New Build: Baby Tricopter #2

[Kevin_Erik]

Is dRonin free?

[Kevin_Erik]

BTW the new Betaflight allows for Dynamic filtering, which allows you to drop all other forms of filtering. This greatly increases the responsiveness of the controls and this really helps with Tail-Wag in flight. Tail-Wag on the ground or near it is still an issue but considering that its fighting the ground effects its understandable.

[LitterBug]

Yes it’s opensource and can be found at dronin.org . I am using a non-stock fork that has most of Lauka’s TriFlight routines merged in.

Not a big fan of BetaFlight. I use it sometimes, but prefer dRonin.

[Kevin_Erik]

Litterbug,

So hows the Baby flying and have you converted it to 6S yet?

[LitterBug]

I’m not converting either of my baby tris to 6S, Just F80 1900kv on the Mini Tricopter and a couple new build 6S quads. It’s still indoor season here. Snow, wind, rain, bleh….. Have not had the Tris out in some time. New base release of dRonin is almost ready for release so I’ve been focusing on testing that with my quads.

Cheers!
LitterBug

[Kevin_Erik]

I’ve been looking into iNav considering that dRonin isnt friendly with my current FC. Do you have any experiance with this?

BTW, i found this battery online and think it would be great for any “Mini” 6S build. Tattu 1000mAh 22.2V 75C 6S https://www.getfpv.com/tattu-1000mah-6s-75c-lipo-battery.html

[LitterBug]

I played around with iNav a year or so ago on one of my FlexRC Owl 118mm quad Frames, but have not done anything with it recently. I may do more with it this year in some of my planes. For my larger quads, I will stick with PixFalcon and Naza. No plans to make my tricopters autonomous.

Hard to go wrong with Tattu batteries… I’ve killed two via hard impacts, but they didn’t puff or explode. Just drained them and retired them rather taking a chance on using obviously physically damaged batteries.

Cheers!
LitterBug

[LitterBug]

After the recent dRonin Wired firmware release, @jihlein has rebased and added the triflight routines to his MyDronin branch. This also adds hardware support for the RCExplorer F3FC flight controllers. Managed to build it on my dev box and test it on two frames tonight at an indoor fly.

5″ Baby Tri #2 F3FC: http://dronin.org/tunes#?key=ahFzfmRyb25pbi1hdXRvdG93bnIYCxILVHVuZVJlc3VsdHMYgICAmJqLwAgM

Think this one had TriFlight.7 beta2 on it before starting tonight. It was dropping into DFU mode in BF configurator and was not recognized by GCS either. Did this as a scratch install, then reloaded a previous (early july) TriRonin uav file from this frame with all the triflight config enabled. Re-did the ground and in-flight tailtunes, then did an autotune leaving tri routines enabled. All flights LOS in leveling/Horizon modes except in-flight tailtune. This one flew OK, but I need to do some work on the yaw pivot. There were some low frequency yaw oscillations on this one, and it is most likely due to binding in the pivot or servo. The pivot does not move freely and has some tight spots. Will do more testing on this frame only after fixing the yaw pivot oscillation issues.

Cheers!
LitterBug

[Kevin_Erik]

Question, has there been support added for the Matek F405-CTR controller ?
Unlike the F405-AIO, its a new card card not near the end of it’s life.

[LitterBug]

Kevin,
Matek has their own firmware support target. If their hardware mapping just happens to align with another controller that is supported by dRonin, you could take advantage of the other controllers firmware target. If Matek had interest in supporting their hardware with dRonin, that would be on them to do so. If one of the dRonin developers decided to add support, that would work too. But if I were to look for an F4 FC supported on dRonin, In order, it would be with an AirDTF Seppuku, Omnibus F4 variant (no SD card), or possibly the BrainFPV RE1. Support for both firmwares would be with an Omnibus F4 variant or possibly the BrainFPV RE1.

But in all honesty, there is nothing wrong with F3FC or DTFc targets I’m using. The F3 targets I have don’t have CharOSD, so there are plenty of free CPU cycles and memory to handle everything I throw at them with no issues. If I wanted, I could even go full autonomous with the F3FC racing FC. I’ve even tested that on the F3FC Racing by adding an I2C baro, I2C compass, and serial GPS.

I’m really grateful that both FCs support both TriFlight and dRonin so I can compare both firmwares, on the exact same hardware, back to back if I want. I have @david, @lkaino, and @jihlein and probably others to thank for this. @david for developing/marketing all these great frames FCs, PDBs, Servos etc…, @lkaino has done great work for improving the handling of tricopters, and @jihlein has done a good deal of work integrating those Tricopter routines into dRonin, Added F3FC support to dRonin, and added servo feedback support on the DTFc. (which did not have a free analog input such as RSSI so he remapped the LED out which was capable of ADC input).

I stick with what works for me and I’m just giving my build progress, thoughts, feedback, and testing results here for this particular frame. Really only want to fly FPV with this build so don’t need a plethora of free uarts or other features.

Cheers!
LitterBug

[LitterBug]

Weather is finally starting to cooperate and have a new tail to test on BabyTri #2. Have @Terje’s new Baby ImposiTilt https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2869393 printed up and mounted and am playing with @jihlein’s dRonin based TriFlight merge branch.

Got an autotune in on dRonin http://dronin.org/tunes#?key=ahFzfmRyb25pbi1hdXRvdG93bnIYCxILVHVuZVJlc3VsdHMYgICAuNjWgwoM and the yaw appears to track much better than it has in the past.

Should be interesting to see if the other Baby Tri with the high speed servo does even better.

Cheers!
LitterBug

[Kevin_Erik]

What FC’s are valid for dRonin ?

[LitterBug]

I’m using the RCExplorer F3FC racing on my Baby Tricopters. Have the AirDTF DTFc on my larger tris. Am planning on building another Mini Tri with a AirDTF Seppuku. That way I can keep my F40 Mini Tri and have an F80 Mini tri too. :-D…. I would recommend one of those three for a tricopter, especially if you want to try the dRonin Tri branch.

Cheers!
LitterBug

[Kevin_Erik]

Took a look at the AirDTF Seppuku but didnt see anyting detail-wise that suggested what its max voltage is or much of anything else for that matter. Could’t even find an online version of its manual.

[Kevin_Erik]

I’ve ordered another Matek FC until I can find out more about the Seppuku. Currently the website for it i really lacking in details.

[Author]

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