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UAV Dev Board

The UAV Dev Board, designed by Bill Premerlani, is an IMU-based development platform for building controllers for Unmanned Aerial Vehicles. This site hosts the development of UAV code that runs on this board, allowing it to stabilize an airplane, maintain altitude, and optionally navigate back to the launch site.

You can buy a UAV Dev Board from Spark Fun.

If you buy a UAV Dev Board, and are interested in hearing about upcoming changes, or want to participate in or influence future development, we strongly urge you to join the UAV Dev Board Discussion List.

There is also a lively community that discusses this platform on the DIY Drones site.

News!

Team Lawn Dart places at the 2011 SparkFun Autonomous Vehicle Competition - Saturday April 23, 2011

Congratulations to Team Lawn Dart on their great entry and performance. They used a modified UDB, running a modified version of MatrixPilot to win 3rd place in the air competition.

MatrixPilot wins DIY Drones T3 HILSim Contest - February 2011

Congratulations to Marcus Fahlen of Norway on winning 1st place in the DIY Drones contest to replicate a flight around Manhattan using an autopilot (in this case the UDB3) connected to a flight simulator. Thanks to all of the wider team that have made Marc's success possible. See here for the competition thread , and the results were published here.

MatrixPilot 2.5 - Thursday, August 19, 2010

After many months of work, the UDB development team is excited to release version 2.5 of MatrixPilot! This version adds tons of new features, including inverted stabilization, camera targeting, more configurable waypoints, wind speed estimation, dead reckoning, and hardware-in-the-loop simulation. See the full list on the status page.

More News...

Hardware Specifications

This board comes with a dsPIC30F4011 CPU, an MMA7260 three axis accelerometer and two dual-axis Inversense IXZ500 gyroscopes already soldered as shown in the picture. It is intended for the do-it-yourselfer. By itself, it can be used to develop a three axis IMU controller. With the addition of a GPS receiver, it can be used to develop a UAV controller for an RC car, plane, or boat. All firmware versions are compatible with the EM406 GPS. The new MatrixPilot firmware can also use the uBlox 5H GPS.

Already Have a UAV Dev Board?

UAV Dev Board Firmwares

For info on the latest developments and future plans, check out the ProjectStatus page.

MatrixPilot
MatrixPilot is the latest branch of the firmware for the UAV Dev Board. It is a recommended upgrade from both MatrixNav and AileronAssist. It offers up to 5 input channels and 6 output channels, control of Delta Wing and V-Tail airframes, allows much more configuration, plus a bunch of other cool new features too.

AileronAssist
Aileron Assist controls a plane's elevator and ailerons to stabilize a plane's pitch and roll, and to navigate back to the launch location on command. It is recommended that AileronAssist users upgrade to MatrixPilot for better support.

MatrixNav
Matrix Nav controls a plane's elevator and rudder to stabilize its pitch, and navigate back to the launch location on command. It is recommended that MatrixNav users upgrade to MatrixPilot for better support.

RollPitchYaw
The Roll Pitch Yaw firmware is not meant for flying. It's a test program that drives three servos proportionally to the current roll, pitch, and yaw of the UAV Dev Board. It also sends serial data about it's orientation out the TX pin, which can be useful for visualizations on a computer.

UAVSelfTest
The UAVSelfTest firmware lets you test that your dev board hardware is functioning properly. It helps you test the receiver channels, the servo channels, the gyros, accelerometers, LEDs, and switches.

Wiki: AileronAssist
Wiki: HowToConfigure
Wiki: HowToContribute
Wiki: HowToInstall
Wiki: MatrixNav
Wiki: MatrixPilot
Wiki: News
Wiki: ProjectStatus
Wiki: RollPitchYaw
Wiki: Troubleshooting
Wiki: UAVSelfTest