2024-05-07 EE Architecture

Owned by Daniel Puratich
Last updated: 2024-05-08
4 min read

ToC

During Meeting Notes

  • Discuss features we want for the next rev of hardware.

    • was intended to be zp4 focussed, got out of hand quickly

  • Autonomy, EFS, & EE Leads present

  • chose two board

  • daniel gave the same pitch he’s been giving before, i’ll write this later

    • integrate compute and flight controller (rpi and pixhawk)

  • having like elrs transciever as a castellated board

  • phone connection and usb to it

  • Why RPi 5

    • 130 cad

    • rpi vs jetson

  • scrws & standoffs in the stack

  • phase 1

    • using supported proccessor, are they available commercially

    • rpi5 hat pixhawk

      • includes all pixhawk functionality

    • should be careful on imu and barometer mount

      • everything is in the little cube

    • stack would be

      • rpi5

      • lte hat

      • zp

  • phase 2

    • ~50W 5V power supply

    • everything else that’s an objective toard final goal

  • Final Goal

    • everything on drone comes off except for

      • ESCs

      • rc link (ELRS)

      • telemetry link (right now lte via phone, will be added to the stack)

      • video system (vtx + camera)

      • GPS

      • Main power current sensor (bc it’s a part of the hv system)

    • Rpi + LTE hat + ZP all connected in one big stack

    • power input from batt, couple sensors come out

    • separate LV and HV systems

  • Super Far Goal

    • final goal + combined RF link for rc link telem and video

  • Insane Goals

    • custom rpi

    • rf heartbeat

  • todo

    • what do we not like

    • what are we trying to optimize

  • ok so here we go

    • no zp4, its not needed

    • no need for the extra auto stuff

    • focus on tangible objectives

      • monster mount CAN device ← Michael Botros

      • making ESCs support CAN ← Meghan Dang

      • possible make the GPS (which are uart) a CAN thing so we can space them a ton

      • Video system unified board reduce harnessing, CAN to pixhawk

      • combinging power supplies: already in BEC project

      • servo module CAN support

    • having the stack will reduce system complexity and assembly complexity

      • a problem we have is assembling small connectors, but let’s come up with a way to reduce those

  • zp is a solution kind of, but there are better solutions to worse problems that are simpler

    • new pixhawk is a fun and interesting project, not very high value, be upfront about it

    • zp4 solves integrating everything into a single stack with would simplify failure points and making it a single easy to work with assembly.

  • Going all in on CAN is a worthwhile endeavor because

    • makes electrical harnessing easier in exchange for firmware complexity

      • we want EFS team to have comp related projects

    • it is doable and made up of lots of smaller projects

    • it is easily reversible if we don’t like it architecturally

Summary