GT-2 Reset after emergency

 Mission time: 2015-05-22 11pm

 The weather is still too bad to fly so I haven't had a chance to test my repairs yet.  I have spent more time developing the software and I have the BIP almost completed, just need to add in more information from the drone.  Currently the camera information, the angle limiter and the emergency mode all work.  I also have programmed an additional button on the joystick to exit out of an emergency mode which will save me from having to unplug the battery if an emergency is triggered.

Drone update

No test flights today; it was too windy outside and the indoor hull is setting after yesterday's crash.  I got my hands on some glue and the drone seems to be on the mend, hopefully it will still be able to fly.  As a result I spend today working on the BIP which is starting to come together now!  So far only the camera and communication error is working but I am hoping to get the full BIP working by the end of today.  The screen shot is a picture of the control station not connected to the drone.

IF-2, Hard Landing

Mission time: 2015-05-19 6pm

So I tried to get another flight today with the drone but there is a glitch with the altimeter,  where the altitude can go negative.  This results in the drone going to full power crashing into the ceiling and falling out of the sky.  One of these tests resulted in the drone hitting a light in the ceiling, spiraling out of the sky and landing sideways!  This caused some minor structural damage to the protective housing of the drone (a chunk came out of it) but the drone was fine.  I figured out that the bug was due to me flying over a table since the drone didn't crash when I flew through a corridor.

The good news is my VSI (vertical speed indicator) is now working correctly and even goes red when the drone is descending.  This is the first step towards building a nice TUI that is easy to read.  Next up BIP (Back-light Information Panel). Oh and fix the housing, just need to find some glue.

Drone descending

OF-2 Asymetrical Flame Out

 Mission time: 2015-05-17 5pm

First sign of trouble

So I figured out how to adjust the altitude limiter and I had the drone flying up to 10m!  I've heard stories of people's drones getting stuck and drifting around so I have some RC helicopters on standby to fly into the drone and take it down.  Thank goodness I didn't have to use any of them!  That being said I did have one incident.  I drained the batteries too much and the warning didn't kick in until the drone was 3 meters in the air.  Unfortunately the drone lost power to one of the rotors causing the drone to cartwheel out of the sky.  Note to self, add in a low power warning.  Also during this flight I generated detailed logs of the entire flight so I can see what information I want to display.  Next test: BIP (start with T/O and Landed lights).

OF-1 Good results

 Mission time: 2015-05-16 11am

I went out to the quad to try flying outdoors and it was a good test flight.  I managed to avoid crashing the drone too much.  I did have one moment where my code crashed due to a typo on a function inside a specific method that can only be called while the drone was flying.  This resulted in the drone going into a hover!  To get it to come down I had to grab it and flip it around so it would go into emergency mode.  Other than that the testing was pretty smooth. 

IF-1, terrifying!

 Mission time: 2015-05-15 3pm

Wow my heart rate skyrocketed after this test! And I thought finals were meant to be bad.  Anyway I think this is the last test that I will do indoors, at least in the labs, there's not enough room.  It was still a good test, I got a good data stream from the drone giving me accurate information about it's position.

GT-1

 Mission time: 2015-05-14 10pm

First test of the drone and it does a pretty good job.  The camera appears to be suffering a 7 second delay making it impossible to fly the drone in real time.

Tests:

• Pitch roll and yaw display passed
• Camera partial-pass
• Lagging badly
• Camera toggle works

Next objectives:

• Fly in a lab