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We were already using the Gumstix Overo COM in our winning EMAV 2009 entry. Other projects have started to adapt the system design with Linux onboard computer. It separates the Linux computer vision system and control/estimation code running on an external microcontroller. At that time we already did the electronics design for a custom camera board, but eventually used a USB machine vision camera. However now we have a working driver, which allows to attach the Aptina MT9V032 machine vision CMOS sensor directly to the Gumstix Overo COM. The board will be available from Gumstix Inc., but is not yet released as a product. The pxOvero base board weights only 28g including the camera with M12 glass lens! It works under very low light conditions and has a much lower noise level than typical webcams. We hope to see this pair soon in many computer vision MAVs. Our upcoming aerial robotics middleware is lightweight and has been developed so scale to lightweight computers. Together with this camera, it will provide a very convenient toolkit for computer vision on micro air vehicles.

TrIMUpter - GPS Position hold test with ArduIMU + GPS EM406 on Vimeo.

Hello, I have successfully tested the GPS position hold with my TrIMUpter (a VTOL tricopter).

The full stabilisation process is simply done with:
- an ArduIMU+ V2 flat,
- a triple axis magnetometer (HMC5843),
- a GPS EM406,
so this is a very cheap setup.

Below a photo of the setup used:

The TrIMUpter is stabilised by the firmware TriStab v2.1

Some features of the firmware v2.1:

- Full stabilisation process required for a multicopter,
- GPS position hold, tested with the GPS EM406, and compatible with Ublox, NMEA, and Mediatek MTK ,
- a true Heading Lock for the yaw with 2 modes: inertial heading lock or magnetic heading lock,
- self-calibration of the IMU sensors,
- self-test at the startup for valid datas from the HMC5843 triple axis magnetometer,
- the switch from the "stabilisation mode" to "the GPS position hold" is done with switch linked to the ch5,
- the Roll/Pitch PID gains can be easily tuned via the transmitter knob linked to the ch6,
- the main servo mixer is placed in one function "call_servomix()" and can be easily modified for multicopters
and also helicopters...

The firmware TriStab v2.1 can be downloaded here.

Have fun and happy dev,
Jean-Louis

• Payload until 10 kg in order to fly :)
• 3 16x10 Propeller
  

All Things That Fly is by far the best RC podcast, a weekly romp of news, information and entertaining banter on the RC world, by a cast of charismatic hobbyists. It's the highlight of my commutes and a must-subscribe from anyone into RC.

This week Jamie was kind enough to invite me on to talk about DIY Drones and the launch of the ArduCopter project. Listen here and subscribe via RSS here.

For the first time in the history of the IMAV events, teams can apply for borrowing an MAV platform for use in the competitions. The IMAV 2011 Summer edition is sponsored by Parrot, the producer of the Parrot AR Drones. Parrot has made it possible for the IMAV organization to lend drones to teams that wish to focus on the artificial intelligence / software part of the competitions.

The procedure for applying for borrowing a Parrot AR Drone:

1. Write a short plan for the competition(s) in which your team wants to participate. Send it to: microuav -at- gmail.com
2. The IMAV 2011 organization evaluates the incoming proposals and notifies the team whether it can borrow a Parrot AR Drone.
3. Register the team and its members for the competition(s) and the conference.
4. After payment of at least two team members, and acceptance of the conditions for borrowing the platform, the Parrot AR Drone will be sent. As a preliminary indication for the conference registration costs, a student pays only 150 Euro for the entire conference / competition, including conference dinner ticket.

Please note that the NUMBER OF DRONES IS LIMITED, and we will assign them on a first-come first-serve basis, if the quality of the proposals is sufficiently high.

Here's an update on the ArduPilotMeta software roadmap:

• The current public (zip file) code is the ArduPilotMega 1.0 Beta. We update that every week or two with the latest bug fixes (the version that went up last night fixes a bug with centripetal acceleration handling. If you're using the 1.0 beta you should update it with this latest version). You can see if you have the latest code by looking at the upload date. This is a fully functional autopilot and many people are flying it now, but it is a beta so we're very keen to get flight and bug reports so we can improve it. As always, file bug reports in the Issue Tracker, not as comments here.
• The next release will be APM 1.0 (not beta), which should be out in about a month. This will be integrated with a new Ground Station (GCS) that can handle in-flight uploading of mission command and PID gains, rather than just using the standard ArduPilot GCS in legacy mode is we do currently. It will also fully support the very cool Debug Terminal, which can give you very detailed data and control over APM functions in flight. You can watch our progress on this version in the SVN trunk, but we recommend that you do NOT try to run or fly this code; it changes every day and is often untested. We cannot offer support for this code or answer questions, simply because it's unfinished and if we have to explain our work in progress all the time we won't be able to finish it!
• Planning work on the APM 2.0 code is underway. Goals include adaptive control (so you won't have to manually set PID gains), better AI, more camera control including automatic location tracking, and easier setup processes, including an installation file that can allow people to use APM without ever having to see code or touch the Arduino IDE if they don't want to. We're looking at spring 2011 for a public beta.
• Meanwhile, the ArduCopter quadcopter and helicopter branches of the project are making rapid progress. The quad team, which already has a very smooth flying public beta, should be adding GPS position hold in the next week, and waypoints and GCS support shortly thereafter. The heli team (which is using the Trex 450 platform) has achieved good flying performance and should be releasing public code this month, too.

European FoxTeam are doing the first test of Quadfox in Acro mode. We're doing some looping. The Quad Pilot is Giuseppe D'Angelo FoxTeam member the Father of HG3 .

In the video He explain how is possible to do looping with QuadFox v3 . At the end of looping for stabilize Quad he use switch to put quad in stable mode.

Happy vision

For more info check our blog at : http://www.virtualrobotix.com

Pre Flight Check Stable mode control vs Acro mode ... in stable mode with standard configuration is not possible to flip the quad.

Regards

Roberto Navoni (Redfox74)

Arduimu and ardupilot hardware, with my own code. all control loops are simple PID. Position feedback using Optitrack system.