
    GPS: EM406

    etc. It does not ask me to set the limits as 6.2 did and does not get past this loop.
    .
    Also there are variables in AP_Config.h for #define CH3_MIN and #define CH3_MAX which are annotated '// (Microseconds) Range of Ailerons/ Rudder'. Should these be CH4?

    Richard
  • Magnus July 29, 2010 at 1:17pm
    Hi,
    I just started to play around with the 6.7 beta and ran in to a strange problem regarding the throttle. I have enabled throttle output but i do not get any throttle output in manual and stabilize modes but in auto mode it works. Telmetry reports that the ap is reading throttle values and it indicates that a throttle value is set. This is how the output looks:

    +++ASP:0,THH:41,RLL:38,PCH:-18,` in:1394,***
    +++ASP:0,THH:43,RLL:38,PCH:-6,` in:1404,***
    +++ASP:0,THH:41,RLL:49,PCH:-13,` in:1390,***
    +++ASP:0,THH:35,RLL:40,PCH:-13,` in:1354,***
    +++ASP:0,THH:29,RLL:43,PCH:-12,` in:1311,***
    +++ASP:0,THH:21,RLL:46,PCH:-14,` in:1266,***
    +++ASP:0,THH:15,RLL:48,PCH:-14,` in:1224,***
    +++ASP:0,THH:9,RLL:47,PCH:-11,` in:1186,***
    +++ASP:0,THH:5,RLL:45,PCH:-13,` in:1162,***
    +++ASP:0,THH:3,RLL:43,PCH:-14,` in:1148,***
    +++ASP:0,THH:2,RLL:45,PCH:-13,` in:1139,***
    +++ASP:0,THH:2,RLL:38,PCH:-15,` in:1140,***
    +++ASP:0,THH:13,RLL:48,PCH:-12,` in:1211,***
    +++ASP:0,THH:29,RLL:46,PCH:-12,` in:1311,***
    +++ASP:0,THH:41,RLL:49,PCH:-13,` in:1390,***
    +++ASP:0,THH:49,RLL:40,PCH:-15,` in:1445,***
    +++ASP:0,THH:55,RLL:41,PCH:-14,` in:1478,***
    +++ASP:0,THH:58,RLL:46,PCH:-14,` in:1498,***
    +++ASP:0,THH:58,RLL:49,PCH:-11,` in:1497,***
    +++ASP:0,THH:52,RLL:46,PCH:-10,` in:1460,***
    +++ASP:0,THH:43,RLL:46,PCH:-12,` in:1405,***
    +++ASP:0,THH:34,RLL:36,PCH:-13,` in:1344,***
    +++ASP:0,THH:24,RLL:30,PCH:-12,` in:1283,***
    +++ASP:0,THH:16,RLL:31,PCH:-13,` in:1232,***

    Any ideas?

    /Magnus
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