19-Nov-2014 20:42, Adam D. Ruppe пишет:
I've been kinda wanting to build some kind of programmable aircraft ever
since watching DConf this year and now I'm thinking about actually doing
it.
What I'm envisioning is something like a quadcopter that we can program
to follow a pre-set course. Or something. A fun demo might be to set it
down in the school's gymnasium and set up a number of waypoints it
should hit autonomously.
Yeah, be prepared to find good big chamber for it. 3 meters tall at
least. No ropes or other stuff dangling around! Also catching the thing
may prove real hard, so soft floors would be awesome.
So nothing extraordinarily complex, but cool to
do yourself. (My motivation here is mostly just cuz I think it would be
cool, but the local school is considering doing some kind of programming
robotics thing too and I know a guy with influence on that so I might
pitch an idea to them as a student competition too)
You could start with some existing flight controller + chassis. The
combo is usually notoriously hard to tune, especially for the first
time. A good starting option would be to buy a ready to use kit and play
with it.
Or you can take it all piece-wise with any of OpenHardware/OpenSource
flight controllers like e.g. MultiWee. Stuff is actually cheap and
abundant on Chinese hobby stores.
For instance, controller:
http://www.hobbyking.com/hobbyking/store/__31138__Multiwii_and_Megapirate_AIO_Flight_Controller_w_FTDI_ATmega_2560_V2_0.html
And (picked randomly) simple but fine chassis:
http://www.hobbyking.com/hobbyking/store/__24291__Hobbyking_SK450_Glass_Fiber_Quadcopter_Frame_450mm.html
4 proper DC motors + 4 power drivers for each + 12 or more of propellers
(these get wasted real quick at first), lots of extras to wire it all
up. Make a good damn big red button to shut it down ;)
Then, of course, some remote is in order. Then WiFi/Bluetooth/ZigBee
etc. to talk with flight controller and program the thing. Well you see
where it goes from here :)
In any case even with ready-to-go kit buy some spare LiPo batteries, and
then some more. You can't get too many of these. Also buy good,
professional charger or you'll risk to see the beauty of LiPo going boom.
15 minutes of flight on one pack is typical number (depends on weight
and such of course). Charging a LiPo pack takes an hour at charging
rates I'm really not comfortable with (all the extra heat).
A ground robot would be nice too, heck that's the kind of thing I might
be able to build entirely myself with a few motors and an arduino or
something. But a flying drone just takes the coolness factor to the next
level.
Actually have a quite a bit of experience with land things. Been an
technician in a robotics lab. Oh, the cool stuff we did on a tight
budget;) We had one project (a competition) with quadrotor, it was kind
of cool and fully autonomous. We were inches away from the 1st place but
had lost :(
Have any off you ever thought about this kind of thing before? Any
suggestions on hardware or other tips to get started? Also, I don't want
to spend an enormous sum of money so keep budget in mind too.
Sure thing. I'd love to get back to robotics once I have some spare
time. In a year or so it seems ;)
As for budget the recipe goes - you either spend some more money or some
more time. Overall it's not too costly if you don't go fancy with
sensors, cameras and other cool extras.
--
Dmitry Olshansky
