Ap.parrot minidrone

Intro

Originally the Rolling Spider from Parrot is a Bluetooth controlled flying quadrotor, designed to be controlled with an Android or iOS device. Not any more: With a few simple clicks you can run Paparazzi on the Rollinspider, Swat and Blaze.

Note that information this page also can be use to connect to a Parrot Swat and Blaze. Where you read "Rolling Spider" read it then as "Swat" or "Blaze" Also where there is RS_ in the text replace with Swat_ or Blaze_

Supported Minidrones

Paparazzi testflown with:

- None yet with new firmware as on 20170719. Soon more. The TU Delft has various Minidrones. X-Wing, RollingSpider, Swat, Blaz

• Spider
  • Parrot Rolling Spider
• Mambo
  • Parrot MAMBO
• Swing
  • Parrot SWING
• Airborne Night
  • Parrot Airborne Night Maclane
  • Parrot Airborne Night Blaze
  • Parrot Airborne Night Swat
• Airborne Cargo
  • Parrot Airborne Cargo Travis

The Jumping Sumo and Hydrofoil extention, while Paparazzi likely can run on those, since they cannot fly there are no plans for testing or support. If you have on and teste it, make a pull request with any improvments you made, welcomed.

Features

Connectivity

The minidrones have a Bluetooth Smart technology, Bluetooth V4.0 BLE device. Communication over older 2.0 bluetooth also possible after making some configuration changes on the Minidrone. Paparazzi can do this for you automatically

Sensors

• Ultrasonic sensor
• 3-axis gyroscope and 3-axis accelerometer (MPU 6050)
• Vertical camera
• Pressure sensor

Battery

Lithium-Polymer and removable Lasts up 8 min (6 min with wheels) and full recharge in 90 min

How to connect

There are two ways to connect to the Rolling Spider with Paparazzi. The first one is an USB cable and the second one is Bluetooth (4.0 or normal). Both have the possibility to connect as WiFi access point and transfer files through FTP and execute programs over telnet. But be warned that connecting over USB disables the vertical camera, as it uses the same USB bus. Also note that if the /data/video folder does not exist on the Rolling Spider, both FTP and consequently any attempt to upload will fail. This is a simple fix by telnetting in and making the /data/video folder.

Connect with USB

• Set the Rolling spider on
• Just plug in a micro-usb cable from your drone to the computer
• A new network device will show up
• Connect with 192.168.2.1 through ftp or telnet

Connect via Bluetooth

• Turn on minidrone
• Make sure you have bluetooth enabled on your computer

• Execute "hcitool scan" and look for the mac address of the "RS_...." device. (If you cannot find it look at #Setup normal Bluetooth)
• Install the bluez-utils package (if not installed) with "sudo apt-get install bluez-utils"
• Execute "sudo pand --connect <MAC address> -dGN -n", to connect to the bluetooth of the drone. *
• Execute "sudo ifconfig bnep0 192.168.1.2 up", to setup the ethernet device over bluetooth. *
• Connect with 192.168.1.1 through ftp or telnet

* This has to be done everytime you reboot the drone

-- Note --

• You will need to enable the actuators by telnetting to the drone and typing: gpio 39 -d lo 0
• After uploading Paparazzi, you have to start it manually via telnet.
• Go to /data/video and type ./ap.elf

Setup normal Bluetooth

• First connect over Bluetooth 4.0 or USB to the drone as described above
• Connect with telnet to the drone. (telnet 192.168.*.1)
• Open the "/etc/init.d/rcS" file and search for the line with "BLEproxy". (vi /etc/init.d/rcS)
• Now change the "BLEproxy" to "BLEproxy --normalbt"
• Reboot your drone by executing: "reboot". (This makes sure the filesystem is saved)

Airframe

A Parrot minidrone eample airframe is in the works... The code is not yet available in Paparazzi Mater. For the Time being, progress here. As soon as testflights are performed a pull request will be made and example in the Main Paparazzi repository

Bottom camera

All minidrones have a camera which can be used for various purposes

Extend Hardware

GPS

An GPS connected to the USB port, while possible, never done yet.

Serial

XBee and Si10xx based modems

By using external modems it is possible to exten the range of the drones.

Micro laser range ring

A TU Delft project makes it possible to fly autonomous inside a building using micro laser rangers. See {TODO}

Links

Some links that might be helpful for developers or otherwhise