What's the best way of achieiving this? I have a 2-axis setup & would like control of the tilt from a dial on my MX20, I can't get this to work apart from wiring straight from the receiver to the tilt & then to roll, ideally I would like it the other way reciever>roll>tilt. I'm sure im just missing something simple with the prgramming? Thanks!
Some questions first. Do you use MK electronics? Is this a one man operation (flight and camera)? Do you have the receiver of the MX20 set to SUM? If all of the above are yes then it's the same setup I did on my CS6. You will need to connect the radian to the Flight controller. It will go between the tilt servo and the FC. On the Camera Tab in MK Tools adjust the compensation to 0 and you will have to play with the min and max values of the servo, increase the min and decrease the max. I'm not near my equipment now so I can't confirm the values. Associate a channel to the camera tilt on MK Tools as you would normaly do. I recommend one of the pots on the radio. Disconnect the tilt servo and connect the Radian to the PC, start everything up (REMOVE THE PROPS FROM THE MOTORS!!!) move the tilt channel on the MX20 and watch the values on the Radian software. I hope this helps, if you need more infos, just drop a line here and as soon as I get home I'll get more info and post here. Good luck.
Arthur, are you saying that it is possible to connect radians to the servo outputs on an MK board? For example, I would be able to connect radians between the MK's tilt, roll and pan outputs going to servos? We would still maintain slew control out of the radians even if the RC RX signals are going through the MK then passed along to the radians? So as long as we disable the mk tilt/roll compensation via mk tools. This would actually be great. This would allow us to use radians in conjunction with (yes you guessed it) MKs pan/tilt ramping.
I've done a, more or less, step by step manual on how to configure the Radian to work with the MK Flight CTRL. It's based on my setups, so no warranties. The PDF is here: https://dl.dropbox.com/u/107383206/Radian2FC.pdf
Arthur, this is ABSOLUTELY awesome. Great manual! very well detailed. Few people will actually need this but there will be others that think this is the greatest. I use a separate gimbal mounted MK board so this MK/Radian setup is perfect. I knew eventually there would be a solution...good thing I'm always logging in and checking for updates.
Arthur: nice work. Howard: this beats my mechanical alleged "solution" by a wide margin. Please let us know how MK FC + Radians work out and whether you get appropriate ramping.... Thanks Andy.
Cool instruction, is it correct understood that the camera positions with the described setup using 3 pos switch is two fixed positions and off? Have no camera man next to me, so seeking the most effective and simple setup.
Arthur, Will this set-up put limits on tilt servo travel? In another thread, we've been trying to figure out how to avoid shooting the boom when the tilt servo transitions too far when flying. Nice job. jim
Jim: Just as an experiment, I loosened the set screw on the big tilt pulley, so that the pulley was free to move, but the camera on the camera plate did not (the shaft just rotated inside the pulley). So then I pulled back on the right hand stick of the Futaba 8FG that controls the tilt. The pulley and the Radian then rotated "up" to the maximum angle that the Radian goes to. If I then hold the camera plate at the maximum angle I wanted it to tilt up to and tightened the set screw in the pulley, wouldn't that do what you want? It certainly limits the amount of tilt up for the camera (and allows lots of tilt down/looking backwards!) Andy.
CPoulsen: No, with the Radian there is no way to set a predetermined position. With this setup it will work like this. While the switch is in the middle the camera stays pointed at same level, with the switch up, in my particular setup, the camera will tilt down until the switch is returned to the center or the Radian reaches it's travel limit. The speed of the movement is adjusted by the Slew command in the Radian interface or by the Servo MAX and MIN in the MK-Tools Camera tab. Jim: The travel is controlled by the Radian and it's hard coded in this version of the firmware as I saw in an old post. Unfortunately there is no way to limit it now. Andy: That idea will work for a steady flight but if the CS shakes or tilts the Radian will pass that limit, but this is better than nothing if the boom is a problem, I agree . Just remember that by doing this, the boot up level of the camera could become a little down, so watch out for those long lenses hitting the ground.
Yeah, I agree, Arthur. It's a compromise. I'm originally British. We do that. I couldn't think of anything else. Andy.
Awesome, I thought the Radian was only intended for the CS gimbal (but only see the radian installed on the nick on the AV200). How did you installed it in the roll? Just today I obliterated my rig against a port crane, looking for the next rig. Thanks Arthur for the manual!
Jeez. That's really disheartening. Sorry for the British Understatement, but I'd get voted off the island if I wrote what I was really thinking. Did you just clip a prop and down she went? Judging relative distances is really hard (if not impossible to do). Sorry to hear of the demise of the bird... Andy.
Come Home mode, invisible cable at distance, clipped a prop, did weird flip at 100m high and it crashed gimbal first fortunately, FC, NV, all BL´s, GPS good. Camera pulverized, crushed AV200, 4 booms gone, all engines good, but had vibration problems with those MK3638 (have new set of Avroto on the way before the crash). Now looking to upgrade my AD-6 HL to a Cinestar, and Gimbal with Radian for roll axis. Ive been reading here that tilt axis do not have limit-able ends, son only getting Radian for Roll.
Ouch. Don't like to read about anything pulverized.... The tilt Radians have a built-in limit of 10 degrees up, to -110 degrees down (measured with respect to Earth-horizontal). See this thread for more discussion. Hope this helps. Andy.
Andy, I received my Radians with Castle's CC BEC, but their output is 5.1V, not 6V. Does this affect performance on the Radians and Servos? Thanks. Mark.