Some nice chases...

Cameramount and new landing gear

Hi,
I finally killed all jello with a new static cameramouunt without any dampening.

The new landing gear is protecting the gopro perfectly.

Current Sensor

I got my ACS758 current sensor today



I will install it at the powerline between my Lipo and my Power distropution, I will be able to measure the current that is coming out of the battery pack and in combination of the voltage over time, I will be able to calculate the mAh that I have used out of the Lipo and can save the Lipos more precisely.

Turnigy 9X mod

I finally bought a Turnigy 9X.

Sadly the vendor on eBay ripped me off and I had to repair the TX, he reverses the voltage and fried a lot of the circuits. I replaced som voltage regulators and the TX is good to go now.

I immediately flashed the TX with er9X custom firmware and now I have a perfect TX for my nDROiiD.
I use it with my TR6A V1 which provides a SumPPM sadly there are only 6 channels on the RX but it will do the trick for now. I will try to get a sumppm encoder to use all 8 channels that are available on the TX.

Vacation in Danmark

I am back from my windsurf and family vacation in Hvide Sande, Danmark. I took nDROiiD with meh and made some Spectacular aerial photos in superwindy conditions. The copter was very flyable and stable despite of the wind. I am very satisfied right now. It were also my first flights with my new tx: Turnigy 9X with er9x mod.

nDROiiD: FPV Cloverleaf in acro mode: ACTION!

Now this was some serious fun.

The Copter felt great and was so responsive, looking forward to more like this...

A short flight movie with the new MPU 6050

I did it: First flip!

Hi,
I finally pulled my self together and accomplished my first flip:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ml62BDNmNN0



After some tuning (higher RC Rate) I am pretty used to the maneuver:

Altough an backflip does not work because of some broken front motors :-/ .
I used my crappy Keychain cam because my GoPro is far to expensive for that kind of maneuver.

Now I need to improve my throttle handlin, to loose less height:

Maby warthox can help:

http://vimeo.com/22615550

less throttle while in midflip ;-)

Nils

Cloverleaf antenna done

I built my first cloverleaf antenna for 5.8gHz FPV TX. Testing will happeb as soon as possible.

Look here for details

Www.rcexplorer.se/page14/CPantennas/CL/CL.html

First passenger on FPV goggles

I gave my best to make him puke, but it did not work.

Howto Inflight ACC - Calibration in MultiWii 2.0

Method A: The Failsafe method (if you have an aux vhannel assigned to arm your copter).

Preparation: uncomment #define InflightAccCalibration

Step 1 :- Copter on ground, Motors off:
- Stick Combo: Throttle + low yaw left + pitch foward + roll right
-> Copter Beeps 2 times: Function activated (do it again to deactivate: copter beeps 3 times)

Step 2 : get airborne and level copter either by trimming TX in hover mode or level it in acro mode.

Step 3: When copter is leveled (no drift) switch off engines while airborne: copter beeps.

Step 4: Switch Engines Back on and land: copter beeps long and new Offsets are stored in EEProm

Step 5: Start again and notice the new new calibration (Important: If you trimmed in level mode: take back all trims on your TX or you will propably crash)


Method B: Using the passthrough function

Preparation: uncomment #define InflightAccCalibration, assign passthrough to one of you aux channels.

Step 1: get airborne and level copter either by trimming TX in hover mode or level it in acro mode.

Step 2: activate switch "passthrough"

Step 3: land and deactivate "passthrough": copter beeps long and new Offsets are stored in EEProm

Step 4: Start again and notice the new new calibration (Important: If you trimmed in level mode: take back all trims on your TX or you will propably crash)

ps.> this function overwrites the ACC/Trim multiwii is providing, feel free to optimiye I bz hand with the usual stick combo after auto trim.

New airframe almost done

My new airframe is almost done, I just need to mill the new Landing legs and the new constructed motor mounts and it is ready.

The new cage is nearly indestructable and has a MK mounting ring ontop, so I can mount the GPS and the cam up there.

GPS finally working

Mit the newest DEV of the MultiWii Code comes a working GPS routine, I have now fully working Return to Home and Position Hold.

I did some test flights and I am pretty impressed by it.

Updates and videos coming soon

Spring...finally!

Let's celebrate it with some FPV footage:

aaaand

good to be back...

Some minor updates: Gyro Calibration / new GoPro Case

Due to the rainy and windy weather right now, there is not much time to fly and have fun.
I made some short flights in the past days but nopthing serious.

I had some pretty rough days in december. I was pretty occupied with my Taekwon-Do club and hat not much time for the ncopters.

But I managed to do some software tweaks:

I finished and perfected the acc autocalibration and I finally managed to restart the gyro calibration routine at startup if the copter has been moved durin calibration. Pretty handy...


Second small projekt was the revision of my fpv gear. I was unhappy with the bold camerahousing and decided to spend some money for the original GoPro skeleton case, this case is lighter and has the opprtunity to connect the video out plugs while the camera is in the case. Abolutely worth the money.
This way the camera is protecteds way better than beforce. Only drawback: The camera has to be mounted upside down but the gopro is capable of rotating the image live so I still can do fpv and all recordings are rotated too. *sigh*
Especially the lens is now secure. And besto of all it looks way sleeker now.

GoPro HD in skeleton case mounten on nDROiiD 2

My FPV deck is now complete. You can attach it in 20 secondes and convert an action Quad to a fpv gear in seconds.

Nils

Introducing the Inflight ACC Calibration

Hi,

I programmed a feature that allows to find the perfect hovering zero point for the ACC sensor while inflight.

At the Shreddiquette community I took part in programming the same procedure after an idea of a fellow programmer and I ported the idea to Multiwii.

Why:

• In reality there is no flat surface, so calibrating the ACC on ground will bring you close to a good value but you still have to find the perfect trim by trial and error.
• Every copter is different so a perfectly flat surface does no recognice the inaccuracies in a copter, COG, bent arms, askew pylons etc.

Doing this inflight makes sure you are defining the zero point while in a perfect stable hover

How:

1. Arm the function with a stick combo (see below)
2. take off and find the point of no drift (in acromode or in hovemode with TX-trimming)
3. disarm via Aux1 and Aux2 (Aux disarming is a requirement) while flying, fon't worry there is a failsafe that prevents the engine from turning off while yu still have throttle > minthrottle. The offset is measured.
4. Land and redo the combo to save the measured values. (be sure to undo the TX-trimming you did while flying in hovermode)
5. Take off again and be happy ;-)
6. You can do the combo again if you do not want to start the calibration anytime before taking off and do the measurement, to disarm the measurement. If you do not want to save the meausred value just do not do the combo. The values are lost after you cut power. You can always repeat the processover and over again  if you are unhapy with the result.

Stick Combo to arm/disarm the calibration.

You can find the code here:

http://code.google.com/p/multiwii/source/browse/#svn%2Fbranches%2Fjevermeister%2F1.9patch2%20-%20inflight%20ACC%2C%20global%20buzzer%2C%20failsafe%202


Nils

How to catch a quadrocopter

The Mail man was there: A working FlyduGPS

Today, I received a new Shipment from my sponsor  www.flyduino.com.

Two friends of mine started building their quadrocopters and use Paul's complete quadrocopter frame with MWC board and black flydumini.

I got some new reenforced 10" props and new brand new GPS bob.

GPS Bob kit as delivered by flyduino with my FMP04

After 10 minutes of soldering I had everything onboard, including the FMP04 and the Bob was ready to go:

ready FlyduGPS

Just a little adjustment in the multiwii code and I got a tight satellite fix inside of my living room near the window:

FlyduGPS in comparison to a Get em... bob I am currently testing

Satellite fix after just a few seconds

working MultiWii GPS code

detailed comparisons and testing coming soon...


Oh by the way: You should really buy the new 10" props from Flyduino they have improved a lot and the mounting is perfect now, I can hardly tell the difference to Mikrokopter props

Flyduino

I would like to introduce and thank my sponsor!

Paul from www.flyduino.com is supplying me with all the stuff I need to get airborne.
He also delivers the newest protoypes for my testing purposes - like the GPS bob or the new Flyduino v2.1.

He developed the famous Flyduino controller which is powering many many multicopters right now. Also he developed several boards and bobs and offers a lot of RC products for reasonable prices.
The quality of his products is outstanding and the service is great. He delivers fast and reliable and is offering great support. I can recommend this shop and his products.

My nDROiiD quadrocopter is using the following Flyduino products:

• Flyduino v2.1 flight controller
• Flydusense v2 Sensor Board
• Flydubution Power distribution board.
• Green and orange 8" and 10" props
• GPS Bob prototype
• Numerous plugs, pins, bolts and a Bosch BMA020 Accelerometer bought at flyduino.com

Thank you Paul!!!

FPV Action, GPS and axes

Hey,
some cool FPV Videos .... I am getting the hang of it.

I am optimizing the software right now. There were some very bad drift issues - so I think about replacing my BMA020 with another accelerometer.

I have a problem with the Mag, the motor currents distort the mag readings severely.

aaand:

Today I got a GPS Bob made by aBUGSworstNightmare from Paul from www.flyduino.com for testing purposes.
After some time of reading and understanding the pins I now have a working GPS onboard.
I am looking forward to try position hold and coming home functions!!!

Working satellite fix on the Copter 

a GPS bob

Additionally I ordered a FMP04 GPS Chip from Kinderkram to fit it into Flyduino's upcoming GPS Bob.

FMP04 GPS Chip

Last week I made some custom motor axis out of spring steel - no more bent axes!

selmade spring steel axes