Monday, October 29, 2012

Arduino Based MWC Field Programmer

Yes, the name is horrible (haven't worked that part out quite yet), but this is my latest project. Basically, it uses an Arduino, character LCD, user controls, and some sort of serial connection (Bluetooth, hard-wired, Xbee, etc) to the MultiiWiiCopter FC so that it can change the settings as seen on the computer GUI in the field without a laptop or phone. This is important to me since i dont have a phone or laptop with bluetooth or serial port and i don't want to lug around a laptop, anyways. It will navigate via buttons or buttons and an Encoder (quicker, will act like a scroll wheel on  your mouse), plus a few short cuts to make things easier (read, write, root). It has the same "comment" and "uncomment" style that MWC code has to enable/disable settings.

First Rev

Currently, the project is still in its beginning stage, but in the first revision i plan to at least have:
  -LCDs supported:
      -Sparkfun Serial
      -Parallax Serial
      -General 4bit interface LCD (HD44780
      -16x4 or bigger (any smaller would be a pain, right?)
  -MWC Functions:
      -PIDs
      -Sensor values
      -Channel Values
      -Read/Write all of these (where applicable).
  -User Control Methods
      -7 buttons (select, back, left, right, up, down)
      -Root Addon Button - Go back to main screen any time.
      -Read Addon - Re-read values from MWC FC.
      -Write Addon - Write values to MWC FC at any time.
      -Encoder - Uses encoder to scroll through the menu faster.

BreadBoarding


Features


For all features(now + later) i am thinking of:
  -LCDs supported:
      -Sparkfun Serial
      -Parallax Serial
      -General 4bit interface LCD (HD44780
      -16x4 or bigger (any smaller would be a pain, right?)
      -More upon request + plausibility

  -MWC Functions:
      -PIDs
      -Sensor Data
         -MWC direction (heading, pitch, roll)
         -Enabled Sensors
         -Calibrate Them
         -See any debug errors

    -Channel Values
    -Rates /expo

    -Aux Channel Setup
    -Presets for all settings
    -Reset Defualts

So basically the whole computer based GUI.

Menu Layout on the LCD

The menu on the LCD will look like so:
  -PID
     -Roll
     -Pitch
     -Yaw
     -Alt
     -Etc
  -Channel Values
  -Rates + Expo
  -Sensors
     -Enabled Sensors
     -Calibrate Sensors
        -Gyro
        -Acc
        -Mag
     -Values
        -Gyro
        -Acc
        -Mag
        -Heading
        -Alt
        -GPS
        -Opto
  -Aux Setup
  -Settings Presets
     -New
     -Save
     -Load
  -Read Values
  -Write Values
  -Reset Defaults


1 comment:

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