Thanks for the info. I connected a standard ardupilot-type voltage and current sensor to the PWR Sensor port , and it works after configuring the appropriate settings in the system tab of Libre pilot GCS.
One thing that bothers me during bench testing in the past week is , after I flash the Revo board with an Ardupilot fw, can I do ALL the configuration in Mission Planner, instead of going back to LibrePilot GCS ?
An example is the Battery monitoring. Can I configure the voltage and current sensor in the Optional Hardware tab of MP ?
My Revo board is running on the original Revo FW now. During flashing back and forth between Revo FW and Ardupilot FW of my other Revo board, I damaged one solder point of the 2 SBL solder spots before I started to solder an ON/OFF switch across the SBL solder spot to avoid soldering and desoldering on the 2 spots. That is why I want to make sure before I flash the Revo board with Ardupilot FW, I want to do all the necessary configuration which can only be done with LibrePilot GCS.
@wcfung1 glad you got things figured out! i personally have no experience with librepilot GCS, but rest assured that, once you’re running ardupilot FW on your revo, you can do all setup steps via MissionPlanner.
if you’re stuck at any point, don‘t worry to get back and ask, we‘ll get you going!
the FW defaults used for battery monitoring should do fine with a standard power module. it just requires setting parameter BATT_MONITOR to 4 to enable both voltage and current momitoring. i’d suggest to prefereably use the full parameter list / tree. this parameter requires reboot to take effect.
the specific default settings used are:
BATT_VOLT_PIN = 12
BATT_CURR_PIN = 11
BATT_VOLT_MULT = 10.1
BATT_AMP_PERVLT = 17.0
volt and amp multipliers might need adjustments for optimal precision.
Thank you for the input. Both the voltage and current figure get update after powering up.
On the same subject, regarding calibrating the current sensor (voltage calibration is simple), wiki says a power analyser can be connected to read the current. But I have a 550 size quad, and at higher current (for more accurate calibration), it is dangerous to spin the 4 prop on the bench.
Earlier MP version has a Compass MOT test for power line interference compensation. This involves installing 2 diagonally placing props on a quad upside down to neutralize the upward thrust. So we can spin the props at a higher rev for current calibration. But this test is not there.
Have you heard from others about calibrating current sensor on larger size quad.?