Perfect first AQ flight -- it was all worth it!

[Max]

The subject pretty much says it all... you can skip down to the picture if you want!

Great test flight weather this morning with very still air. I'm flying a home-made Y6 which has already proven itself very stable with another flight controller, so the only new/different thing on it is the AQ. I had already verified basic functionality with a quick (and careful) hand-held indoor test, so I knew I had the controls right at least. I did have to reverse my elevator, which was a bit unexpected (now the radio output value goes down when I push the stick up) since I'm pretty sure the mixing table is correct.

I armed it outside once it showed a 3D lock and fired it up. It flew PERFECT. Totally level w/out any trim needed, excellent control response on every axis (including yaw, and no overshooting), and great auto-leveling response (when letting go of roll/pitch controls). It did absolutely nothing unexpected. And this is all with default PID settings! I changed nothing past the "final setup" part of the documentation. Wow!

I engaged position hold, and it did the "throttle-down and drop a bit" thing... dropped maybe half a meter before it caught itself and rose back again. But since I've read about it, I wasn't very surprised (just a little ). Then it locked into position and just stuck there like glue. Super smooth! No jerking around to stay in place or wondering off and drifting back. Granted there was no wind... but still very impressive. It held altitude great as well, although I think I have to increase my deadband setting a bit because it was tricky to get it to not climb or descend slightly. But again the alt. hold was steady, no jumping up/down like a yo-yo.

And finally "DVH" (or is it now?) is a treat. Just raise or lower the throttle to slowly ascend/descend... brilliant. I even let it land on the grass and it detected the touchdown perfectly and shut down the motors.

I expected to need some, or maybe a lot, of tuning to get to this point, so this is a very pleasant surprise. Some basic mission testing will be next I guess, or maybe the gimbal first.... ahh decisions...

Thanks to everyone for their help, and of course Bill and the crew for the great FC!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0QE11zKm8io


-Max

[GoFaster]

Woohoo..congrats Max, another AQ in the air!
My hand held test also revealed that pitch control had to be reversed.

Another Evo flyer I see

[Max]

Thanks Felix! She's a pleasure to fly.
I did notice that about the elevator in your maiden report post, which reassured me
Yea they'd have to pry the Evo out of my dead hands... haha.. well, until something better comes along that I can afford, anyway!

A few pics of my snake's den and "unconventional" groundplane. Fully stabilized onboard video hopefully coming soon.

-Max

[kinderkram]

Congratz, Max!
Nice looking Y6 - now for a flight video.

I'd suggest to start with simple RTH games first before you try waypoints. Try it at different altitudes and distances to see if she's overshooting or behaving strange.
That way you'll find out if the home point is properly set and if it climbs/dives or whatever...

I'm sure your motor mixing table, parameter file and PIDs will be of interest for others. Could you please attach them here? Thx in advance.

Happy flying to y'all!

[Max]

Thankz!

Good point about RTH, forgot about that. Will be trying that soon. I've been monitoring the GPS position using the Android GS (via BT), and so far it's been dead-on.

I did post my motor mix table here viewtopic.php?f=33&t=731 (which I'll update to confirm working).

But I have a question regarding that -- I believe I got the negative/positive pitch grouping right (negative for the 2 motors in the back and positive for the 4 in the front), but I had to reverse my elevator control so that in QGC Setup -> Radio -> Radio Value I now get negative values when I push the elevator forward, and vice-versa. Which seems counter-intuitive to me. Which way should the radio values move in regards to stick direction?

-Max

[Max]

RTH works great! Wow! No overshoot, very smooth arrival at home position. Like it's on rails. Especially with how it first yaws around to be tail-in on the way back, and then sets out with a purpose. Impressive, to say the least!

Altitude hold isn't quite perfect... and sometimes it slowly drops down a significant amount before recovering, but that's rare. I do have foam over the baro and of course the dome. Not really sure how the dome affects the air pressure readings... will try w/out it (carefully!).

And the cut-over from manual to PH mode is still rather dramatic (lots of revving up and down quickly to maintain altitude)... gotta work on that.

-Max

[GoFaster]

Is your hover throttle close to 50%?
I think your dome, unless completely airtight, along with the foam is a great way to dampen out rapid pressure fluctuations.

I haven't figured out RTH yaw yet. Mine seems to first yaw to original yaw heading when HomePos was set before coming home. Trying to understand it along with the yaw angle setting so I can have the thing point nose first while coming home.

[Max]

Yea hover is around 50%, a bit less with my lighter set of batteries. I logged a smooth flight and will be checking on the throttle value to set that hover throttle setting better. BTW the foam still makes a big difference, even inside the dome. And... I LOVE the logging feature. The spikes in the first graph correspond with very choppy alt. hold performance.

Well, come to think of it, it would have been yawing around to the original "home" orientation. In my test that would have been tail-in as well. Guess I'll need to test some more... bummer!

-Max

[Max]

A bit too rainy to fly today, so I put together this 4.5m video, shot yesterday. Just some short-range RTH testing, a little P/A hold, and some manual mode flying. Not very exciting and won't win any production awards but it gives a decent feel for how mine flies.

Caveat emptor: The best camera operator I could get on short notice was my 12 year old daughter... who has never done this before. So it's not the smoothest video in the world, and some cuts had to be a bit harsh. I might have to get hear a Steadicam for her next birthday... LOL Oh and don't mind the sound track fading out sometimes... i wanted to keep the motor sounds but not subject you to most of the inane dialog.



Enjoy,
-Max

[Max]