Overview

Ardupilot is a firmware that is commonly run on consumer off the shelf (COTS) flight controllers that WARG uses. These devices use MAVLink as their primary telemetry communication protocol.

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The Ardupilot SITL Simulator lets WARG test software using MAVLink without requiring a physical drone.

Mission Planner

Download and install Mission Planner: https://ardupilot.org/planner/docs/mission-planner-installation.html

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• The Simulation tab is at the top of the screen

• Select Multirotor in the bottom centre and Stable , unless you specifically need another vehicle

  • If you have already run Multirotor at least once, you can select the Skip Download button in the bottom left

  • The default start location is near Canberra Airport in Australia. If you want a different location, you can add --home=[location] to the Extra command line text box in the centre, where [location] is: [latitude in decimal degrees],[longitude in decimal degrees],[ground ASL in metres],[initial heading in degrees]

    • Example E5: --home=43.472978,-80.540103,336,0

    • Example WRESTRC: --home=43.43405014107003,-80.57898027451816,373,0

    • Example Alma, QC: --home=48.5102184,-71.6473002,128,0

Mission Planner automatically downloads and runs the SITL files, and then connects to the simulated vehicle.

Mission Planner is ready to be used as though it is connected to a real drone!

MAVLink

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forwarding

Mission Planner can be used as a bridge between the drone and another application:

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You can also observe some of the MAVLink messages through Mavlink Inspector (ctrl+f).Instructions based on this.

If you want to switch or change connection settings, you have to restart Mission Planner and follow the instructions again.

Sources: https://ardupilot.org/planner/docs/common-mp-tools.html

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Common errors

No connection could be made because the target machine actively refused it

• Did you start forwarding at all, and with the correct settings?

dronekit.TimeoutError: wait_ready experienced a timeout after 30 seconds.

• Restart Mission Planner and follow the instructions again. Do not forget to check Write access

Ardupilot only

Untested.

The Ardupilot website has extensive documentation on setting up the SITL found here (https://ardupilot.org/dev/docs/sitl-simulator-software-in-the-loop.html). You may be able to download the SITL binary without compiling yourself by downloading the firmware from here: https://firmware.ardupilot.org/Copter/latest/. And use https://github.com/ArduPilot/ardupilot/blob/master/Tools/autotest/sim_vehicle.py to run it. (although this is untested).

DroneKit

Untested.

DroneKit also has a SITL simulator.

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