Setting up my ArduPilot system... A project post...

Well the day has come, my Shield V2 arrived, and I have all the parts necessary to start building my UAV control system. This is just a documentation if you will, of my progress, hope, dreams...etc. I've been reading this site on & off for a year or two, and am now finally getting started. Within you will see my trials and tribulations, do's and don'ts( mostly don'ts so far lol) and who knows, I might be of some help with the newbies like myself. =] If you need some help like I did when you want to get started, try this link, it's what I did... =]My Ardupilot:

I thought I would use the Swiss Machine Pin Headers after reading on Sparkfuns website that they hold really well, which is what I wanted. Also the FTDI cable works as well(my own realization).

DO NOT USE THESE! They hold a little too well...

You can see in the pic above that they tend to bend when trying to pull off the shield from the ArduPilot, they can't bend a whole lot, or they break.

So I need to find my damn desoldering tool, and desolder ALL the machine pins off, and put in the regular headers that came with the shield. This doesn't shine a bad light on sparkfun and their products, they work really well, just not for this purpose... lolLast but not least, here's my ArduIMU V2:

My plan is to use Doug's Ardu-IMU-Pilot code, and do some testing with it.That's it for now, until I do some desoldering, and resoldering. lolPeace out...

OK, so I was able to fix my failed header pin fiasco... Trust me when I tell you, it was a whole lot of fun. So with that out of the way, I was able to do some testing. I loaded the 2.4 code, hooked up my AR7000, a couple servos, and an ESC, IT WORKED!

So since the AP setup worked, I tried uploading some waypoints. I'm unsure what I am doing wrong, but I've only been able to get a successful write 3 times maybe. I have the com port set to 6, and have read the manual, troubleshooting, FAQ's, & searched the site, still having issues. I think I have it pegged to a sequence of steps I need to do in perfect order, or I will get a fail...

I also made a wiring harness for my ArduPilot that will connect with my ArduIMU. I loaded Doug's code, and the R17 code for the IMU on my V2 IMU. Hooked everything up, and tried to get a response from it, nothing much happened, but again, I believe it comes down to my procedure. It was late 2nite, so I wasn't very in tune with my thinking. I'll be doing more tomorrow, trying to get things ironed out.

Oh, and I'll also be uploading more pics and vids when I wake up tommorrow.

laterz...

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Benjamin Lanehart December 29, 2009 at 10:39am

@ Chris, thanks for that, thought it was me... =]
3D Robotics

Chris Anderson December 28, 2009 at 11:33pm

Note: just because it says "something is wrong" doesn't mean that the write didn't go through. Just do a read and check. We'll fix this funkyness in the next version.
Benjamin Lanehart December 28, 2009 at 11:24pm

OK, so I was able to fix my failed header pin fiasco... Trust me when I tell you, it was a whole lot of fun. So with that out of the way, I was able to do some testing. I loaded the 2.4 code, hooked up my AR7000, a couple servos, and an ESC, IT WORKED!

So since the AP setup worked, I tried uploading some waypoints. I'm unsure what I am doing wrong, but I've only been able to get a successful write 3 times maybe. I have the com port set to 6, and have read the manual, troubleshooting, FAQ's, & searched the site, still having issues. I think I have it pegged to a sequence of steps I need to do in perfect order, or I will get a fail...

I also made a wiring harness for my ArduPilot that will connect with my ArduIMU. I loaded Doug's code, and the R17 code for the IMU on my V2 IMU. Hooked everything up, and tried to get a response from it, nothing much happened, but again, I believe it comes down to my procedure. It was late 2nite, so I wasn't very in tune with my thinking. I'll be doing more tomorrow, trying to get things ironed out.

Oh, and I'll also be uploading more pics and vids when I wake up tommorrow.

laterz...
Benjamin Lanehart December 21, 2009 at 2:14pm

My kitchen table if chock full of baked goods for the last couple of days(tis the season I guess), so I haven't had a chance to desolder my mess, and fix it. Feeling bored, I was rummaging around the house, and I found the charging plug that came with my wife's iPod Touch. She doesn't use it, so I decided to claim it. Some of you may have these, but for those that don't, they plug into the wall, and convert 120 - 240VAC down to 5VDC, and have a handy female USB connection.

One thing I'm not a fan of is having a to spend a varying number of minutes to grab a GPS lock because of traveling, hasn't been turned on in a good while, or any number of reasons. I figure this will be a perfect solution, and it turns out to be a nice option versus draining batteries. As an added bonus, it works with the DIY Drones official FTDI cable. =]

ArduIMU V2:

ArduIMU V1:
Randy Varilek December 20, 2009 at 2:30pm

Morli, This camera control is for a full size powered parachute. This is my winter project so nothing to really show yet. I am working on version 2 of the wood mock up of the pan and tilt structure and trying to figure out the ArduIMU board/software/interfacing. Basically at the hair pulling stage with the electronics trying to learn the basics. Got the lights on the ArduIMU board so it seems to be sending data somewhere but I have not found out
where yet!
Admin

Morli December 20, 2009 at 2:00pm

@ Randy, That is bit different! :). Any pictures of the installation of your setup and any videos with this setup? Thanks Are you talking about scale paramotor?
@ Benjamin, LOL , I guess the last piece of advice on your build diary/blog would be "" LOAD the CODE , It HELPs a LOT . :)=( "" , I like the quality of the pictures in your build , good close up. keep it up, thanks once again for sharing.
Randy Varilek December 19, 2009 at 4:20pm

This is a great post. I just received my ArduIMU + board and am trying to figure out how to really use it. My “drone” is the camera on my Powered Parachute. I am looking to stabilize it to stop the up and down and side to side motion that occurs to a camera mounted to the powered parachute frame. If that is successful, maybe I will be able to lock on a view, which would be neat but not nearly as important as to take the movement out of the picture. If you watch a video of the camera mounted to the frame it will quickly make you seasick unless the air is extremely calm.

Randy
Benjamin Lanehart December 18, 2009 at 9:55pm

Thanks, I like to share my screw ups, it usually helps someone... Like this one I failed to mention. When I soldered everything on, it helps to LOAD THE FREAKING CODE... I went through plenty of cigarettes out in the 20 degree temps we had today watching the blue and orange LEDs bounce back and forth waiting for a GPS lock, DUH. Needless to say, after feeling defeated, I went back in, loaded the 2.4 code. After I did that, I went outside and it took five minutes. lol Oh well... =]
Admin

Morli December 18, 2009 at 7:59pm

@Benjamin, Good work , build diary will good for all other new comers. Pls keep it up and looking forward to see the whole story with lotsss of picture. Thanks for sharing. Cheers

This reply was deleted.