ModalAI Forum

@griffin
To extend the wires, you only need to solder splice the correct length of extra wire.

I'm looking into our custom version being available to you. Probably won't have an answer until the morning

@Shivam-Sehgal
The glue is an easy to remove RTV silicone adhesive. If you follow the instructions posted by Alex, you should be successful. I've done this myself a couple of times.

After removing you will need to clean away as much of the remaining glue on the voxl2 as possible before installing the new adapter board. You don't necessarily need to apply glue when installing the new board, but we find it helps with keeping the adapter from accidentally teetering at the hirose connector.

Please let me know if you need further help with this matter

@griffin
For Starling MAX, the correct motor is the 2203.5 1500kv.

Did you order them from us? We customize the length of the wires for the Starling MAX specifically, so an "off the shelf" version of that Tmotor will have shorter wires.

@Judoor-0

We apologize for the delayed response. I'd like to get your problem resolved quickly. To help facilitate this, could you please send me your original order number? This will help determine the correct motor to send as a replacement.

I'll await your responses and get things moving for you as quickly as possible

@rohitpillai Good morning,
@Vinny filled me in on your issue and I wanted to check in with you on the status. You mentioned coming by the office and so I also wanted to discuss that option with you. Ease let me know if you're still interested in doing that.

Thanks!

@kitkatSG
Good morning, We can prepare a px4 parameter file for you that will reset the tune. First could you send us a px4 parameter file from your drone? You can send it directly to my email (jeremy.schmidt@modalai.com)

I'll take a look to make sure I send you everything you'll need.

Thanks

@rohitpillai

Good morning,

As long as you complete our online form then we have no problem with you dropping it off to us since you're local.

@alfa-budiman And I would also suggest going back into QGC and configuring the PWM related params back to their defaults. Once the polarity of the PWM's are correct, you should be able to calibrate successfully.

@alfa-budiman Good morning, please try reversing all six pwm connections coming from the escs to the breakout board.
Your photo shows them plugged in with incorrect pinout.
This will definitely cause all of the problems you're describing. Thanks and good luck.

@Slade-Villena

Is it possible? Yes, but we highly discourage modifying our Sentinel platform in this way as we have not built it for these purposes. May I ask how much additional payload mass you're wanting to add?

@Slade-Villena The Voxl2 flight deck is the only payload that we've configured the Sentinel drone for and tested for. We don't recommend a specific additional payload type or weight because we haven't tested for it but of course the customer is always welcome to modify their drone as they want. With that said, the maximum additional weight that the Sentinel should be able to lift in it's default configuration is around 1.3 kg.

@Jagatpreet-Singh-Nir

We ship the Sentinel configured to fly outdoors using GPS positioning so that may be the reason for VIO not working for you. All you should have to do is load our EKF2 indoor/vio params. I'll drop a link to where you can find all relevant param files and helper files such as the ekf2_indoor_vio.params that you need.

Files · master · voxl / VOXL SDK / Utilities / voxl-px4-params · GitLab

PX4 parameter files for use on VOXL2 and Flight Core

GitLab (gitlab.com)

Please let us know if this helps

@Jimk_Aero

Sorry so hear that you're still having problems. The built-in BEC shouldn't be required for basic use case. Unless you're trying to power some other on-board electronics/avionics with the BEC.

All you should need is the "power in" to all 4 esc's from a PDB and then signal and ground from esc's to flight core J7, via the breakout board.

Modalai's breakout board was designed for PWM signals only and works well in that regard. Also check to make sure that DSHOT_CONFIG
is set to "disable"

Here's some notes from our board designer to clarify.

The primary design intent was to be used with a distribution board for power

It is actually unsafe for these types of pin headers to have exposed voltages on them

We wanted to prevent some customers from accidentally installing two BEC generators on these blocks which occur all the time in other hobbyist forums/kits and customers end up damaging their BEC modules.

We apologize we did not make it clearer this is just a breakout board and not a BEC distribution block.

Our PWM breakout board does not have the positive rail connected.

@Todd-Humphreys

Hi Todd,

I believe they are replacing them with almost identical motors but with a slightly higher KV value. If you can source those then they would be a drop in replacement.

If you're interested in something else, then here's some that I've tested before. The only thing is you'd need to solder the 3 male 2mm bullet connectors onto each motor. Otherwise they're drop in replacements.
https://usa.banggood.com/Racerstar-Racing-Edition-2216-BR2216-810KV-2-4S-Brushless-Motor-For-350-380-400-450-RC-Drone-FPV-Racing-p-1083206.html?utm_source=googleshopping&utm_medium=cpc_organic&gmcCountry=US&utm_content=minha&utm_campaign=minha-usg-pc&currency=USD&cur_warehouse=CN&createTmp=1&ID=521309&utm_source=googleshopping&utm_medium=cpc_bgcs&utm_content=sandra&utm_campaign=sandra-SSC-usg-sku-1019-xp-cvrcart-11sale-21&ad_id=554267045258&gclid=CjwKCAiAjoeRBhAJEiwAYY3nDF7t6brTndAN6m0qocX3YTDihgCK1dw6y2-u2YtW9OWuC_Xq_bipZxoCnv8QAvD_BwE

@rohitpillai
Hi,

The drone not arming can be caused by many different things. Did QGC print out an error when trying to arm? That error will help us narrow down the problem.

If there was no error then you could be having a problem with a bad calibration on either the Spektrum controller side or the esc side. Check that you don't have an "emergency kill switch" enabled. What airframe and esc's are you using?

If you could send us a fresh log while this is happening and your px4 parameters that would be very helpfull.

Thanks

@umlr ,

Are your camera calibration files missing from the drone?

If you ADB shell into the flight deck and then cd data/modalai
Then do you see 5 ".yml" files?

I would first test functionality of the voxl-flight in terms of being able to both ADB into the voxl and connect to QGC.

If all goes well with that then I'd check the px4 firmware version on the flight core side and no matter what it's at currently I'd go ahead and re-flash with our latest px4 firmware which is obtainable via our downloads.

This link should contain all information and relevant links to complete this update of the firmware.

Flight Core Firmware

ModalAI technical documentation for VOXL and VOXL 2 Companion Computers for PX4 and ArduPilot Obstacle Avoidance and GPS-denied navigation, assembled in the USA

ModalAI Technical Docs (docs.modalai.com)

Hello,

You shouldn't need to calibrate those esc's as long as you have "Dshot" enabled in the QGC parameters.

The parameter you're looking for is "DSHOT_CONFIG"

Enable the dshot speed that best fits your ESC specs and after that you'll want to verify all motor ordering and directions before flight.

Here's a link with more information https://docs.px4.io/master/en/peripherals/dshot.html

Hi,

Do you already have the new firmware downloaded? If so, power up the drone with usb connected.
Connect to QGC and navigate to the firmware tab.

At this point you want to power cycle the drone and when it comes back up in QGC you should see the window pop up which allows you to choose which firmware to select.

I believe our videos will show you the rest of the process. Let me know if you run into problems.