Mikrokopter Higher altitudes while keeping horizontal position?

[ovdt]

Hi everyone,

When the GPS is installed on Mikrokopter, position hold (PH) feature comes.

What I'm curios about:

Let's say it's a bit windy and I want ascend to 150 meters but keeping the same coordinates. (Only altitude changes, no changes in horizontal position)

Is it possible with current Mikrokopter firmware?

I don't know if I expressed myself clearly

Thank you guys.

 

[Macsgrafs]

Im no expert, but from what I've read if you put in any input then it takes it off of PH, so when you get up to altitude hit the PH switch then.

Ross

 

[Pano-Dirk]

Let's say it's a bit windy and I want ascend to 150 meters but keeping the same coordinates. (Only altitude changes, no changes in horizontal position)

Is it possible with current Mikrokopter firmware?

Yes.

Dirk

 

[FlyEYE]

I think the mikrokopter people call it elevator mode.
Here's a photo from 90 meters

If it's windy it's more windy up there so you need to be aware of how it handles and what to tweak. There are a few stories of "fly aways" at higher altitude. I can attest that with the wrong settings it will drift in the wind, luckily I wasn't that high. I don't think I have the balls to risk a really high altitude unless it was a calm day.

 

[ovdt]

Thanks for the info!

It seems, it's a matter of tweaking the settings in windy conditions. Searching for it on the forums right now!

 

[Droider]

Let us know what you find as everyone seems to have windy weather at the moment.

I dint loose PH when I turn off AH and climb to a new height. It just stays put where I initialed PH. Not sure but does PH only deactivate with left and right, forward and backward?

Dave

 

[ovdt]

Not sure but does PH only deactivate with left and right, forward and backward?

I'm curious about that too.

After building my setup (waiting for the components right now) I'm gonna work out with the windy conditions. I'll definetely write what I'll find out.

 

[RTRyder]

If you have the GPS Stick Threshold set to zero in the Navi-Ctrl tab of MKtool you can move the MK off the GPS P/H coordinate with either pitch or roll but it will return to it as soon as you let go of the stick. Yaw will not have any effect on P/H, or rather it won't as long as the MK is well balanced.

If you have the Stick Threshold setting at anything other than zero it will move off the GPS P/H coordinate and use the position of wherever you move it to as the new P/H location. The amount of time it takes for the MK to log the new position is determined by the Position Hold Login Time setting in Navi-Ctrl2 tab of Mktool.

So if you use vario A/H and set the Stick threshold to zero you can ascend and descend without moving off the set P/H coordinate, or as close as the MK can maintain to it. If there is little to no wind a properly setup Mk will stay pretty much on the set position, if there's any wind at all it's going to wander some and no amount of GPS tuning is going to get it to stay perfectly on the same location, just the nature of the beast. As the wind moves it, it will try to return to the original position so depending on the wind you can see this as a back and forth motion or in some instances a circular motion as the Mk gets moved off coordinate then tries to work its way back.

Ken

 

[Droider]

If you have the GPS Stick Threshold set to zero in the Navi-Ctrl tab of MKtool you can move the MK off the GPS P/H coordinate with either pitch or roll but it will return to it as soon as you let go of the stick.

Thanks Ken for putting in the correct terminology.. I should know that but my head is completely scrambled trying to understand CAP722 (UK regs)

 

[RTRyder]

Hi everyone,

When the GPS is installed on Mikrokopter, position hold (PH) feature comes.

What I'm curios about:

Let's say it's a bit windy and I want ascend to 150 meters but keeping the same coordinates. (Only altitude changes, no changes in horizontal position)

Is it possible with current Mikrokopter firmware?

I don't know if I expressed myself clearly

Thank you guys.

No, if its windy you will not be able to maintain exactly the same position no matter how you set the Mk and Navi-ctrl settings. The amount of horizontal movement will be proportionate to the strength of the wind and the weight of the MK and a little bit with the GPS settings in MKtool. Bottom line, the Mk is light enough that no amount of GPS tuning will keep the wind from moving it around and the stronger the wind the more movement you will see. Depending on how you have the GPS set you can minimize the amount of movement but you will not eliminate it, civilian GPS doesn't have the accuracy to make it possible and neither does the MK firmware.

So as long as you do not mind some amount of movement within a roughly 5 to 10 meter radius of the GPS coordinate then you can remain in the same position as you climb in the wind.

Ken

 

[RTRyder]

Thanks Ken for putting in the correct terminology.. I should know that but my head is completely scrambled trying to understand CAP722 (UK regs)

P.S. position hold is not limited by the 250 meter limitation of GPS waypoints, you can manually fly beyond the limit and P/H will work as long as you have firmware version .80 or higher.

Ken

 

[Droider]

Hi Ken thanks for clarifying that.. in my Navi-control2 panel i have the following settings
GPS Wind correction - 90
Speed compensation - 30
GPS max Radius - 150
GPS Angle Limit - 75
Postion hold log in time -1

Does the setting in the GPS max radious mean it will only work to 150 meters?
Any comments on the other settings?

Dave

 

[RTRyder]

Hi Ken thanks for clarifying that.. in my Navi-control2 panel i have the following settings
GPS Wind correction - 90
Speed compensation - 30
GPS max Radius - 150
GPS Angle Limit - 75
Postion hold log in time -1

Does the setting in the GPS max radious mean it will only work to 150 meters?

Dave

That's exactly what it means. Change it to 247 (the largest # it will accept) to get the maximum GPS waypoint radius.

Any comments on the other settings?

Yes, if the GPS is working well don't mess with them unless you save them first

I'd have to look at the default settings to see if yours are different, they may have been tweaked due to you having a Y6 so I can't really say much of anything about them at the moment.

I can say the -1 in the Position Hold Login Time means it will lock immediately if you move it to another location, or as close to immediate as possible, don't know how long it takes the Navi and F/C to discuss it and make the change.

Ken

 

[Droider]

Thanks ken.. the login time is - 1 like seperator 1 so 1 second which is a bit to quick at when flying to a new position it seems to be a tad girky in flight probably because its locking on to quick

dave

 

[ovdt]

Thanks for the heads up, Ken! Very informative topic, indeed.

Droider, check out this topic:

http://forum.mikrokopter.de/topic-20364.html

And very informative chart: http://www.mikrokopter.de/ucwiki/en/MKTools-Setup#Screen:_GPS

 

[Droider]

Cheers ovdt.. I get lost on the MK wiki sometimes.. I know I have see stuff but when I want it I can never find it.. Ta .. now bookmarked!

Dave