Re: [Paparazzi-devel] ardrone2_raw starts but doesn't fly

[Freek van Tienen]

2013/10/7 Ben Laurie <address@hidden>

On 7 October 2013 10:23, Christophe De Wagter <address@hidden> wrote:
> You "bricked" your flight-recorder?

Well, maybe - but I didn't actually do anything to it between working
and not-working. :-)

Does the ardrone reset it, do you think?

Yes the ardrone original software does reset and also configure it.

> If you can not manually configure the "ublox6***" in ucenter, then the AP
> module will not be able to do it either.

It wasn't clear to me how to manually configure it to do UBX in
ucenter, tho the fact other functions didn't work made me suspect I
wasn't going to be able to even if I knew how - do you know how?

> In some cases, the baudrate of usb devices is not important but in many
> cases it still is. (e.g. usb->serial converters like the prolific chip in
> the flightrecorder)

Ah, sure.

> Even if the position fix is way to slow, there is no reason to fall out of
> the sky. It might be unstable and constantly move left/right but if it falls
> out of the sky you probably should reduce the max-bank angle to start with.

I'll give that a try. What setting(s) would I change to make it
generally fly less aggressively?

MAX_BANK inside the GUIDANCE_H of your airframe file. Start with that.

> And if after take-off it moves laterally instantly, then make sure your
> accelerometer neutrals are calibrated correctly.

It doesn't - it hovers for a short while, then heads off. But I guess
I should calibrate everything, too! 

Oh, I forgot to mention another issue - because the ardrone upload
includes the kernel driver for u-blox, you have to plug in the GPS
_after_ the upload, or it isn't recognised.

Yes that's right, we haven't fixed that yet because we use a ttyUSB cable instead of direct ttyACM which is available at some uBlox GPS'.

BTW. Do you have the logs of the flight? Because I'm really curious about what happened.

>
> -Christophe
>
>
> On Sun, Oct 6, 2013 at 7:17 PM, Ben Laurie <address@hidden> wrote:
>>
>> Well, I've had some fun.
>>
>> Firstly: Flight Recorder - I have no idea what's going on with that -
>> but broadly, paparazzi doesn't seem to get positioning from it
>> anymore, sirf demo appears not to want to talk to it and if I try to
>> cat its USB port, I get one block of data and that's it.
>>
>> Secondly: u-blox. I have a device that claims to be a u-blox 6, but it
>> stays in NMEA mode, despite ap trying to reconfigure it. u-center also
>> seems unable to do things it ought to be able to do, like get a log
>> from it or save its configuration. This is a cheap one from China - I
>> have a more expensive one from Germany on order :-)
>>
>> Thirdly: I had to change the device from /dev/ttyUSB0 to /dev/ttyACM0
>> - the ardrone doesn't seem to create a USB0 node. BTW, I'm mildly
>> confident the baud rate setting is irrelevant for USB devices - any
>> comment?
>>
>> Finally: so I configured things for NMEA instead of u-blox. This
>> actually works, in the sense that I get a fix, and its in the right
>> place and height. And it does actually take off this time. However, I
>> have a similar experience to before: it zooms off at high speed,
>> overshoots, turns around and eventually falls out of the sky (or in
>> one case, hit a tree). Could this be because it doesn't get an updated
>> position frequently enough?
>>
>> At least these things appear to be quite robust!
>>
>> Any suggestions on why the u-blox doesn't work? If I wanted to
>> manually configure it, that should be possible from u-center, right?
>>
>>
>> On 5 October 2013 15:04, Ben Laurie <address@hidden> wrote:
>> > On 5 October 2013 14:42, Freek van Tienen <address@hidden>
>> > wrote:
>> >> You should check the hight of the waypoints compared to the current
>> >> hight.
>> >> What I could think of is that it didn't do a good "Geo init" and
>> >> doesn't
>> >> have the correct height.
>> >> The other thing I could think of is that if you have a joystick
>> >> connected
>> >> you should set it into NAV(AUTO2) mode, and give no thrust at the Start
>> >> engine block(else it can't start the propellors) and give full thrust
>> >> after
>> >> the propellors are turning before entering the Takeoff block.
>> >>
>> >> 1. The Geo init block: This one updates the waypoints positions and
>> >> height
>> >> of the drone in respect to the current GPS position.
>> >> 2. The Start engine block: This block starts the propellors at the
>> >> lowest
>> >> speed, so they should be turning but it should not take off.
>> >> 3. The Takeoff block: This block let the drone takeoff and go to the
>> >> next
>> >> block in the flight plan. So then it should really go to STANBY for
>> >> example.
>> >> (Keep in mind that if you have a joystick connected you must give full
>> >> thrust, because the thrust of your joystick is the limit of thrust the
>> >> drone
>> >> can give)
>> >
>> > I don't have a joystick connected - do I need to change anything to
>> > compensate for that?
>> >
>> >>
>> >>
>> >> 2013/10/4 Ben Laurie <address@hidden>
>> >>>
>> >>> Any hints on how to debug this? For a change, my weekend is clear!
>> >>>
>> >>>
>> >>> On 1 October 2013 11:50, Ben Laurie <address@hidden> wrote:
>> >>>>
>> >>>>
>> >>>>
>> >>>>
>> >>>> On 1 October 2013 11:38, Christophe De Wagter <address@hidden>
>> >>>> wrote:
>> >>>>>
>> >>>>> For take-off you are supposed to
>> >>>>>
>> >>>>> 1) click the start engine flightplan block
>> >>>>> 2) click the takeoff flightplan block
>> >>>>
>> >>>>
>> >>>> Hmm. I did that, I think. As I say, it didn't take off, but it did
>> >>>> spin
>> >>>> the props.
>> >>>>
>> >>>> What would I expect to happen at these two stages?
>> >>>>
>> >>>>>
>> >>>>> We have no experience (yet) with flying in raw mode with the Parrot
>> >>>>> Flight Recorder.
>> >>>>
>> >>>>
>> >>>> Happy to help debug, but not sure what I'm looking for - why might
>> >>>> the
>> >>>> GPS prevent takeoff?
>> >>>>
>> >>>> I do have a ublox GPS on order, btw.
>> >>>>
>> >>>>>
>> >>>>>
>> >>>>> -Christophe
>> >>>>>
>> >>>>>
>> >>>>> On Tue, Oct 1, 2013 at 10:46 AM, Ben Laurie <address@hidden> wrote:
>> >>>>>>
>> >>>>>> Ping?
>> >>>>>>
>> >>>>>>
>> >>>>>> On 30 September 2013 14:46, Ben Laurie <address@hidden> wrote:
>> >>>>>>>
>> >>>>>>> OK, so I got the Flight Recorder working is sirf mode.
>> >>>>>>>
>> >>>>>>> But when I tried to actually fly it, it was a bit weird.
>> >>>>>>>
>> >>>>>>> At first, it kept losing GPS fix and switching itself into KILL
>> >>>>>>> and
>> >>>>>>> refused to do anything. After a few restarts, it seemed to stop
>> >>>>>>> doing that,
>> >>>>>>> and switching to the Takeoff block span the motors up, but not
>> >>>>>>> fast enough
>> >>>>>>> to actually take off - it just sat there with everything spinning.
>> >>>>>>>
>> >>>>>>> Am I do something wrong? What am I actually supposed to do for
>> >>>>>>> takeoff? Go to Start Engine first? Or what?
>> >>>>>>>
>> >>>>>>
>> >>>>>>
>> >>>>>> _______________________________________________
>> >>>>>> Paparazzi-devel mailing list
>> >>>>>> address@hidden
>> >>>>>> https://lists.nongnu.org/mailman/listinfo/paparazzi-devel
>> >>>>>>
>> >>>>>
>> >>>>>
>> >>>>> _______________________________________________
>> >>>>> Paparazzi-devel mailing list
>> >>>>> address@hidden
>> >>>>> https://lists.nongnu.org/mailman/listinfo/paparazzi-devel
>> >>>>>
>> >>>>
>> >>>
>> >>>
>> >>> _______________________________________________
>> >>> Paparazzi-devel mailing list
>> >>> address@hidden
>> >>> https://lists.nongnu.org/mailman/listinfo/paparazzi-devel
>> >>>
>> >>
>> >>
>> >> _______________________________________________
>> >> Paparazzi-devel mailing list
>> >> address@hidden
>> >> https://lists.nongnu.org/mailman/listinfo/paparazzi-devel
>> >>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Paparazzi-devel mailing list
>> address@hidden
>> https://lists.nongnu.org/mailman/listinfo/paparazzi-devel
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Paparazzi-devel mailing list
> address@hidden
> https://lists.nongnu.org/mailman/listinfo/paparazzi-devel
>

_______________________________________________
Paparazzi-devel mailing list
address@hidden
https://lists.nongnu.org/mailman/listinfo/paparazzi-devel