VOXL Mini 4in1 ESC and VOXL 2

m4v3r

Hello,
I am trying to connect the aforementioned items to no avail.
I have connected the ESC's UART's TX, RX and GND to their corresponding pins on VOXL 2 "J18" and updated PX4 on the DSP to your 1.14 fork from the SDK v.1.1 repo and installed "voxl-esc" inside the VOXL 2 but if I run voxl-esc and try (1) which is "scan" it always comes out as "no ESCs detected".
The motors are giving off a little boop-beep when first powering up so I'm thinking it's not a hardware fault.
Am I doing something wrong or is that "VOXL Mini 4in1 ESC" just not compatible with the VOXL 2?
cheers and thanks for any pointers in the correct direction that I need to take here.
regards

m4v3r

@m4v3r Here's the console output that I'm seeing:

voxl2:~$ voxl-esc
Starting Wizard

What do you want to do?
1) scan              3) spin              5) upload_params
2) detect            4) upgrade_firmware
#? 1
enabling bridge
bridge enabled
Detected Python version : 3.6.9 (default, Mar 10 2023, 16:46:00)
[GCC 8.4.0]
Found voxl-esc tools bin version: 1.4
VOXL Platform: M0054
Detected RB5 Flight, VOXL2 M0054 or M0104!
INFO: Scanning for ESC firmware: /dev/slpi-uart-2, baud: 2000000
/usr/lib/libvoxl_io.so: undefined symbol: fc_sensor_set_library_name
INFO: Scanning for ESC firmware: /dev/slpi-uart-2, baud: 250000
/usr/lib/libvoxl_io.so: undefined symbol: fc_sensor_set_library_name
INFO: Scanning for ESC firmware: /dev/slpi-uart-2, baud: 921600
/usr/lib/libvoxl_io.so: undefined symbol: fc_sensor_set_library_name
INFO: Scanning for ESC firmware: /dev/slpi-uart-2, baud: 230400
/usr/lib/libvoxl_io.so: undefined symbol: fc_sensor_set_library_name
INFO: Scanning for ESC firmware: /dev/slpi-uart-2, baud: 57600
/usr/lib/libvoxl_io.so: undefined symbol: fc_sensor_set_library_name
INFO: Scanning for ESC firmware: /dev/slpi-uart-2, baud: 115200
/usr/lib/libvoxl_io.so: undefined symbol: fc_sensor_set_library_name
INFO: Scanning for ESC bootloader: /dev/slpi-uart-2, baud: 230400
/usr/lib/libvoxl_io.so: undefined symbol: fc_sensor_set_library_name
WARNING: No ESC(s) detected
successfully pinged ESCs
disabling bridge
bridge disabled
DONE

m4v3r

I just apt- and apt-get updated everything and ran the configuration scripts again (SKU and mpa) and while "voxl-esc" still does not detect anything I can now confirm spinning motors from QGroundControl's actuator tab.
Working as expected, only the script doesn't seem to detect anything.
Any ideas on why?

Eric Katzfey

@m4v3r Looks like the apt upgrade didn't work quite right as there is a clear mismatch of software versions. That is what is causing that undefined symbol error. Can you download the SDK 1.1.0 archive and use that to do a fresh install?

Eric Katzfey

@m4v3r https://developer.modalai.com/asset/2

m4v3r

@Eric-Katzfey Hey there. Thanks for looking into this.
I installed VOXL Suite 1.2.0 today and was able to talk to the ESC but then I tried to update the firmware (because motors would only spin very slowly regardless of throttle signal) . The flashing process went through on all 4 without any errors but now only two of the four are recognized anymore
The two ESCs that still show up say "Firmware version 39" and "Bootloader version 184" but the other two won't show up anymore.
They're still doing a startup tone on the motors but it's a different tune from the two that are showing up in software and it also says something about not all params match! and I'm just lost with all the versions right now.

Can you maybe tell me a stable combination of the system image and voxl suite versions that will run PX4 1.14 and be able to communicate with the 4in1 ESC on VOXL 2's "J18", please?
The flashing of the ESCs took place with system-image 1.5.5 and voxl-suite 1.2.0 using voxl-esc 1.3.8.

Messages I noticed, not specific to flashing but all around:
"WARNING: Received data from SLPI for unrecognized topic aggregation, discarding data"
"ID config CRC mismatch 60163 != 0"
"ERROR: Params for ID 0 are invalid"
...and so on.
Sorry if I sound confused but I really am.

Eric Katzfey

@m4v3r That link I sent gets you to the approved SDK installers. The latest is for SDK 1.1.2. Those are what you should use to update the system.

Alex Kushleyev

@m4v3r ,

I think the ESC params installation failed during an upgrade. Not a big deal. Here is a procedure you should follow to get your ESC to a good state. We have been improving the update process, so hopefully this does not happen in the future.

get the latest voxl-esc tools on your voxl2. You can clone directly to voxl2 or to your PC and copy to voxl2 if your voxl2 does not have internet access

git clone https://gitlab.com/voxl-public/voxl-sdk/utilities/voxl-esc.git -b dev

stop px4

systemctl stop voxl-px4

make sure you can scan / detect ESCs . Note that based on your current state, the script should find at least one ESC running at 57600 baud rate, which would mean the param install failed (57600 is the fall back baud rate). This is ok.

cd voxl-esc/voxl-esc-tools
./voxl-esc-scan.py

install the params based on your motor / propeller configuration or any custom ESC param that you created. This script should find all the ESCs even if they are running at different baud rates

./voxl-esc-upload-params.py --params-file <path_to_esc_params_file.xml>

install latest firmware (this script will auto detect the board and pick the correct firmware). Please note that if the ESCs are detected at different baud rates, that needs to be fixed with the correct params (command above). This script will not automatically find the ESCs running at different baud rates (we will fix this soon).

./voxl-esc-upload-firmware-all.sh

Then you can start px4 again if needed

systemctl start voxl-px4