I am having real problems with intermittent servo output.
Let me start with the hardware:
Cubepilot Orange
FRSky X9D Plus transmitter
CRSF Nano Diversity Receiver
4 x 50aH Victron Lithium Ion Phosphate batteries in parallel and series giving 24 volt
Ampflow Dual Motor Speed Controller
4 x Ampflow brushed motors providing skid steer
Mauch voltage and current sensor
3DXR Here 3+ GPS and RTK ground station
When initially setup everything was fine. It ran in Manual mode perfectly. Acro mode was not to successful as I knew that the whole thing needed tuning.
First time the servo output failed was during a simple mission. I stopped the mission as the rover was heading towards a tree. When I went to rerun the mission it would not arm and I had no motor servo output.
I know when the servo output has failed because there is a small red light on the speed controller that stays permanently on without any input. When input is detected the light flashes once every second.
I checked the RC Calibration page and could see that the Cube was receiving the Sbus signal. The servo output page showed that throttle left and throttle right was doing nothing, yet I could see the light switch working on channel 2 which I thought was strange as I would have expected the whole rail would have stopped working.
I managed to get it going after changing the carrier board for a new one. (I am now not sure that was the issue)
Second time it did this I was running another simple mission on fairly rough ground. A wheel fell off so again I stopped the mission to replace the wheel. (A taper Lock Bush had not been tightened)
I spent quite a few days sorting it this time. Only after plugging in an old D4RII receiver directly to speed controller did I get some movement again. This at least showed me that the speed controller was working OK. I then checked all parameters and found that BRD_SAFETY_MASK did not have 1 and 3 servo outputs checked. (I am not running a safety switch) Checked these and bingo…with a new receiver everything started working again.
Yesterday whilst finally getting down to some serious tuning in Acro mode the same thing has happened again. I have the speed controller light on constantly and no servo output on channels 1 and 3.
I really am running out of options now. Can anyone point me in the right direction?
I am sure you will have plenty of questions and I’ll do my best to answer them the best I can.
Cheers,
Martin
