Arduboat, best way to plan out smooth paths

ArduRover ArduBoat
1

I am looking to use arduboat to run an entertainment boat that needs to do various paths throught the day on a manmade lake. Does anyone know if groundstation can coordinate all this and allow for very slow smooth movement. Accuracy is not as important as slow organic movement.

Thanks

jason

2

Jason, you have complete control of the cruise speed of your “rover” when it is in auto mode. You plan out the waypoints so you can plan the path to be very smooth. For instance, at a corner, instead of just one waypoint, you could put several forming a gentle arc and your boat will navigate through the curve. Of course, tuning the various control loops is very important, but that’s just patience and learning how to do it.
Kenny

3

Maybe you could submit a PR for support of Spline Waypoints in Rover. Works pretty well in Copter.

4

I could use spline points for my boat.

5

Yes, I could see how that could be useful for boat. I’m not sure why it’s only in Copter. I do know it’s a 3D function for Copter fitting a spline course to both the horizontal plane and altitude. For a rover it’s much more challenging unless it’s a big open field. With the typical GPS precision (non RTK) it’s easy to run into obstacles. I still have a lot of fun planning and running Rover missions though. In fact I’m assembling a new Rover now from a Crawler as my current Rover has poor low speed control.

6

I don’t know if this is really a ground station question but more about how the mission is setup when downloaded and the tuning of the boat. I don’t see much use for splines in a rover or boat type of environment.

7

The OP wants smooth organic movements. Nothing better than a spline for that. By definition a spline is smooth. The fewer control points, the smoother.

8

That can be handled by proper parameters, meaning turn rate in degrees a second etc. It really has no use, maybe I’m wrong, in an environment that boats work in.

9

I don’t think there is a way to limit jerk. Any significant jerk will violate the OP’s request. A spline will take care of jerk, snap, crackle, pop, etc.

In the high Froude number environment my boat works in a spline has a lot of use.