Well, now I’m really confused. The motors never armed again after it flipped. The antenna is on one of those
foldable mounts. It landed on its top and the mount collapsed, I did not see it at the time but the cable got pinched
pretty bad. I only tried a couple of times though.
Today I went in and was making sure of my modem switching and I noticed that the sensors were out of whack.
What should of been level showed an extreme tilt in wingui flight deck. Also the compass was all off.
I would point it east and it would say southwest. And the motors would not arm so I figured it was because the
drone did not think it was level.
That’s when I found the crimped wire to the gps antenna. I did try recalibrating several times but it would not track
Suggestions now? So the mag sensor may be damaged?
There might be mixed things in your issues.
Please attach a print-screen of your “Modes” as they are at the moment, with your Transmitter open.
The compas on the first page/tab show the calculated value which is usually the MAG sensor itself.
However if you have a GPS mode enabled it can use the GPS value as well which might give you false results.
I did have a gps mode enabled. After your last post where you mentioned stability can be challenging without some modes I went in and had it enabled on every position of one switch. So it would have been engaged as you described.
At this point I know there is an issue with the gps antenna, you can see the separated wire through the split insulation. So let’s fix that problem first. I will go in and make sure it’s in acro and see if the mag sensor behaves. I’ll report further.
Thanks again Eric, appreciate you hanging with me. Now I’ve got a bad esc on my qav540…wasn’t the motor after all…I had ordered some 50a emax from a popular Chinese web site. Im wondering if they were genuine…
So I was going in to take a screen shot of the modes. I noticed now that all the sensors shown in the flight deck tab appear to be oriented. I have a gps antenna on order so that will be replaced soon.
So the I go to the rc page and now I notice that when I change a control on my radio it is reflected in the computer but it responds very slow, partially and/or not at all. For example I have a two position switch on aux1 and it’s only used to arm the motors. It may be low at 1000, then I push the switch high. It might take several seconds (> 10s) to move and then in might not make it all the way to 2000. It might stop at 1200, 1600, wherever…it’s not constant. So I played around with that for a while…nada.
Disconnect from the USB and I cannot get the motors to arm. Nice level surface, confirmed level when it was connected to wingui. The arm switch does not work nor does the stick movement. It’s not armed since the last flip a couple of days ago.
I will get some screen shots but I had to walk away as I was getting ready to test the drone by dropping it from a very tall height…without a battery, not that it matters here…
Charging the dx8 helped. The voltage as reported by the radio increased from 5v to 5.5v and apparently made a difference. It feels like the unit may need a new battery as I had a fresh charge on Sunday and by Monday night it was discharged. Not a lot of on time during that period.
Anyway here are some screen shots. More than you asked for but maybe they’ll help. Thank you so much for your help
Thanks for the pictures.
The first thing to set will be the modes as there are way too many there.
Angle and Horizon are never used at the same time. The Horizon mode is the latest and unless you really want to use the Angle always use Horizon.
You also activate the same modes with two different AUX which is not right.
AUX1: Will control the basic modes (stabilisation) with or without height (BARO) control
AUX2: Kept the ARM function on a High value
AUX3: GPS functions best on a 3ways switch
[blockquote]
LOW: LAND and BEEPER
MIDDLE: Nothing
HIGH: GPS HOLD and BEEPER
[/blockquote]So when you fly:
]Flip AUX2 to arm the copter/:m] ]Takeoff with the AUX1 set to LOW[list=1] ]Once in flight you can trigger AUX2 to HIGH if you want to keep altitude with the Barometer/:m]/:m] ]To land you can flip the AUX3 to LOW/:m] ]To keep the GPS position you can flip the AUX3 to HIGH/:m][/list:o]
Hope it clear things a bit ?
I think we made progress. At first the motor arming just didn’t seem to work right, seemed sometimes the motors started and sometimes they did not. The motors would not turn it mag or acro but spun so fast at idle that the drone almost flipped.
So I went in and lowered min throttle to the lowest value. The props are off now but on the bench everything sure acted way more normal than it had. So maybe we are getting close! The props continue to spin in baro mode at low throttle but I suspect that is normal. If I pick up the drone and move it up and down, tilt it, etc you can tell the motors are trying to adjust.
I got everything together and it’s going to fly. I had it in my basement and just barely touched the throttle and it was in the ceiling. Is there a way to adjust the throttle so there is a lower throttle range in the first half of its travel and more later? I’d like it a little less aggressive taking off. Not a lot I know it’s not a slow flyer …
But it’s exciting. The amount of power this has is incredible and that’s with a 4s battery…
Thanks Eric, before I came back to this post I did what I should have done in the first place, read the manual and scan some forums. I learned that in the Spektrum dx8 there isn’t the usual expo for a stick control. Rather you can set up to three or four different curved, each with five points and select different curves with a switch. That sounds great for me as I can really tame the drone down or make it as aggressive as I can stand. The “expo” for the throttle simply smooths the curve between points so it’s no as twitchy.
However you gave me new information, i.e. To do it through wingui. Thanks. I’ll have to play with that to see what best meets my needs.
Again, I so appreciate your patience with this “old newb”. You have made what has been a terribly frustrating experience at times a rewarding one…and we are not done.
Somebody really needs to write a “Drones for Dummies” book. There is a complete lack of cognizable information out there for beginners, especially old ones like me…I’m 61 years old…
Most of the time “companies” try to show how easy it is to use / setup a new drone but in real they are not.
Since the “frame” change a lot and even electronics, there are things to tweak for each platforms.
Some controllers like the DJI NAZA will give you a smoother experience with highly stabilized platform.
However you still have to tweak it a little and it will not fly as “free” as a MultiWii for example. And platforms like the VTail are not supported…
I think I changed a couple of settings, the min_command, min_throttle and max_command in doing some experimentation. Instead of posting settings and going back and forth, is there a real basic explanation about these settings and what they do? Something descriptive like “if you set the min_throttle lower the props will start to spin earlier as you advance your throttle”…something like that…
Sure they are all explained in the FCT user manual.
Also, the “not arming” is vague as there is also a setting to allow the propellers to spin when arming or not in the FCT called “Motor Stop” so make sure it’s set right for what you want when you arm.
Well finally got it outside. Everything was all set. I slowly throttled up, it rose nice and gently to about 4 feet, gave it a little more throttle and it violently rolled 3 or 4 times sideways before crashing to the ground and breaking the tail. What a bummer.
On a positive note, my QAV540 which I’ve been working on forever flew flawlessly. A lot faster and smoother than I expected as well. So the day was not a total disaster…
I’ll get back in here after I get a replacement tail. I don’t even want to talk about this thing right at the moment…
Violent roll to a side without any “input” from the user might but a problem with a motor and/or propeller which come off the copter.
Hart to say once it’s on the ground…
No, if you want to see pix of it now I can get them too you. I have not started to disassemble the drone. There is a broken prop that I’m quite sure happened from hitting the ground…next time, after I replace the destroyed parts, I’ll video the process. I should have done it this time…
