Pixhawk for boat trolling motor

Looking good! Default PID’s don’t work well for anything :slight_smile: Step thru the configuration as per the Wiki.

As promised, I have compiled video from photos and various videos from build and water tests. Hope you will enjoy it and find some inspiration.

Ardurover Canoe

If someone wants, I can publish design files. But they are so very specific to my case, components I have used and manufacturing technology I have.

Fun facts:

  • You can hand RC controller to passenger in front a let him drive. Very useful.
  • Looking to a laptop while passenger drives and trying to configure Ardurover causes sea sickness :smiley:
  • Faces of people watching me driving full size RC boat from shore are priceless.

Facts (not funny but useful):

  • Trolling motor was not modified at all. In case of failure, I can connect battery directly to motor and get back in normal way (it is awkward on canoe with motor at very end but doable).
  • Old trolling motors use resistors to slow down. On 1st gear it wastes more energy to heat than goes to the motor (measured). PWM controller is crucial. On highest gear (5) current goes directly to motor. I have kept this throttle switch intact and for normal use I keep it at highest forward gear. ESC is connected externally.
  • Servo I used is big and strong (33kgf/cm?) but has quite a lot of slop. Trolling motor shaft has slop on its own. I was afraid about this but it has proven not to be a big issue.
  • Driving at full throttle is about 22A at about 11V (as measured by FC)
2 Likes

Hello, post your PID settings.

@kolin,

That’s looking really good. A beautifully silent boat is so nice.

This vehicle is using vectored thrust so when it comes to tuning, I’d first set the MOT_VEC_ANGLEMAX parameter. the FRAME_CLASS parameter should also be set to boat (2).

The most critical parameter that normally needs tuning is the turn rate controller’s feed forward parameter. This is ATC_STR_RAT_FF and can be tuned in real time as described on the Turn Rate tuning wiki page.

… again, really nicely done!