G'Day All, Well, I'm scratching my head, and looking for the simple fix that I have overlooked, I have just completed a new HL build, and for the life of me can not get it to start. I am using the abusemark I2C and FF ESC/PDB combo, with MT 3515 motors. With MK Tool open I can run all the motors individually. However when I try to start the copter with the controls, for as long as I hold the left and right sticks in the respective lower right hand corners, I just get a continuous beep about 1 every half second?? Does anyone have an idea what it is trying to tell me? I have an SD card in, and with the setting written to start with out a GPS fix or compass error Cheers Chris
Hi Chris: Can you confirm that you have: 1. Recalibrated the ACC? 2. Calibrated the compass? EDIT : Also, when you have MK Tool connected and you try to start the motors using the RC transmitter, do you see any kind of error message? Andy.
G'Day Andy, Thanks, in my excitement and haste I had forgotten the ACC calibration ... everything now works as it should. Hoping for good weather tomorrow for test flights. Thanks Chris
Hello Chris, Please post your findings here. Are you using 6S Lipo? Can you read the battery voltage on your MK telemetry screen?
G'Day Ozkan, Yep running 6S, the battery voltage comes through on the telemetry just fine, I have run the FC power direct from the PDB. Cheers Chris
Chris Sounds good!!! Looking forward to your results. I am building one and I was just about to purchase the exact components you did until I heard about the new MK 3.0 BL's. I'm going to be using the same exact components as yourself except I'll be using the new PDB instead of the freefly ESC's.
Test flew this morning, with stock MK settings, and it flew pretty well, the position hold needs a some tuning, as it oscillates in an anti clockwise motion around the PH point but between 2 to 4 metres in diameter, running 2.0d for the firmware. I have dialled the GPS P and D down to values of 90, but this seems to have made the circles a bit larger, so will soon try with GPS D higher. I think a tuning guide would be a fantastic document, but it would be good if it could apply across software/firmware revisions. If there are any takers out there who would like to help on putting together a tuning guide, drop me a message, in the mean time I will start trying to pull together the bits and piece to try and make a start.
G'Day Andy, I had the gain on POTI, as well as the P and D values, these were the values that I had reasonable but not great performance with. I have now set the GPS gain to 85, and compass effect to zero, and am walking out the door, to try those (as the only changes from the settings shown) fingers crossed
Just back from trying those, adjustments, and no appreciable difference. The behaviour I observed was when flying to the right, and stopped, the copter, swung in three quarters of an anticlockwise circle. When flying to the left and stopping it would move rearward and swing in a quarter of an anticlockwise circle before stabilising.
G'day Chris It's behaving like a drongo, isn't it? Well, leave the compass effect at zero for the time being. That will eliminate the compass as a factor. By the way, the screen shot shows the compass effect at 60? I presume you set it to zero after that and then wrote the data out to the board? Need a schooner of plonk and contemplate my navel on this one....could it be some form of radio or electromagnetic interference? Nah. The compass effect to zero should eliminate the electromagnetic side. My flight test copter is an MK Hexa XL -- only use it for flight testing. I upgraded it 2.00e and the PH orbits very, very slowly in a circle about 60 cm or so which is pretty good. I tried the PH with boom 1 pointing N, S, E and W. No differences. I was out in the middle of pretty large paddock to avoid obstacles and get a good GPS fix. How many GPS sats were you getting? Andy.
A drongo indeed! I'm almost wondering if it is the GPS Stick value .... as if I keep ever the slightest pressure on the sticks it will hold a reasonable position, (or that could be me correcting the orbiting). However this behaviour also sounds similar to the GPS-D value being to low?? The standard values that came on the FC v2.5 were significantly higher than on the values I was flying on V2.1/2.2 FC @ 0.90j V2.5 | V2.1/V2.2 GPS Gain 100 | 80 GPS - P 100 | 90 GPS - I 90 | 90 GPS-D 120 | 90 GPS Acc 40 | 0 GPS Wind 50 | 90 PH Log Time 2 | 5 Are the GPS routines changed such that the values previously used are no longer relevant? I had between 10 and 11 satellites in the according to the GPX files for the test flying. and was flying at large oval, only with a couple of small club houses around, so nothing of note for interference. the bottom of my beverage is not enlightening on the solution yet. Cheers Chris
Actually just playing through the following GPX file, and if you watch the sticks window, you can see the RC sticks move in a direction, then as the the stick is centred, the GPS sticks, perform a perfect drongo manoeuvre, the anticlockwise circles about the point before settling.
Sounds like the auto-pilot is the problem -- which means the GPS routines are the issue -- this could be the "timing error" that Holger said he found in the firmware and is allegedly now fixed in 2.01e (that was this morning, we might be at 2.93q by now.... <evil grin>). But, give him his due, Holger is trying to fix what got broken rather than the Apple strategy of denying there is a problem. Andy.
Obviously, and I read that a couple of MK beta testers at the MK forum don´t know about it either. Where did you hear about it?