Cheapest way to build obstacle avoidance drone?

i need to build a drone that wont crash into whats in front of it.
as cheap as possible…
what do you guys suggest for a fc board and lidar unit?

would a Holybro Kakute F7 work for the fc?
with a Matek Optical Flow & Lidar Sensor for lidar?

That’s not what Optical Flow is for. A Benewake TF-Luna may be the best cheap option.

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Optical flow sensor to use Loiter wihtout GPS (if that saves you money) and then TF-mini or Luna for Simple Avoidance (fence avodiance won’t work but I think proximity avoidance should work).
Tried and tested method would be a simple GPS + cheap range finder … That way you can even use Path Planning algorithms (provided you have a decent memory on your FC)

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thank you for your replies!
to be more exact. i need the drone, when 6 inches from a wall, to stop going forward, even with user stick command. it would still be able to go left or right, or up or down, just not forward.

so from what im reading, these would be the items that would make that possible…,

ardu pilot, on Holybro Kakute F7 fc, add a gps module and a tf luna for lidar?

what gps module would you reccomend?
what pdb board would you suggest for the kakute f7?

thanks again… this community rocks!

Seeing as how you are on the cheap any M8N GPS module will do. And if you go with the AIO version of the Kakute F7 you don’t need a PDB. Minimum distance with the TF-Luna is more like 8".

thx dkemxr…

I was thinking i’d need the pdb board for the esc’s…

i have old school individual esc’s on my current build now, and didnt wanna spend on an all in one esc 30mm board to go with the kakute if i could avoid that with a cheap pdb…

. can the esc’s run straight off the kakute board?

is there another lidar unit that has a closer proximity reading thats a lil more expensive?

Mark-It doesn’t matter if you have individual ESC’s or a 4in1. There is a connector on the FC with the Motor outputs, you get the signals from there. That makes it easy to connect some 4in1’"s with a single cable but you don’t have to.

The TFMini Plus range is rated at 0.1m-12m. But this range depends on the reflectivity of the target and whether you are indoors or outside So YMMV.

thx dave, youre help has been invaluable.

was thinking about distance, the lidar will be towards the back of the craft so 8in will probably be okay as min distance to the lidar/wall.

the craft would be mainly used outdoors at night, against white and black walls.
texture and reflectivness would be akin to matte surface.
would lidar still work for this use case?

I’ve linked the 3 items im about to purchase to build with…

lidar : https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B086MJQSLR/ref=ox_sc_act_title_2?smid=A28CGGHEZKZAJJ&psc=1

gps : https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0736XHC1C/ref=crt_ewc_title_dp_1?ie=UTF8&psc=1&smid=A1N6DLY3NQK2VM

kakute f7 aio board : https://usa.banggood.com/Holybro-Kakute-F7-AIO-V1_5-STM32F745-Flight-Controller-w-or-OSD-PDB-Current-Sensor-Barometer-for-RC-Drone-p-1317570.html?rmmds=search&cur_warehouse=CN

I will post updates on my progress here for anyone else who this might help.

Looks OK. Assuming because you are buying from Amazon that you may be in the US, you can get the Kakute FC domestically also from a few sources.

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