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Garbage attitude control

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  • Patrick HincheyP Offline
    Patrick HincheyP Offline
    Patrick Hinchey
    Contributor
    wrote on last edited by
    #21

    Thank you for your insight everyone,

    We have an important milestone coming up in 2 weeks so we're going to use the external flight controller until then and then resume troubleshooting this issue after that - trying all the suggestions above.

    Thanks, see you in 2 weeks!

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    • X Offline
      X Offline
      xav04
      Contributor
      wrote on last edited by
      #22

      Hi, I have the same problem. I have VOXL 2 I/O and every time I try to take it off it wobbles and crashes. I have a quad x, I have done the ESC calibration and I have followed all the instructions. Is there any solution to this problem?

      Patrick HincheyP 1 Reply Last reply
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      • X xav04

        Hi, I have the same problem. I have VOXL 2 I/O and every time I try to take it off it wobbles and crashes. I have a quad x, I have done the ESC calibration and I have followed all the instructions. Is there any solution to this problem?

        Patrick HincheyP Offline
        Patrick HincheyP Offline
        Patrick Hinchey
        Contributor
        wrote on last edited by Patrick Hinchey
        #23

        @Chad-Sweet @xav04 I have had a chance to get our new ModalAI x T-motor F55A ESCs out of the box and plug them in. I can communicate with them over FTDI converter on my laptop, but the VOXL2 doesn't recognise them.
        There's not much troubleshooting I can do as the tutorial just says to plug it in and set the correct PX parameters. Do I remember correctly that I read somewhere the MAVLink console doesn't work on VOXL2? It certainly doesn't work on mine.
        The motors don't spin when I arm, and I'm not getting any telemetry info from them.
        I followed the tutorial for VOXL EXC V2. IS there anything special I need for the F55A?

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        • modaltbM Offline
          modaltbM Offline
          modaltb
          ModalAI Team
          wrote on last edited by
          #24

          Hey @Patrick-Hinchey I can get on the phone with you tomorrow if easier just let me know.

          It's likely the baud rate on the VOXL2 side that needs to be updated. There's a param UART_ESC_BAUD that by default is 250kbit

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          File not found · modalai/px4-firmware

          PX4 Autopilot Software. Contribute to modalai/px4-firmware development by creating an account on GitHub.

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          I believe the default baud on this F55A config is going to be 2Mbit (2000000 as the param).

          When you mentioned you are talkin' to them over FTDI, is this through the voxl-esc python tools?

          As for the MAVLink console, we don't have the plumbing going for some of the commands over the UDP link from QGC to VOXL2.

          That said, you can get to the nuttx like shell via command line if you SSH onto target or adb (captured here, as a work around )

          Patrick HincheyP 1 Reply Last reply
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          • modaltbM modaltb

            Hey @Patrick-Hinchey I can get on the phone with you tomorrow if easier just let me know.

            It's likely the baud rate on the VOXL2 side that needs to be updated. There's a param UART_ESC_BAUD that by default is 250kbit

            Link Preview Image
            File not found · modalai/px4-firmware

            PX4 Autopilot Software. Contribute to modalai/px4-firmware development by creating an account on GitHub.

            favicon

            GitHub (github.com)

            I believe the default baud on this F55A config is going to be 2Mbit (2000000 as the param).

            When you mentioned you are talkin' to them over FTDI, is this through the voxl-esc python tools?

            As for the MAVLink console, we don't have the plumbing going for some of the commands over the UDP link from QGC to VOXL2.

            That said, you can get to the nuttx like shell via command line if you SSH onto target or adb (captured here, as a work around )

            Patrick HincheyP Offline
            Patrick HincheyP Offline
            Patrick Hinchey
            Contributor
            wrote on last edited by
            #25

            @modaltb Sorry for not replying. Is there an option to set up email notifications?
            Yep I was talking to the ESC with voxl-esc python tools. And I believe it was indeed at 2Mbaud.

            We've decided to use the FlightCore V2 as the flight controller going forward, with VOXL2 acting only as companion computer. We may revisit this sometime in the future as a weight-reduction exercise, but not any time soon

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            • modaltbM Offline
              modaltbM Offline
              modaltb
              ModalAI Team
              wrote on last edited by modaltb
              #26

              OK thanks for the info, we are still looking at the main issue at hand in this thread still.... it's slow progress right now, but we will update here when I have positive movement to share.

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              • Patrick HincheyP Patrick Hinchey

                Hi,

                I have integrated the VOXL2 onto a standard carbon-fibre drone frame, roughly 400mm between diagonal motor mounts. This frame has been flown many times with Betaflight and Pixhawk flight controllers and always flies beautifully.

                The VOXL2 is performing awfully. I initially loaded on m500 PIDs and it couldn't even take off without shaking violently. I detuned the gains down to almost nothing before it would stop oscillating. I can coax the thing into the air now, but the gains are so low that disturbance rejection is terrible and it's just sloppy. It's impossible to tighten the gains without it shaking itself apart.

                I originally had the VOXL2 hard-mounted, but then I tired mounting it with 2 different levels of foam. Neither worked. Here's the kicker - I set it up to use a Pixhawk 4 as external controller and it flew b-e-a-utifully straight away on default PIDs.

                I have tried two different VOXLs and they both perform the same. The oscillations are present in both Stabilize and Acro mode, so the Rate loop is to blame.

                For context, I have 10 years of experience tuning PX4, Ardupilot and Betaflight controllers on aircraft from 20g to 200kg, so this isn't 'how do I tune the PIDs?', rather 'what am I missing?'.

                Normally when I see this kind of behaviour, it's caused by vibration, but looking at the 'vibe' meter on QGC, X and Y vibe is non-existant, and Z vibe about 5% of the clipping threshold.

                So what am I missing?

                We just completed a remote flight with telemetry controlled by the VOXL2 over VPN, I controlled it from 20km away so I'm pretty happy right now, but it would be even better if we could eliminate the external flight controller.

                Thanks,
                Patrick

                bensusanaB Offline
                bensusanaB Offline
                bensusana
                Contributor
                wrote on last edited by
                #27

                @Patrick-Hinchey
                hi patrick
                did you manage to solve the tune problem ?
                we king of facing same problem with our drone
                any help will be appreciate

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