• Conall Kingshott Nathan Green

• Clamping blocks with side shroud mounting ability underway by Jonathan Di Giorgio

  • 3d printed, hopefully stop some vibe in the arm, some metal parts in there and clips to mount the battery shrouds

• Photo:

  

• No other major developments, frame seems to be holding together well from testing.

• Alison Thompson Evan Janakievski Georgia Vachon Westerlund

• Some awesome work is being done on the cabin, first rev is scheduled to be done by tomorrow’s mech meeting with goal to have it manufactured by end of December so we can flight test.

  • give time for people to see it and test!

• This revision WILL NOT have doors, windows, seats, cargo compartment, etc. It is purely to test geometry and flight characteristics while mech team works on integrating all of those things.

  • cosmetic features will come later

  • frame to mount things onto cabin!

• This also allows us to change geometry if needed.

• You can read about specific updates in mech docs

  • (will link later I’m writing this last minute)

• First version of battery shroud made by Andy Zhang.

  • Conall Kingshott screwed it up, but new version will be done soon, and we can start doing layups.

  • small mech detail but we get it fixed

• Important note that this will all add some amount of weight.

  • we can test flying with or without battery shrouds

• done this week and try to get it laid up this weekend or next weekend

• clips integrated into the design, plug and play

• Smile Khatri mech, attached mount!

• Attached the mount onto the arm last week. Currently, the lidar and OFS are attached and wired up thanks to Mena Azab .

  • The wires are zip-tied to the tube so they aren’t flying all over the place when the drone is flying

  • So far so good!

  • Some components can be hard to access the connectors? Shouldn't be a big deal

    • will be worked on from Smile to add in more spacing

• Some things to improve upon:

  • Slight wobbling because hole for the tube is a little big.

    • Just need to reduce the hole diameter and reprint to find the sweet spot.

    • To fix this week

  • Might be challenging to insert/remove the Clevis pin because it is directly under the tube (but it wasn’t too bad when I tried it). I can redesign if it’s too inconvenient but I don’t see it being a huge issue. If everyone thinks I should redesign so that the clevis pin should be perpendicular to the tube length-wise I could but there’s a high chance it adds more weight to the mount ;/

    • can be tricky to remove, but may be fine

  • Need to add more space for the wires (it still fits but would be nicer to have more space) and the FPV camera since the plate is kind of close to the tube.

• There was a concern about the leg appearing in the CV camera’s field of view (which would affect object detection stuff) but I tested this with the autonomy leads and the legs don’t appear in the CV camera (LET’S GOOOO). But not sure if the leg will appear in the FPV camera (also which subteam should I inquire about stuff relating to the FPV cam?)

  • so far so good

  • Was tested with the camera and it looks good!

  • Center of mass depends heavily on battery decisions!

If anyone has suggestions on how I can improve the mount please lmk, would love to hear your thoughts!

• Nathan Green Georgia Vachon Westerlund Megan Spee

• Nothing to report on, will be discussed at mech meeting!

• falls under monster mount, NA

• Tom Chiu To add updates!

• Assume minimal progress.

• Michael Botros

• Need to update with monster mount

  • may have been completed?

• Flow sensor on CAN1. Lidar on i2c. esc on telem3

• Still unassigned due to no free members. However two new members have completed the Bootcamp. We should be able to delegate during this week’s EE meeting.

• Neel Patel Parker Lawrence-Valeriani

  

  Neel:

• General layout idea revised

  • Navigation light static red on left, green on right

  • Beacon lights, red strobing all 4 corners for 360 visibility

  • Anti-collision lights, white strobing lights all 4 corners for 360 visibility

  • will need to discuss with mechanical where they could be placed near the motors

    • Nathan Green is setting requirements for the caps on the motor mounts to protect bullet connectors so could be worked into that

      • To setup meeting to discuss integration

  • Possibly in a position so wires can go through the arms

  • any concerns with soldering directly to LEDs

    • none so far depending on implementation details

    • Jerry’s done it, no problem!

  • Are we still taking arms on and off?

    • We would like to maintain that idea

    • so if we run through arms we would need to include a connector

    • The drone fits in cars without taking arms off

    • makes it easier to fix things when we break them

    • can bring spare arms to comp

    • cost of connectors is minimal

    • make connectors light

• Power Architecture

  • How do we wanna power the LEDs?

    • depends on what LEDs are selected

  • Spec LED’s that take 12V and total less than 2 amps

    • should decision matrix / analyze power consumption of LEDs first

    • Possibly use the PDB 12V which can supply 3A

      • currently only see the VTX which draws 250 mA

      • absolutely an option, for EE to analyze from a weight and efficiency perspective, please evaluate it

    • Could also use another BEC is required which can supply up to 12V, 5A

      • absolutely an option, for EE to analyze from a weight and efficiency perspective, please evaluate it

• LED Spec Questions

  • what distance of visibility do we need day/night, does this need to be researched?

    • this is heavily proportional to power draw of these

    • the big point is these have to be visible when the judges walk around to verify they exist so we can get points

    • anything visible during the day will be plenty for night tests

  • What waterproof rating is required?

    • don't make it hard to design, but make it possible so last minute we could waterproof it as necessary

    • we may have to fly in the rain for comp

    • good to keep in back of mind

  • Could source higher voltage LEDs

Parker:

• Utilizing a 555 timer to achieve strobing

  • would be tiny 555 package if we do go this route

  • Used in its astable configuration so it’s functioning like an oscillator (aka multi-vibrator)

  • Duration of ON vs. OFF time is easily chosen by selecting resistor values

    • ON time must be less than off

      • for strobes

        • 1 Hz

        • 20%-30% positive duty cycle

        • leave flexibility in ee design

        • we can buy LEDs with a build in blinker without an extra board

          • more pwr draw, but possibly worth

          • worth evaluating

    • Disconnected from Pixhawk

      • less failure points

      • simplified

  • potentiometer

    • would be to control on vs off time

    • use potentiometer for debug on ground

    • use resistors in flight

• Questions

  • How long do the ON and OFF states need to be?

    • defined above

• Farris Matar

• Ready for firmware for three assembled boards

• Could order a final optional component for backpack

  • waiting for an ali express order to tag along on to avoid shipping fees, low priority for now

• Derek Tang Please write updates!

• Starting on this theory research

  • software is now much simpler Anthony Luo due to expanded support

• Heard from Derek they are struggling to source compatible target as relay, looking for ELRS receivers

  • should be one in Tubie up on the top shelf right side that functions fully and wont be needed soon

  • we need these to do Gemini testing end to end

  • we can buy in bulk from ali express lol

• Paused.

• Nolan Haines Hardy Yu Michael Botros

• need to add connector for cell sense leads

• Michael made progress on the schematic

  • Added to schematic input protection circuit, not done yet but concept is in

  • want to add safety to the battery circuit to enable low voltage LEDs and then cutoff the battery

  • bunch of resistors need to be calculated

  • connectors

• Hardy considering connectors

  • considering using 2.54mm long lead connectors to through hole the entire Nucleo shield

  • allows us to reduce the number of tiny connectors on the schematic

  • adding sd card connection

    • this L5 doesn't have sd card on it

• placement can be started after schem stuff

• Not much new stuff on this so it should be grindable

• Done done before finals kick in? schematic and layout

  • there’s three people on it

• Yuchen Lin Stanley Tang

• Decided to use VN300 for tracking antenna

  • because experience some difficulty using neo m8 to get gps data at cloudy condition

    • neom8 is bad in cloudy conditions?

    • the neom8n is bigger one

  • when its cloudy some freq ranges kinda suck for gps

  • VN just better antennas as well

  • will reach out to vectornav to request a vn200

    • Daniel Puratich would like to review all emails to vn

    • if we no get a vn200 we should get dev kit for popular system

  • this has been a long term blocker and kinda gging us

    • could pull something from hobby community and improve in future

• Mavlink development in progress

  • using mission planner sims it’s in progress

  • want to verify worky

• Alex Yang

• Not much in past week

• Setting up infra to go through training images

• want to gather training images as much as possible!

• Tong Zhang

• Not much progress, have plan for timeline and tasks assigned

• integrating workers from autonomy

  • geolocation integration and testing

    • getting geoloc tested is end of term goal

  • lots of workers so will be into next term

    • some haven't been made yet.

• Arunav Munjal

• SoC calculation looks very involved

  • State of Charge

  • it is …

  • battery characteristics ideally finalized by end of term

  • battery voltage and current is logged in every flight test and should be for our final config

• turn radius around waypoints

  • ardupilot will do it’s best to follow any turning radius you give it in pathing if you let it

  • Autonomy can also specify a turning radius if analyze splining

  • letting ardu do it means ardupilot can optimize it itself

  • when would airframe be finalized to practice maneuvering

    • there’s a lotta tuning we could do that will affect this

      • diminishing returns

    • for now there’s no good answer

    • pick a median defaulters value

    • half way through next term reasonable deadline to lock this in

• for task 2 working on creating mock path for wrestrc

• then test with simulation and lte

  • this week or next week

• then flight test

  • before finals

• Daniel Puratich Hardy Yu

• Training flight for Hardy Yu and Yuchen Lin for Houston auto-tune

  • works for Yuchen, Hardy avail as well

  • Do full auto-tune here in chat for practice

    • auto-tune is unique for each axis

    • we don’t wanna crash Pegasus

    • doing it once on Houston is good

    • ask Anthony Luo for help on this

      • legend is avail

        • especially friday evening

      • auto-tune can be kinda sketchy

      • watch videos on this and expect groundstation messages

• Does autonomy wanna run more data collection on Houston?

  • Amy Hu would like to flight test this weekend but Amy is not available

  • will get delegation and flight test request goin in next day

• Pegasus auto-tune and endurance on four vs six batteries

  • Is the data we get on four vs six LiPos relevant if we plan on switching to Graphene or Li-Ion stuff

  • Vanguard has a flight time of 30mins on two batts so we should get what we want on Pegasus on four batteries?

  • We should see if what we have works before going crazy

  • Try to make it work with what we have!

  • buying more sets for backups and testing adds up to a lot of cost

  • more data points

  • Disadvantage of not buying batteries

    • testing time

    • if we buy batts rn they wont be here by end of term for testing

    • could order over holidays and have same result

  • test with what we have now

  • We still have 600 dollars for batteries in an account

  • Pilots for this

    • Nathan Green and Aidan Bowers (Deactivated) unavailable for this

    • would be Hardy Yu and Yuchen Lin but low pilot exp

    • can call it off if Houston practice goes poorly

      • totally fine to relax this

  • The endurance tests would be at least 45 minutes each (up to like 2 hrs) so its a lot of time, would need both of yall for this to trade off

  • Flight test plan should be thorough, note everything you expect to occur in flight

  • Test plan must have details for Anthony Luo to review

    • Anthony wants tables and not bullets

• Hardy Yu Yuchen Lin putting together test plan for Houston practice and then two Pegasus things

  • ping Anthony Luo and Megan Spee and Nathan Green with questions.

• Drone bookings

  • Saturday Houston for training

  • Sunday Pegasus if all is ready

  • Sunday Houston autonomy testing

• Anthony Luo would like full logs from controller and pixhawk from all flights for future reference

• Anthony Luo doing presentations to impart knowledge!

• Please start on the quizzes and then ask for stick time so we can get you up to speed!

• Please come to flight tests to learn how things are goin!

• Hardy Yu and Yuchen Lin are only ones so far (and they’re doin great!!! )

• Anthony Luo Running the system!

• No RFCs yet! Ask questions when ready to add to arch doc.

• Arch doc is pre drip

• Please subteam leads and project managers delegate this out to members to alleviate load

• Sections soft allocated and details for subteams so please add thoughts