Posted by Mike Bakula on January 18, 2010 at 6:00pm
The Project SOAR group at Embry-Riddle got into the air again today. Although we couldn't get any time on the Autopilot (some problem with reading the Ublox5 GPS) we were able to test the Webbie as an on-board camera. The camera was attached to the EasyStar with 2" Velcro, which works well;
We mounted it screen-down, so the video would be upside-down. This is easily fixed in IMovie.
I really want to avoid putting anything else above the wing, since that would be shadowing the x-y sensor, as well as part of the GPS field of view. Above the wing is also where flow disturbances have the biggest impact on lift.
On that note, does anyone have experience cutting ports in the airframe below the wing? It's a real challenge keeping the CG from going too far forward, and I didn't put anything into that space before assembling the fuselage.
I also lost my XY sensor just aftert dark, I was lucky to find it the next day, I should paint it florescent orange, black just disappears, I found it just under the grass 3 feet from crash site. It took 1 hour of looking, I found it by running my hand over the grass, They cut the grass the next day....
"I Initially worried about the camera coming off"
Take from someone who has crashed a lot, when it does happen, make sure you find all the little pieces of gear that are scattered about. I've walked away from a crash not realizing my XY sensor was in the grass or my xbee was 15 feet away, etc. Velcro is almost perfectly designed to release in a crash.
Mark, the uBlox is hot-glued to the adapter, so far that has worked well. I think I am going to move the camera to the other side for better balance, but there's stuff to run into there as well. I Initially worried about the camera coming off, but it only weighs 115 grams, so 4 square inches of Velcro holds very well. The camera is free-running for now; I'll probably mod it after we get the Arduino ProMini working for mission management.
The camera could detach in a crash and possibly damage the uBlox antenna, maybe move gps to other side, but hopefully you won't crash.. I would heat shrink the whloe uBlox as the interface connector is not reliable.
Did you hack the camera for remote control? or just let it free run...
Comments
Take from someone who has crashed a lot, when it does happen, make sure you find all the little pieces of gear that are scattered about. I've walked away from a crash not realizing my XY sensor was in the grass or my xbee was 15 feet away, etc. Velcro is almost perfectly designed to release in a crash.
http://diydrones.com/video/webbie-on-ezstar
Mark, the uBlox is hot-glued to the adapter, so far that has worked well. I think I am going to move the camera to the other side for better balance, but there's stuff to run into there as well. I Initially worried about the camera coming off, but it only weighs 115 grams, so 4 square inches of Velcro holds very well. The camera is free-running for now; I'll probably mod it after we get the Arduino ProMini working for mission management.
Did you hack the camera for remote control? or just let it free run...
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