Multipilot 2.0 - AP32 Building Log realtime update. The next gen cpu for your Arducopter.

[Roberto Navoni]

Hello everyone,
a year and a half ago came Multipilot 1.0 an inertial platform for applications and semi-professional hobby. After the excellent results obtained from the marketing of these cards, and participation in development projects as open source and Aeroquad Arducopter and 'born www.virtualrobotix.com community.
Today our community is proud to present the evolution of our project: Multipilot 2.0 ST.

The characteristics of Multipilot 2.0 are:

• Hardware:
  • ARM7  Cortex-M3 processor STM32F103VET6. 72 Mhz
  • Flash 512 Kbytes RAM 64 Kbytes
  • 16-bit Timer 4
  • SPI 2 (ADC Interface, MicroSD connection)
  • I ² C 2 (First I2C (sensor), Second I2C control until ESC 12)
  • USART 5 (GPS, DEBUG Console, XBee Pro Telemetry)
  • USB 1 (Upload Firmware, Debug Console, Power Board for Debug)
  • CAN 1 (Interconnection with Professional ESC 1 Mbit update rate)
  • 6 PWM Output Bit 16 (ESC / Servo Control)
  • 8 PWM Input 16 Bit (RC Input Channel, accept PPM SUM)
  • 8 Analog Input 12 Bit.
  • Professional 4 layers PCB.
  • DC: DC 30 V (6s Lipo): 5 volts and 3.3 volts
• Sensor Board:
  • Diydrones OilPan . (High quality entry level board)
  • LN Professional Sensor Board: 3 Axis Accelerometer, 3 Axis Gyroscope, 3 Axis Magnetometer , 10 HZ Gps ,   High Quality Sensor for certify professional application.
• IDE and Development tools:
  • Arduino IDE.
  • Arm GCC Toolchain.
  • Fully compatible with arduino wiring language.
• Firmware:
  • On this platform will be available a lot of RC library developed by Virtualrobotix and Diydrones community.
  • Standard software will be an improved revision of Arducopter , Ardupilot , Multiwii , Aeroquad . The first revision of code will be Arducopter NG .
  • MultiFox Rev 4 special  Arm Edition.
• Special Feature :
  • Multipilot 2.0 is fully compatible with ArduPilotMega DiyDrones Board.
  • OEM revision of Multipilot 2.0 available.

P.S.

Thanks to Sandro for His Beautifull Renders of Multipilot 2.0

[Michael Stephen]

Ok I might be making a comment in completely the wrong place so forgive me if I have.

I am a commercial photographer who has many clients who need aerial photography and hiring helicopters is extremely expensive. The multicopter option is the perfect answer for me so I have headed down the path of first building my first basic quad which is simply Jakubs KK quad. 

I am however in the not too distant future needing to build a heavy lift octocopter, I plan to use the driodwox company frames but need a suitable flight control system.

 

My problem is this, Im a photographer, many years ago I was an electrical engineer but I have forgotten much of what I knew and also technology has moved on.

I dont understand programming and my industry runs on Apple computers, I havent used a pc in 25 years.

 

So Im looking for a flight control system that is reasonably simple for someone without certain knowledge to set up and use. There is the hoverfly board on the market which at this point looks a better option than the multiple board and multiple connections mikrokopter systems.

 

Is what you are developing here suitable for someone such as myself or is this more a development system?

 

Thanks

Mike

 

[Roberto Navoni]

Hi Mike,

in our project we would support advanced electronic and software user and also advanced rc hobbyst.

So we're working on a simple tools that send to our customers last stable version of code ... without any kind of complex operation on software .

[loic(titeuf007)]

whaoooooooo this is amazing news!!

 

[Roberto Navoni]

Dear Friends,

today i add advanced docs for developing Library on MP32 Board. This docs are about micro STM32 and Hardware interface. Schematics and pin connections.

So I'm working on some tutorial about the first program using VROS and a tutorial for developing your fist C++ library.

This is the link : http://www.virtualrobotix.com/forum/topics/multipilot32-advanced-sdk

Regards

Roberto Navoni

[Roberto Navoni]

Dear Friends,

today i'm working on basic test program .. actualy it support these function :

• PWM output for control Brushless controller.
• RC-Reciver at this moment only PPM_SUM but i think that i will work also on standard rc-reciver.
• OilPan ADC converter.

The news is that respect of last revision it's my first multi threading application . I'm very happy about this approach :)

In the next day i start to upload some source code .

Regards

Roberto

 

[Roberto Navoni]

So another news is that i add a Thread about my work on driver at this  link in ChibiOS forum:

http://forum.chibios.org/phpbb/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=72&p=340...

Thanks to Giovanni  that help me a lot on this hard work :)

Regards

Roberto

[geir]

I see you have OilPan ADC converter up and running :) Have you checked what sample rates you are able to get??

[Roberto Navoni]

Hi Geir ,

the spi can work until 14 mhz. But the limit is ADS7844 in the datasheet the limit is 200 khz. I see value until 250 khz but after this refresh rate stop to reply on spi.

Regards

Roberto

[Roberto Navoni]

Today i solve the doubt about HSI and HSE clock.

So I understand that STM32 have one inside RC oscillator and possibility to have external XTAL .

With internal HSI you can going until 64 mhz of clock using pll multipiler . With external clock instead you can going until 72 Mhz. 

So if you use internal clock you set PLL_MUL x 9 instead if you use internal you need to use PLL_MUL x 16.

This micro is excelent and powerfull we can going fast also without external oscillator . Great !!!

 

I doing also some test on SPI for reading OILPAN adc http://focus.ti.com/lit/ds/sbas100a/sbas100a.pdf 8 channel 12 bit ..  I see that the refresh rate limit is 200 Khz ... the limiti of spi is 14 Mhz or more .. so the problem is the adc not stm32 

The Internal  ADC Conversion time is 1 microseconds ... veryyy fast ... the next revision of oilpan could don't have an SPI ADC converter but cand directly connect the sensor to analog input

 

[geir]

This must also be diveded between the 8 channels am i right?? This will probably make it to slow for Inertial navigation :( :(

[Roberto Navoni]

Hi Gier,

so you can have all 8 sensor at rate of  250 khz . The inertial navigation isn't possible with that kind of sensor . Mems is not good for this implementation . You need to use a laser gyro is better more expensive and think for professional application.

Regards

Roberto

[geir]

It is possible to use mems sensors for INS but its not as good :) (coupled with GPS of course).