trouble arming my quadcopter
Jim Coburn
Posts: 9
hi - not sure if this is the right place, but I just finished building my quadcopter and i'm trying to get it working. I have successfully downloaded new firmware to the hoverfly open board and now i'm trying to arm it. the board blinks green, I move the throttle to bottom left and it beeps once, I move it to the bottom right, and it beeps twice, but no red led's come on, and the board continues to blink green - which I assume means that it didn't arm. the contining green blinking is not covered in the hoverfly documentation. any suggestions? thanks, Jim
Comments
Also try setting your throttle trim to the lowest position.
I don't recall what the blinking lights mean. I just remember my quad had a purple light when it wouldn't arm. I remember now. I had trouble with the altitude hold switch being in the wrong position. I have several quads and I have a hard time keeping them straight in my mind. I've managed to have trouble getting each of them armed correctly initially.
There are lots of things to get straight with a quad but there are lots of us willing to help until you're airborne (and after).
I'm using the Spektrum 6 channel DX6i. the receiver came with it. I haven't tried to do much with the transmitter yet - i was hoping just to see if the props turned. I did set up the ESC's and the motors turned during that process (without the hoverfly board in the loop.) so i know i have connectivity and it appears i have control as far as the ESC's go. One question i do have on the ESC setup - the parallax manual says to set up the ESC with the setting for a LiPo battery, which is what i'm using (sold to me by Parallax). the hoverfly open manual says to set it to MetalHdy, regardless of LiPo or NiMh is being used. any suggestions - which manual to follow?
I don't see a purple flashing on the LED - only a green flashing, which i interpret as "ready to arm". so it's obviously not completing a step - which according to the hoverfly manual would be sensor calibration.
Jim
I've listed some ELEV-8 threads in post #10 of my index. I know there's discussion about the battery settings in one of those threads.
I think the DX6i may need it's gear channel throws adjusted. I think this is also mentioned in one of those threads. Don't worry about trying to read the really long threads. If you can't find what you need let us know and we'll help find the information for you.
Well, my vacation ended back in July before I could do anything more - so I'm still in the same place. That is, i can't get past arming the quad copter. I've decide after scrolling through the list you sent me that i would try another path. My understanding is the that the ELV-8 is open source code running on the Hoverfly/parallax board. where would that code be available? I'm a C programmer by vocation, so sorting through the code would - i assume - be useful.
thanks,
Jim
Jim,
While I do not own a ELEV-8, (yet), I don't think you should have these problems.
I would suggest you contact Parallax Tech Support on Monday. You may have a hardware issue that need replacing. They should be able to identify the problem in no time.
In post #3 you mentioned you having messed with the transmitter settings yet.
One of the first thing to try is setting your throttle trim all the way low. You also want to adjust your gear channel to the settings suggested in the documantation.
Kevin has sent you a PM regarding this issue.
thanks for your help and the phone conversation. it pushed me in the right direction and i've been able to arm and have the rotors turn. no flights yet, but that's a matter of time.
thanks again,
Jim
Duane,
you mentioned open source. do you have a link to source that could fly the ELEV-8?
thanks,
Jim
Jason has a couple of different quadcopter control projects going. Here's is code for the HoverFly Open.
If you click on Jason's name you can open his profile. From there you can find the threads he has started. This will probably lead you to his other flight control software efforts.
What are you able to do with your controller and your Elev-8? More so, when you power up your Quad and move the rudder stick full left--->full right--->center, what does the board do? Do you get a single beep when you move left and then nothing when you move right, or nothing at all? Any additional information that you can give me regarding what responses the board gives would be great.
When I move the rudder to the left and then right I get the one beep to the left then the two beeps to the right but the light is still blinking green.
I also get all the motors to beep while I do this procedure
When I connect the battery, I get purple blinking which is also trouble, but I check the connections of the channels and they are ok.
I use the Spektrum DX6i transmitter with the Gear switch to 0.
I don't know if the pictures are enough or helpful. Please let me know.
Nothing still?
Make sure your gear channel is set to NOR, not REV.
Still no solid green?
Change the rudder to 110% in both directions. At one point I noticed a Spektrum transmitter wasn't putting out a wide enough of a pulse range for the Hoverfly board to recognize it.
I'll check back.
- Ken
RC aircraft use the throttle for idling state. The throttle trim doesn't change the center position of the stick the way it trim works on the other channels.
I linked to a list of ELEV-8 threads in post #4 of this thread.
You might want to reword your title...I was thinking caliber or guage in response to "Trouble arming my quadcopter". ;<)
When I have the gear to 0 nothing happens, but when I put it to 1 I get solid green as if it is armed but nothing moves!
I will post the picture of the monitor screen asap.
Thanks everybody for your answers.
I'm using an Aurora radio and find that it must be on prior to powering up the quad for reliable arming. If the control board doesn't see zero throttle and a valid gain on the gear channel when it powers up it might not arm as you would expect.
I also found that the rudder endpoints must be at least 100% (I've never tried more, but I know less does not work).
-Russ
After a lot of try and error, I finally managed to arm the quad with the gear set to 1 and this happens only when I have the transmitter on, before I connect the quad to the battery.
So now I have my 4 rotors spinning and I will try to make it fly because the first time I tried I had a small accident (one propeller broken).
I will let you know for that!!
Thanks again for your help
Happy New Year! Glad to hear you have made progress. The transmitter on behavior is the same as I see - sounds normal. However, not sure what gear set to 1 means. It should be a percentage of the range from zero of channel 5. The gear sets the gain of the flight controller. Attached is my monitor screen. It is from an Aurora radio, not a Spektrum, but sounds like they may be similar. You can see that all channels are zero'd except for throttle and gain. The throttle is at -100% and gain is at 25%.
Good luck.