Today i started to write the theory+tutorial of Ardupilot and Ardupilot Shield. This is the first text. I will try to release more texts describing all the stuff involved in this little baby. My goal at the end is to join all the papers and make the mega manual, very well edited and revised for everybody.This is the first paper describing how the voltage divider in ardupilot works:Ardupilot_paper_preAlpha.doc[UPDATE] You can thrust in my word documents. No virus... ;-)[UPDATE] A better version well structured here (Thanks to Sarel P. Wagner )
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I know, i know. I'm the worse person in the world to write tutorials (and also to respond comments, emails and posts), but i promise i will do my best. Community I need your suggestions: do you prefer word documents that can be converted to PDF, with revisions, editions etc? Or only a simple post with images?
Hi all ..... ArduPilot and ossimPlanet, a potential sweet combo (??). What is ossimPlanet – an open source virtual earth that can easily be integrated with the Arduino board. For example, ArduPilot could potentially control ossimPlanet instantaneous through gps data output. Also, ossimPlanet allows an collaborative viewing experience through it's peer-to-peer communication sockets. Disclaimer: I have no actual experience with this (Arduino & ossimPlanet) combo. Credit goes to Tyler Mitchell's blog (spatialguru) and Massimo Di Stefano. I just see alot of other potential applications incorporating the ArduPilot with ossimPlanet. Interested in reading your thoughts? Warning: changing thought direction ... for anyone interested, it looks like OSSIM also provides impressive open source image processing tools, such as ImageLinker.
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Blimpduino is now available for pre-order at the Maker Shed. Price is $89.
We'll be selling it in the DIY Drones store as well after Maker Faire (Make took all of our initial inventory)
From the product listing:
Features
17 grams, with ultrasonic and IR sensors.
Controls two motors and one vectoring servo.
Built-in RC compatibility (can read two RC channels--throttle and steering)
Designed for a 7.4v LiPo battery; has an automatic power cut-off at low voltage to protect the battery
What's included:
BlimpDuino board, with all SMD parts already soldered on
Other through-hole components, to be soldered by user (easy)
A very simple light ply platform for the board, battery, optional RC receiver, and motor components
A servo, gears and motor shaft for the vectoring (thrust tilting) function
Two motors and props
One IR ground beacon
52" mylar envelope
Additional required items:
7.4v LiPo battery and charger
9v battery for ground beacon
Helium
Optional items:
RC transmitter and receive
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HelloThis is nothing new to the rc world, but maybe helpful to someone and here is my version of the center of gravity tool.
I think the picture show how it´s done, heheIt have helped me allot, because in the beginning i had some problems whit the cg and i tried to use the finger tip method whit out luck, But now i can align my Easy Star to fly better.And here is the Easy Star resting on my center of gravity tool pro!
Got up early this morning to catch a break in the weather before rain.Two hours more time on airframe 1 Airframe 2, now comes in three fits,Observer - looking at things one.Telegraph - relaying things one.Guardian - looking for baddies or fence breaks one.Its all coming together very well, after I've charged everything again I shall head out for another two hours of flying. This time with some sandwiches.
Although I'm still gathering information in the field of UAVs by programming the UAV Playground, I have now designed and built this Flying Wing as a future carrier for whatever electronics I'll be using. I've tried to design it as versatile as possible by using a platform where all the electronics is velcroed on (last picture). Like that it should be possible to carry around even bulky pieces of hardware.Specification- Kline-Fogleman KFm3 Airfoil (top steps at 50% and 75% chord)- Wingspan 1240mm- Wing area 24.8dm²- Weight 430g (330g without battery)Electronics- TURNIGY 28-26B 1350Kv motor- Master Airscrew 7x4 propeller- TURNIGY Plush 25A ESC- Rhino LiPo 3S1P 30C 1050 mAh- 2 x HXT900 1.6kg/cm servo
This is the camera mount and its removable nose cone.
The back view of the Flying Wing with the motor and the KFm3 Airfoil steps visible.
Here the canopy is removed and the electronics and an Arduino are visible.Free Design Tools [update]- ProgeCAD 2008 Smart (AutoCAD clone)- Google SketchUp (3D modeling)- WinLaengs4 (CG calculation)- Estimate Electric Motor and Prop ComboFirst Flights [update]The maiden flight was absolutely unproblematic. Only a few minor trim adjustments where necessary and I increased the travel adjust for elevator and aileron to 115%. I also mixed some elevator to the throttle so that the plane now stays level on throttle up. Elevon reflex is set to 3 degrees.The reactions to the stick movements where quiet precise and it always amazes me how stable my Wings fly. Flying a curve with elevons only was a pleasure and you wouldn't have noticed the absence of the rudder in non acrobatic flying.The KFm3 Airfoil is recommended for slow flying planes and although the maximum speed is rather low the flyable speed bandwidth is more than sufficient for a UAV ship.I tested different weight configurations from 450 to 590g and there is definitely more payload potential because even at full load with a 2200mAh lipo and the camera mounted vertical climbing was still possible.Flight time was about 25 minutes with a 2200mAh lipo (1680mAh recharged).
Aerial Video Central SwitzerlandA manual non stabilized flight in gusty winds. I used a Toshiba Camileo S10 1080p HD video camera weighing 119 grams and costing about 165$.For better quality and less jerking you can download the video from Vimeo (you need an account).A flight in the Swiss mountains [update]Filmed with the Toshiba Camileo S10 in WVGA mode (848x480, 60fps, no stabilization).
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Update: the wiki implementation is terrible in the beta version. I've removed the app until Ning can get its act together. Sorry for introducing it before it was ready.
As some of you have noticed, I've enabled a wiki here. It's the "UAV Resources" tab above. I've populated a few items from this somewhat out-of-date list, with the hopes that the community here can flesh it out with the stuff that's missing.
Let's see how it goes. It it works well for this function, we may find other uses for the wiki.
-c
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My son has used Scratch http://scratch.mit.edu and Alice http://alice.org to learn animation.Can DIY create a kid centered 2D cartoon in Scratch?Can DIY create a kid centered 3D cartoon in Alice?He has now moved on to Maya, Blender, and Orbiter.Orbiter is an open source space simulator. http://orbiter.orgHe has been using Orbiter to model all the aviation and space vehicles he can find. He is interested in DIY drones but would like DIY designers to create models he can manipulate in Orbiter.He also has read "Fly Me to the Moon" an excellent introduction to orbital mechanics.Have DIY designers created any kid based materials.DIY basics?He is using starlogo as part of a Santa Fe Institute/MIT simulation class. DIY kit for GUTs program?http://www.santafe.edu/education/k12-project-guts.phpCould DIY build software for kids to simulate drones?Sell DIY kits for school programs in DIY web store?Young kids have problems with RC controls.Could DIY blimp be designed for kids? Add tethers, etc?How about an interface so kids can control the blimp with their little fingers?A fuzzy logic interface for kids?Forgiving until their skills improve?Nothing can crush a kids impression of DIY than a lost plane or drone.My son has walked crying from the field of dreams after crashing his RC plane.I wished I had built the RC blimp first.What DIY are kid tested?See example Scratch physics cartoon:http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/GeneMachine/34906Read more…
At this time 4 members are invovled in building the first blimp,The members have never before dealt with electronic components inraw form that need to be placed on a board. I had to train themon protecting the items from static charge and explain theneed for inventory. At this time the team is doing research on eachcomponent for data sheets to understand thier primary funtions.We also have to find a rechargable battery, a 5/32 drill bit and asmaller soildering tip. The team will post the next blog and showpictures of thier current work from this week, the data sheets andany other issues that might present itself.The second blimp will start in two weeks after the students thatattend a christian academy complete thier end of the year tripsand ceremonies.Tinicko GriffinOctagon Robotics Founding Mentor
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Grown ups are doing ithttp://www.defenseindustrydaily.com/One-for-All-AAI-Textrons-UAV-Control-System-05412/Maybe there should be a Flying Fox, Ardu, Atto common GCS?? (insert device I have forgotten)Something that allows a group of three people with three different systems on board their airframes to get together and share data.Thinking along way ahead....Pain in the backside if you all turn up at a SAR incident and have to jump seats between GCS to keep three types over the scene continuously.If you see what I mean.I dont have the skills but an open GCS would seem the way to go?
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Today is a great day! finally we had setup the little e-commerce and stocked it with a few products. Be advised! The page still have some little bugs!After making a payment, paypal will return you to the preview store page, don't worry about that, at that point you order has been sent.And the Store URL is................... this:http://store.diydrones.comHaa! I need to sleep now, was an unsigned long long day; Feel free of buy everything you need. ;-) More products coming soon!Good Night!
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DIY Drones factories North (Berkeley) and South (LA) are working hard this weekend. Down in LA, Jordi is populating ArduPilot expansion boards with pressure sensors using our in-house reflow oven.
Meanwhile, up here, the Blimpduino kits are now boxed and waiting for final QA. Here's the box design:
UPDATE!! Got the Servo Outputs running today. They offer 15 bits of precision and are synchronized to the guidance/control functions to minimize latency in the control loop. Also got the Magnetometer running and am talking to the GPS receiverUPDATE #2: May 24 2009: Just got Current Voltage and Temperature Monitoring done. Also have the Attitude Estimation Running. Check it out.Pic32 Autopilot Attitude Estimation.Received my boards from the board house Friday and began building and testing. Power supplies went on first and seem to work fine - clean outputs and efficient. Next went on the processor. I wrote some preliminary code to toggle one of the LEDs and all seemed to work fine. Next I went ahead and mounted everything else and began writing code to grab all the sensor data. I also got the USB port working so I could feed the data to a PC for viewing. Here is the status.Power Supplies - workingProcessor - working12 bit AD - workingGyros - workingAccelerometers - workingAirspeed Sensor - workingUSB - workingAltitude Sensor - Not DoneMagnetometer - workingGPS Interface - workingRF Interface - Not DoneCurrent Monitor - workingVoltage Monitor - workingSD Card - Not DoneServo Outputs - workingPWM In - Not DoneAs you can see there is a bit more hardware to checkout, but it should go pretty fast. I have set up the core timing and am sampling the sensors at 100 Hz via a 5KHz state machine. Right now it's taking 1.5% of the processor throughput to sample gyros, accels and airspeed. I'm estimating 2 to 2.5% when I'm done. That should leave plenty of throughput for guidance/control and communications functions.A very preliminary look at the IDG500 gyros indicates about 0.24 deg/sec noise PtoP (about 0.1 RMS) and .3 deg/sec bias drift after 1 hour. This testing will be ongoing particularly after I have all the acquisition code done.I want to finish getting the hardware validated and to let people know I have 4 un-stuffed boards if anyone is interested. Be warned though - surface mount assembly experience is necessary. Just take a look at the magnetometer and gyros! I might be willing to mount some of the parts for people. Cost will depend on what you want mounted.Let me know what you think!RegardsBrian
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I'm beta testing the new third-party apps platform that Ning will be rolling out soon and trying to decide which are right for us. At the moment, any app I add to the network will appear on every member's profile page (as well as the front page) so I need to choose carefully.
One of the more useful ones is a wiki, which you can see I've enabled in the tab above right (but haven't done anything with it yet). The question is what's the best use for it. Options include:
1) Use it for ArduPilot and Blimpduino documentation. (Paparazzi uses a wiki like this, but they're a stand-alone site, not a community).
2) Use it as a group-editable list of UAV resources, replacing my out of date list.
3) Use it for general how-to instructions, group created and group editable.
What do you think? Vote/discuss in the comments, please.
There are also a lot of other apps. The whole list is for beta testers but here are most of them in the most relevent, ecommerce, collaboration and communications:
Would any of these be useful for us? Remember that if I enable them they show up on every profile page, so we should pick only those with the broadest application. (This may change in the future, but it's the way apps work on Ning now)
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You can't beat child labor! 200 Blimpduino kits being readied for Maker Faire. (And yes, as you can see out the window our house is a construction site at the moment. We're building a drone lab, among other expansions.)
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