We are getting ready to start some waypoint flying - always a little nervous before flicking *that switch* on the maiden flight. Looking to share setups with those who have experience to make sure we've got everything right. Is the Navi truly limited to 32 waypoints? http://goo.gl/15N2AV We have a 1km license on our Navi so distance isn't a problem for jobs - got that one covered. Thanks Holger. Appears as though we *ugh* have to enable Carefree mode? http://goo.gl/XiLptL Really? The idea of it makes us nervous. GPS Hold and Home - will this *only* work on a three position toggle on the TX? My pilot is desperate to have them on separate toggles on our TX.
One thing to consider that bit me in the nether regions: do not outfly your radio's 2.4ghz signal. If you have a Graupner, keep a close ear out for the receiver strength prompts. If you fly to a waypoint that's out of radio range, the copter will go into failsafe/come home, providing it's configured properly.
That's a great thing to watch out for - we can do some ground-based tests to see how far we can get between the Graupner TX and RX so we know our limits when planning the flights. Thanks for that Steve. Rest of what I said above sound right? Planning flights in MK Tool is not as elegant as say Mission Planner, but it is what it is presumably.
YOU ONLY have to use carefree if you want the copter's orientation is a defined position on the flights. You can have carefree off and it will still work.
Music to my ears Dave. So just initiating Come Home will start the waypoint flight as uploaded to the Navi?
Yes when you have a waypoint stored in the navigation, come home starts the flight. I do not have carefree enabled.
Question - what orientation does the drone assume when flying the waypoints, nick forward along the waypoint path?
To be honest I don't know because I point the camera straight down and the gimbal is in free mode. I'm going to make a few tests over the next few days to test the auto trigger function with the flight control. when I start using auto trigger with the cable I will need to keep the gimbal in follow me mode so I will able to tell.
Exactly why I was wondering about orientation - that cable between the FC and the camera can't get twisted around and make a mess of things. I really wish the documentation were more complete for the MK stuff. We are likely going to do the first autonomous flights tomorrow in a large flat field with no one and no obstructions around. Wish us luck! *fingers crossed*
Direct from Lothar at MK in Germany... "yes, you can plan up to 200 WP's on a Map and send up to 100 to the copter." Lothar is actually going to walk me through various aspects of waypoint flying and using MK Tool - gotta love these guys!
Successful way point flights yesterday - very basic 4 point square flights to iron out all the details and develop a high level of comfort with in-air behaviour. Got the FC talking to the camera this morning so next step is to fly the waypoints again and let the FC fire the camera at each waypoint. Baby steps. Is anyone reading this using their MK-based drone to do these types of flights?
Yes I am just starting to use the way point maps with the MK software for aerial surveying and mapping. Did you figure out the orientation of the copter for the way points?
After experimenting, we seem to have determined that when flying the drone in ComeHome but NOT Carefree, the drone will basically fly the course keeping it's existing orientation. So for example, if you point the nick due north and then enter CH, it will fly the waypoints with the nick due north for the duration. So for our purposes, we will align the Movi perpendicular to the waypoint course (we fly grid) using the Controller in Dynamic and then initiate CH on the TX for the drone. Should do the trick. Curious Dave - do you set your waypoint flights to have a WP Event at every interval you need a photo, or do you set the A and B points and ask MK FC to fire the camera every X meters along the path? Since the Navi is limited to 100 waypoints with the commercial license, this could potentially be a limiting factor for a waypoint every point we need a photo. TBD. MK Tool OSD is a wee bit clunky to use, I must admit. We are building two 2M fixed-wing prototypes for survey flying based on the PixHawk - using Mission Planner with a direct link to the PixHawk is so much better. Hopefully Holger is listening.
Success with waypoint flying and camera triggering on each waypoint today using firmware 2.10 - nice. Question - the GPX logs have changed a bit with the new firmware and we can no longer determine which row in the data set represents a camera trigger. Anyone figure that out?
Yup. I'm using MK_GPXTOOL 1.5.5 and it cannot handle this format of GPX file. May I send your GPX file to Franco Scapin, the author of MK_GPXTOOL? In the interim, you might want to use the MK GPX Viewer program. http://wiki.mikrokopter.de/en/SimpleGpxViewer Andy.
Thanks. You may need to post on forum.mikrokopter.de regarding the camera trigger -- it might be in one of the "flag" fields so it's less than obvious. Andy.