Roboteq Driver

[Mike Purvis]

Hey folks,

We've got a pretty solid C++ driver for the Roboteq motor drivers which has been developed for Grizzly:

https://github.com/g/roboteq

There are some grizzly-isms in it at the moment, but if there's interest in having it on ros-drivers, I can work to make it suitably generic.

Other drivers which we'd consider moving if there's interest include:

https://github.com/clearpathrobotics/um6

https://github.com/clearpathrobotics/mocap_optitrack

https://github.com/clearpathrobotics/axis_camera (also needs a new maintainer)

Mike

[Jack O'Quin]

Seems useful. 

You want to add it to ros-drivers? You will continue to maintain it?

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "ROS Drivers Special Interest Group" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to ros-sig-drive...@googlegroups.com.
To post to this group, send email to ros-sig...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/ros-sig-drivers/c4a893f4-5e5d-458d-ac21-5a413f7fa761%40googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.

--
 joq

[Mike Purvis]

The roboteq and um6 packages will be maintained for the lifespan of the Grizzly product.

Unfortunately, I can't make the same commitment for the other two.

Mike

[Jack O'Quin]

On Thu, Dec 5, 2013 at 11:04 AM, Mike Purvis <mpu...@clearpathrobotics.com> wrote:

The roboteq and um6 packages will be maintained for the lifespan of the Grizzly product.

Unfortunately, I can't make the same commitment for the other two.

Mike,

I don't think anyone actually decides what does not go into ros-drivers. I guess any of us with admin authorization can add things. Your opinion is probably as good as any of ours. 

But, it's worthwhile discussing criteria. My personal feeling is that drivers that are generally useful to the ROS community and actively maintained are welcome. But, we really don't want ros-drivers filling up with unmaintained packages. 

+1 So I would vote "yes" for the roboteq and um6. 

What about axis-camera? We use it at UTexas, although not much. I have worked on it and could probably take over maintenance if that makes sense. But, I am not especially looking for extra work right now. ;-)

What is your sense of that driver? Is it useful? Is the performance in Python good enough? Are there better alternatives? Why are you dropping support? 

--
 joq

[Mike Purvis]

+1 So I would vote "yes" for the roboteq and um6.

Okay, we'll talk amongst ourselves at CPR and figure out the best timeline (ie— now, for i-turtle, etc).

 

What about axis-camera? We use it at UTexas, although not much. I have worked on it and could probably take over maintenance if that makes sense. But, I am not especially looking for extra work right now. ;-)

What is your sense of that driver? Is it useful? Is the performance in Python good enough? Are there better alternatives? Why are you dropping support?

We ship Axis cams as a Husky accessory, so it will continue to receive the minimum required to keep it operational for that purpose. We're not dropping support so much as acknowledging that we never properly supported it in the first place.

One of our customers has pushed some fixes to gscam which actually make it possible to stream MJPEGs via that driver, so I suspect that the future of the axis_camera package is to become some launcher stubs and the PTZ-control node.

Mike

[Jack O'Quin]

Makes sense. Probably no need to move it into ros-drivers, then. 

--
 joq

[Alena Kazakova]

Hello, I am new to ROS (just finished the tutorials) and I am using a Roboteq BLDC motor controller for an autonomous car project. 

Could you please provide some guidelines on how to use the driver? I could not find any solution on my own. 

Please let me know if there are any hints of how to make it more generic for my project. 

Thank you,

Alena

[Mike Purvis]

Hi Alena,

The main issue is all the motor control constants hard-coded into the microbasic script:

https://github.com/g/roboteq/blob/indigo-devel/roboteq_driver/mbs/script.mbs

Since you have to compile this to hex using the vendor tool, it's tricky to genericize. But you're obviously welcome to fork the driver and adjust them to your needs (recompiling as required). Alternatively, a version of the hex could be made with sentinel values which get replaced by values passed with rosparam.

Mike

--

You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "ROS Drivers Special Interest Group" group.

To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to ros-sig-drivers+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.
To post to this group, send email to ros-sig-drivers@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/ros-sig-drivers/345fb478-9319-4330-b684-83a172a82677%40googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.

[Alena Kazakova]

Hi Mike,

I have already read your notice that the script should be generated using the Roboteq PC utility. So this is only a part of my problem. Hopefully, Roboteq provides enough resources for me to be able to modify the micro basic script. 

I have been trying to figure out how to use Roboteq SBL1360 for a while now and could not succeed with serial communication (I believe due to some issues that have to do with RS232 to TTL converter module).

Meanwhile I was getting acquainted with ROS and found your driver on GitHub but still no success. What I do not understand as a ROS newbie is how to use the driver to control my motor from Jetson TK1 (Ubuntu 14.04). 

If you could shortly explain or give me any pointers to other resources where I can learn about it I will be extremely grateful. I have Googled about it (maybe I am not entering the right keywords) and tried to look at Grizzly codes but still have no idea where to start.  

Thank you for your fast reply,

Alena

On Monday, February 13, 2017 at 10:38:38 AM UTC+9, Mike Purvis wrote:

Hi Alena,

The main issue is all the motor control constants hard-coded into the microbasic script:

https://github.com/g/roboteq/blob/indigo-devel/roboteq_driver/mbs/script.mbs

Since you have to compile this to hex using the vendor tool, it's tricky to genericize. But you're obviously welcome to fork the driver and adjust them to your needs (recompiling as required). Alternatively, a version of the hex could be made with sentinel values which get replaced by values passed with rosparam.

Mike

On 12 February 2017 at 19:32, Alena Kazakova <alena...@gmail.com> wrote:

Hello, I am new to ROS (just finished the tutorials) and I am using a Roboteq BLDC motor controller for an autonomous car project. 

Could you please provide some guidelines on how to use the driver? I could not find any solution on my own. 

Please let me know if there are any hints of how to make it more generic for my project. 

Thank you,

Alena

On Friday, November 29, 2013 at 5:18:04 AM UTC+9, Mike Purvis wrote:

Hey folks,

We've got a pretty solid C++ driver for the Roboteq motor drivers which has been developed for Grizzly:

https://github.com/g/roboteq

There are some grizzly-isms in it at the moment, but if there's interest in having it on ros-drivers, I can work to make it suitably generic.

Other drivers which we'd consider moving if there's interest include:

https://github.com/clearpathrobotics/um6

https://github.com/clearpathrobotics/mocap_optitrack

https://github.com/clearpathrobotics/axis_camera (also needs a new maintainer)

Mike

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "ROS Drivers Special Interest Group" group.

To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to ros-sig-drive...@googlegroups.com.
To post to this group, send email to ros-sig...@googlegroups.com.

[Shubham Bidkar]

Hello, This is Shubham Bidkar.I am currently working on Roboteq's Brushless motor driver SBL1310. I have built a robot on which SBL1310 motor drivers are mounted. I have connected 4 motor drivers on CAN bus,one of them is master node and other are slave nodes. I am already aware that for using SBL1310 motor driver,microbasic script should be generated.I have installed ROS kinetic on my processor kit which will be responsible for controlling motor drivers.Since,I am new to ROS I do not have much idea regarding the usage of packages for ROS. Can I get a detailed document or guidelines regarding using the package for SBL1310 motor driver. Thanking you in Anticipation.