Ardupilot Arm Switch

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Celena Angolo

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Aug 3, 2024, 5:20:06 PM8/3/24

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(Copter) Optionally check the Simple Modecheck-box for that switch position. You canoptionally set Super Simple mode.If both Simple mode and Super Simple mode checkboxes are checkedSuper Simple will be used.

If you want to just support three modes (using a three position switch)then you would configure the transmitter to produce PWM pulse widths of1165, 1425, and 1815 us for the respective switch positions.

Simply toggle through the modes on your transmitter and confirm that thePWM for the selected channel matches the required PWM values. Thescreenshot below assumes that the flight mode channel is set to Radio 5.

Simply select two switches (one must be three position) and add these mixes on the appropriate flight mode channel used for your vehicle. The example below shows it for a plane using Channel 8 for flight mode (default) and using switch SB selecting three flight modes with SA switch up , and selecting an additional three flight modes via SB when SA is not in the up position.

Ethernet is quickly becoming the go-to communication bus for drones and robots, and is starting to see more widespread adoption into the Ardupilot ecosystem. To make achieving ethernet communication backbones in Ardupilot systems easier, BotBlox has release SwitchBlox Ardupilot.

SwitchBlox Ardupilot is a modified version of our 5 port 10/100Mbps ethernet switch, SwitchBlox, that uses the 4 pin JST-GH 1.25, for easy connectivity to other Ardupilot compatible hardware.

When used with our Ardupilot Cable Adapter and the included cable set, SwitchBlox Ardupilot can be used with all available Ardupilot hardware that currently uses ethernet.

Newly released Ardupilot devices are starting to see 10/100BASE-TX (10/100Mbps ethernet) incorporated for high speed communications with more advanced sensors. Connecting all these devices together in a drone requires the use of an ethernet switch. SwitchBlox Ardupilot is designed to provide this functionality in an incredibly compact (1.75 inch x 1.75 inch) square, at a low cost and with minimal setup required.

SwitchBlox Ardupilot also has a 5V 2A output for powering small nearby devices. This 5V input can also be used as an auxilliary 5V input to supply the board. Make sure to only use either the 8-60V input OR the 5V Auxilliary input, but not both at the same time.

Note, SwitchBlox Ardupilot automatically detects incorrectly connected RX/TX pair and polarity mismatches with a connected device, and will correct its own port connections in this case. This process (part of the ethernet autonegotiation functionality) means you can use a straight or crossover cable, and don't need to worry if you misconnect the polarities of the ethernet signals.

For power input, SwitchBlox Ardupilot is designed to have power wires soldered directly to the power pads. Alternatively, a 3.5mm pin pitch screw terminal can be soldered to the pads for a more easily removable connection. We recommend the 284391-2 from TE Connectivity for this screw terminal

A 5V, 2A supply is available on SwitchBlox Ardupilot when powered from the power input connector. To run SwitchBlox Ardupilot from an external 5V rail, the board's internal DCDC regulator can be bypassed by supply 5V directly into this connector. This can only be done when no voltage is connected to the main power input connector.

Ethernet Switch management control signals are available on pins 2 and 3, which allows direct access to the control registers inside the ethernet switch. These signals are connector to solder jumpers JP1 and JP2 on the board, which are unsoldered by default. To use MDIO and MDC, these two jumpers have to be soldered.

Ethernet's adoption in the Ardupilot ecosystem is not yet standardized, which means different manufacturers use different connectors and pinouts for ethernet. To help solve this problem, we have developed a universal adapter board that is designed to convert between connector and pinout types for the majority of Ardupilot hardware.

On ArduPilot you can assign up to 6 different flight modes to a single channel of your transmitter (the channel is selectable on Plane, but fixed to channel 5 on Copter). ArduCopter also allows you to specify additional Channel Options for channels 7-12. These allow you to assign functions to these switches (for example, to turn on a camera, or return to launch).

Test that the modes are mapped to the right transmitter switches by selecting each mode switch on your transmitter in turn, and check that the desired flight mode is activated (the text turns yellow on QGroundControl for the active mode).

The ArduCopter screenshot above shows a typical setup for a three position flight mode switch with an additional option of RTL being on a channel 7 switch. You can also setup 6 flight modes using two switches plus mixing on your transmitter. Scroll down to the center section of this page for tutorials on how to do that.

You can run ArduPilot on Raspberry Pi 2, 3 or 4 with Navio2. The autopilot's code works directly on Raspberry Pi. For ArduPilot to work properly, use the configured Raspberry Pi OS distribution that we provide.

At this point, you should enter the right choices in the left menu corresponding to your vehicle and frame.Also, you need to decide whether you want to get ardupilot enabled on boot or not and start/stop it now.

Navio2 is supported in ArduPilot upstream and if want to build the binary yourself, please proceed to the Building from sources. Also, you can download the latest stable binary files from ArduPilot buildserver. To download arducopter binary, run the following:

Other than that the launching procedure, it is no different than the one described above. The only exception is that you need to use systemctl utility with ardupilot service instead of arducopter/arduplane/ardurover and use /etc/default/ardupilot for ARDUPILOT_OPTS modifications.

ArduPilot Firmware must be 4.1 or higher to run CRSF protocol. As with any serial-based receiver, you need to attach the TX/RX pads to a UART on your flight controller, then enable Serial RX in the corresponding UART in ArduPilot. In mission planner, you will need to go to the config tab -> parameter tree SERIALx_PROTOCOL = 23 (RCIN)RSSI_TYPE = 3 (ReceiverProtocol) our packet rate is different than CRSF packet rate, and ArduPilot will keep on reporting the mismatch, but recently they have an option to suppress the report. Currently ArduPilot provide a way to suppress this notification with the parameter below. (this will not cause any effect to RC link or telemetry Link.) RC_OPTIONS turn on Bit 9th which is "Suppress CRSF mode/rate message for ELRS systems".

ArduPilot default flight modes channel is channel 8, but ELRS 8 position channel is on channel 12 (in hybrid switch mode). you will need to set your handset to use channel 12 as flight modes and set ArduPilot parameter: FLTMODE_CH=12 if you are using Wide Switch mode (only available in ELRS V2 and above), you can use any channel for your 8 flight mode selection (beside channel 15 which is LQ and channel 16 which is RSSI).