[Autopilot] Hello everyone
Status: Alpha
Brought to you by:
tramm
From: Paschalis <ves...@ho...> - 2002-11-26 17:48:49
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Hi! I have been following the progress of the project since February or so, but this is the first time I write to the list. I have a background in Information Systems Engineering (i.e. EEE&CS) and have just started a PhD in robotics, specialising in bipedal walking and stability. I have a small LMH helicopter which I am terrible at flying and am generally interested in fiddling with things trying to make them work, be them software, hardware or mechanical stuff. I've put up some pics of my "lab" back home, here: http://nomizeis.cjb.net/images/helicopter/page_01.htm My undergrad thesis used the ADXL202 to take measurements of a biped while moving and attempting to walk in a statically stable manner. AD only gives free samples of the SMT version, so I had to create a small conversion board to which it was soldered (by a very able technician's hand!) and then onto a veroboard. I, like you, found the analogue output easier to use in terms of both processing power required and noise immunity. The controller I used ( http://www.joker-robotics.com/eyebot/index.html ) is based around the Motorola 68332 at 33MHz which gives reasonable computational power and comes with a host of accessories (ADCs, servo controller, serial/parallel ports, several IO lines, vision module etc -probably most important is the big LCD where you can create nice and useless graphics :) ) Unfortunately the OS it comes with is closed source and quite buggy. I am currently looking into using a Kalman filter to integrate the acceleration measurements with data from an ADXRS gyro sample I just received. Its packaging (BGA) is a problem; sockets are expensive! In terms of helping with the project, I am currently traversing old emails and am compiling a list of web links with useful information which can become part of the FAQ. I know it's not much but I'm currently quite busy. I think that this project is going to be very successful due to everybody's enthusiasm and the fact that the team does not lack any of the necessary skills: maths, electronics or programming. Also, I am based in London, UK. Anybody else nearby? Best regards, Paschalis |