wannabeaflyers 6 DOF with 24V DC gearmotor

Projects coming along great, will be following with interest.
would be very interested to know what torque your motors are going to put out also as
about to order 12v motors for 6dof from china that achieve 23nm at 100rpm, 43 amps. hoping 6 of those will be enough
so yours will be good to compare against.

Hi @wannabeaflyer2

can I ask what control system you are going to use? from your posts you have
simtools, bff software, kangaroo/sabertooth, and Thanos 1280usb.

both bff and the usb 1280 have the inverse kinermatics maths, so how are you going to tie it all together ?

regards Terry

Hi Telfel , The Current plan is to go with Sabertooth Motor Controllers fitted with Kangeroo Interfaces and Controlled BY Ians BFF 6DOF software , Initially it will be Manual operation just to see the ranghe of mechanical motion , For me this option will get me going ( I Hope ) i do have all the separate parts to build a 2 DOF Race seat for my Boy which will be driven by Arduino & my 2 x 60 Sabertooth motor Controller and Then Controlled by Simtools... My USB128 will be for the Big Big Boy when the money comes along, or better still e-bay becomes a bigger friend ( nothing wasted just gotta make sure they doesn't get obsolete before i use them LOL .. Tonights a big night as im now heading out to my man cave to see if i have set the Controllers up and addresses right before i try to talk to the whole system using Ians Software...Nervous or what ? . i know it seems like i have too many options but i have been lurking so long and collecting bits even longer, its time i bit the bullet and stop dreaming and redesigning .. now its cut wood bend metal , burn plastic and generally create havoc in the man cave and after all that hopefully not making blue smoke Time

Hi
Good luck with your simulator cave, and take care when building testing your rig

regards Terry

Hello matey, I used M12 threaded bar for my joints and arms Looking forward to seeing it in action later tonight

Hi Silent Chill thanks for the Info , Look like i will need to Beef these up for the next build , Mine are 8mm , but have to say these were always about testing the setup , not the full blown weighted Sim as im not sure how these motors will perform Speed and load carrying wise, just need to see that the mechanics work and that it wont rip itself to bits because of my duff design ... Could not do comms check last night as i had a tidy up of the man cave to make space for when the monster Finally Moves under Pc/Game Control ( well at least i hope it will Cheers Guys ..

Hi guys back again, big smile on my face, just literally spent the afternoon redoing the autotune on all six axises on my platform base, damm thats a pain in the butt process, I feel im missing a trick , but hey they are all done, and all kangeroos setup with own addresses , even better I can talk to each card by selecting the chosen address, through describe, so thats a major tick in the progress box,
The best news came when I connected my platform to my laptop and ran Ians BFF software and fsx4 , at first I could not get the software to recognise com port 10, even though I could see the device was working in control panel hardware tab, also describe found it easily, head scratching time, after several attemps I then changed the usb port and bff config fike to match the new com port and the bloody things works a treat so far, so now I can see the axises moving following the motion cues (well their moving at lesst they look in synch) so im going to bed now seriously happy, no blue smoke so far, no runaway actuator movements and i have communication with the driver sofware, so its looking promising,
I only powered one actuator pair so far as I have not yet paralled all the motor power lines, thats tomorrowds task, still need to wait for delivery of some limit switches and spacers for the rose joints , then the beast will be videoed lol, early days guys , lots to learn and do but she's making progress

Doh forgot, any tips on the autotune process would be great as im gonna have to do it again when the platform is partially loaded and I fit the proper actuator arms, can someone confirm that you need to move the actuators using the cursor in the autotune section of the Describe program , or is there a way to manually set the pot or hall sensor range with the actuator not connected to the sensor during autotune, by that I mean, connect dvm to the sensor manually rotate sensor to find high , mid points and lowest readings them reset the sensor to 2.5volts and connecting the actuator arm set horizontal, to the sensor before finishing the final stage of the kangeroo autotune process, im finding using the cursor method a pain as it tends to overshoot when trying the set the min and max sensor voltage range to within 0.2v ... my 180 degree hall senors have a range of 0.2 to 4.4vdc when connected.... cheers guys

one step forward 2 backwards i love the dimension engineering controllers but the Kangeroo setup is proving to be Major Pain in the ( insert Correct term here) .. Hoped to have gotten further with this but have had to Contend with what i'm now sure is a dodgy USB to TTL converter (should of spent more £4.00 each ) .hmmmmmmm.m
its not a major issue but Bloody annoying , can any member recommend a reliable USB - TTL converter that does not Flag up "cannot connect to Com port X " every now and then , im sure this is why im having so much grief with Auto tune.

latest situation is , i have all the modules Connected on my baseplate , With all 3 Controller linked using a shared S1 line on the kangaroo card i can use describe see all 3 controller displayed in the Detect screen ,which is great to confirm the operation of each Channel / Motor linked to the card address . good news 1.

i can activate the Controllers Via FSX and Ian's BFF software , so least ways i have comms through the program and data seems to be going to the right Card/ Actuator Combinations Good News 2

the problem is too often the com port just drops out and i loose communication, so have to start the software process several times just to hopefully get the com port to be recognised ,,,,,,Bad News = Pain in the brain time .. this mainly happens in describe whilst trying to Upload any changes to the Kangeroo, or When trying to get Ians BFF software to get past the Com Port checking routine (if that fails the software closes and you need to start all over again ....Did i mention that's a Pain

will be finishing my Metal actuator arms in the next day so would have liked to have sorted the Kangeroo Autotune process before they are fitted ..

So have ordered some other USB - TTl Converters and may well even buy one from Dimension engineering if it gets me moving on this project . (Turns out it may have been false economy for e=bay specials But wanted to test the unit last week and they delivered next day )...

General shout out for info then guys , have seen a few post here regarding the Kangeroo setup but need some advice regarding the Values i should be looking out for to confirm a good or bad Autotune ...

have seen a few times the message "Control Error, suspected Runaway condition detected" press Om to restart Blah Blah and im guessing this has to do with the Sensor setting range, so am using a DVM to make sure i stop short of the min/max values of the 180° Hall sensor.. as i have noticed that if you go past 4.15Vdc or less than 0.2Vdc then she plays nasty when in live mode either that or The Control Error Message appears ..


Me thinks a day off work to play in the man cave will be required , fingers crossed the new USB -TTl converter performs better.. Cheers Guys..

Hi @wannabeaflyer2

have you thought of raising a ticket with DE, and attach your last few posts as an example of the problems your are having,
just to see what they have to say

regards Terry

Hi @telfel , I was going to wait till I tried my new USB-TTL adapters before bugging Charlene at dimension engineering again LOL most of the time the problems have been due to me missing something or not understanding the User gu ide info,
So to save embarrassment , this time i'll check out that avenue first , I do think this Kit will be the standard before long, as once they beef up the Describe & kangeroo user guides, im thinking their products ease the path towards motion simulation projects , once its all sorted its a good way to get into motion simulation Cost More than some other options but Robust and forgiving so not bad bang for Bucks Modules ... Watch this space guys , Once the head scratching is over im looking forward to powering the full platform up ( with the Biggest E-Stop switch Possible LOL yeah Yeah I know ye of little faith

Annoying but no pain No Gain.... bit of a mess but just need to get hings working then i'll back track and tidy up wiring

Hi guys still battling away with my issue , hoping Ian will be able to set me straight when he's back off Hoiliday, i thought id use this break to draw up my wiring diagram so that you guys could give it the once over.
Just in case like i mentioned its a case of not seeing the woods for the trees Thing , this is my take on Ians Guide to setting up the Electrics, so i've just laid his work out in my so called newbie style , credit where its due i only relaid it out to suit me( lunchtime project LOL

Hi @wannabeaflyer2, I go by BlazinH and I authored the interface to control one kangaroo directly from simtools. I did this not because I needed to use kangaroos myself, but because I had high expectations from them due to the fact I achieved very satisfying results using sabertooth 2x60’s with my own motor control software.

However, now after more than a year of seeing people attempt to use kangaroos, and after experimenting with them myself and attempting to get an auto-tune to even complete on my rig, my findings have been they are pure crap for simulators. Really sorry to have to say that but so far it has not been proven to me to be otherwise. I don’t wish to discourage you, but only to warn you that nobody else has been able to achieve good motion with them as of yet (that I have seen anyway). The attempts I’ve seen from people using kangaroos for flight simulators show jerky, poor motion. The kangaroos were designed more for industrial motor control and battle type robots. DE swears they should work well for simulators too but again, have yet to see it actually happen.

My advice is to go ahead and call (bug) Charlene at DE as much as is required. I’ve wasted hours of time myself going by what their documentation said when it was completely wrong or incomplete! And she is the one that said they should work for simulators! If people with simulators keep calling her with their problems maybe she will eventually figure out the kangaroo does not play well with them after all and quit saying it should!


Ps. No need to pay the ridiculous price DE is asking for a simple TTL converter though. FTDI or CP2102 have been proven to work just as well if not better.

And just FYI, Charlene and DE doesn’t know everything so some of it may still be up to you to figure out for yourself. For example, they couldn’t tell me how to control a kangaroo from a computer and I had to figure it out myself from this, “Note: \r\n is not visible in a terminal program, but must be included when using a function such as scanf to designate the end of the message”.

Unfortunately for you not many on this site run your setup, the wiring looks quite simple, but you have lots of signal interfaces, the configuration of which is your likely issue. What test equip do you have, can you trace where communications stop? If none, Hopefully Ian can sort you out.

Interesting to know @BlazinH , although I wonder how this guy got the Kangaroos to work OK? See his blog for details http://6dof.my.primusnetz.de/.

Looks like he used quadrature encoders @SeatTime, that’s how. Thanks for pointing that out. I should have stated I was referring to using analog feedback with the kangaroos is what sucks, especially hall pots, at least from my tests, and that is what wannabeaflyer2 said he is using.

I’m not saying it’s impossible, but is damned hard to get a good auto tune using analog devices as feedback on the kangaroo. And even though you can manually tweak the settings, the values used are not standard pid values so good luck with that.

With sketches already available here on this site for sabertooths, one really doesn’t need to use the kangaroo now anyway since it has proven itself to be a real PITA! And there are plenty of people here who are more than happy to help people out with those sketches if need and with information how to adjust their pid settings.

Ps I was able to get an auto tune completed on a test bed using the full range of a standard 360 pot. But when I tried a 90-degree hall pot, it would go out of range to quickly to complete an auto tune.

Ok, so the Kangaroo has an issue with any noise on the feedback lines. Seen plenty of noise with a Ard/analog pot setup - although a capacitor normally fixes it. He does say ' use no analog devices, as they could pick up noise'.

Hi guys thanks for the input , I have to say I went along the lines of using the Kangeroo because I thought hey this is easy ( major Wrong assumption ....well at least so far anyways) have seen you guys using sabertooths here, more and more , so given that Dimension engineering controls are good at what they do I thought the Kangeroo would be the icing on the cake.. the wooden sim shown by Seatime really was the one that convinced me it could be done, OK im still having grief but suspect it's as much me trying to get to grips with this system and as mentioned by BlazingH the lack of better details in the Describe manual, so tech stuff needs to be padded out for the lay man and inventor wannabes like myself... funny you guys should mention Encoders as I have just ordered 6 ( ebay link to follow) at a good price just bummer about delivery times. i will be gearing them up to get more ticks given the likely 160 - 170 Total Working Actuator movement and so maybe give the kangeroo and tuning a chance to come good, But hey it will give me time to Bug Charlene LOL. I actually Bought a few CP2102's and they seem to perform better than my original USB -TTl converters , still have com problem with BFF but Much better luck with Describe as I can see all the Modules in the detect Window so at least im making some small progress, Oh oh By the way started playing with the Ardunio / Sabertooth / Smc /Simtools setup so its all good stuff ..... Photo's tomorrow

been collecting all this Gear for years while lurking here and seeing as how the weather has grounded me from Paraglider flying, so im having a made catch up blitz with my Sim stuff ,enough dreaming I need to see some of these things built and running so that at least I can try to contribute something back to you guys ... Big Thanks guys for the heads-up , info, and the interest shown , really hope to have something to show...

These are the Encoders which i will fit 2 : 1 gear ratio 6MM 600P/R Photoelectric Rotary Encoder Incremental DC 5-24V AB Two Phases . at £8.00 each they have to be worth a shot if they can help to get round the issues I may be having trying to use my 180° Hall sensors .. Nothing wasted in this game we just store them till a suitable project comes along LOL... To Close now to give up