APM 2.0 and ardustation for antenna Tracker

HI, I’m using APM2.0 on a raspberry pi, and seem to work just fine. The idea is get off the PC at field, so the raspberry seems to be a nice idea. The problem is that with APM 20, we lost the antenna tracker capability (by now) So in the meantime the tracker functionality returns to the APM, I tought I can use an ardustation 2.0 just for antenna tracking capabilities. My idea was to get the mavlink info from the Tx pin of the usb 3dr telemetry module and connect it to pin2 of the xbee zocket (with no xbee module, of course)
in this way, the APM 2.0 will work with the telemetry module in normal way, but the mavlink frames will go to the ardustation too in order move the antenna.
My question is: Do you think this can work? even in the case I dont connect the ardustation tx pin to anywhere?
Can yo suggest a better way to get antenna tracker to the apm 2.0? (except to to wait the antenna tracker functionality :slight_smile: )

Thanks in advance

Are you running APM Planner 2.0 on the RPi? I can help you enable MAVLink retransmission. Send me an email.

Hi billbonney, yes I have APM 2.0 working in an RPI Model B, it connects great with APM through the 3DR telemetry link and everything seems work fine… I wish to send you a PM, but seems I don’t have enough posts at this forum to allow me do that (sorry about that). May be if you send me a private I can answer it…

Thanks in advance!

Hi Chelio,

Glad I’m not the only person, working with a RPI based GS.

Mine works, but I notice things like the artificial horizon is slow to react, the RPI CPU is most running at 100%, I’m wondering if the RPI is the right platform ?

What are your experiences ?

What version of linux o/s are you using ?
I’m using debian wheezy, I keep it absolutely up-to-date and do with APM Planner. Many of my initial issues have been overcome, but I still struggling with resilience, after I connect to the APM in the plan via 3DR, the planner frequently freezes, does it for you ?

I haven’t yet been brave enough to test it at the field, witht the model in flight.

I guess we are doing this for the same reasons, I already started taking a small 10" screen for FPV to the field and a RPI seemed the natural progression for Arupilot displays.

Check out my posting in this forum for pictures of GS for testing.

Thanks

Andrew

Hi Andrew, yes I’m one of “those” Trying to make the APM working on the pi… (actually I had working a qgroundcontrol version working from last year, but never reach the flying field…
I have same question that you about the next logical step for the future of ardupilot groudcontrol software…
Shure, the RPI is one interesting option especially to keep look and feel with the PC version, but another great option is to use a cheap chinese tablet (about U$S100) and the andropilot or droidplanner excelent software… they get better and better with every new version, and you get almost the same functions than the pc versions (and in some cases, new ones, like the virtual sticks on the touchscreen)
But, getting back to the RPI… I had several problems compilling from the command line, so I used the qt4 builder graphical interface, and in that way i got the software compiled with no errors, just some warnings.
I made last night a quickly video to show you the loading time and the response when connected to the ardupilot through the 3DR telemetry modules (sorry about the bad quality, i you want it I can do it again better)

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8R8dESNea2A[/youtube]

As you can see the response time is reasonable (you can see a freeze at minute 3:37, but was because I got the ardupilot inside the house trying to show the movement, and lost GPS connection)
I suspect this reply becomes a big out of topic, (my apologies about that) so, If I can help you in some way you can send me an PM or can open another thread in the rigth place, and continue the topic…

Reggards
Marcelo.

[quote=“adibbins”]Mine works, but I notice things like the artificial horizon is slow to react, the RPI CPU is most running at 100%, I’m wondering if the RPI is the right platform ?
[/quote]
The RPi has more than enough power to run AP2. The biggest issue is that Primary Flight Display is ‘drawn’ graphics. It would be much better at images loaded,scaled and rotated using the OpenGL libraries. This would unload the main CPU and improve performance.

Hi billbonney, there are some simple way to use the OpenGL Libraries instead the other ones? If you can guide me where to start I can try investigate and compile again using OpenGL…

Thanks in advance

P.D.: By the way, about the antenna tracker function, I sent you a PM as you suggested in the first message, i you can recommend a better way to connect the pan & tilt, I will thank you a lot…

Not simple compile fix. It requires an implementation and design that uses OpenGL. It’s probably better to use QtQuick which uses OpenGL underneath.

Ok will try to investigate about it. Thanks a lot. What about the tracker issue?