FlyPT 6DOF/Stewart/Hexapod Interface for linear and rotating actuators

Sure I will. Thank you for the link!

Hi FlyPT
today i tried yout wonderfull software
But i guess I made more then one mistake

Can you please explain me witch motor should be No. 1?
I wrote my axis into this screenshot:

How would be then the port settings?

The other problem is al lot more confusing
The movement of the grafic is correct, but my rig rides completely different
I tried to control heave but the rig maks a yaw move
Aktually I can say:
Sway moves like pitch
Surge moves like Roll
Heave moves like Yaw
Yaw moves like Heave
Roll moves like Surge
Pitch moves like Sway

My Axis Settings in SimTool are the same as you made in the first post in this threat


Hopfully you can help me

Kind regards
Peer

Hi,

Sorry for the late reply.
The green bar you see in the 3D representation, is the front of the rig, where you are looking at when seated in the rig.
First actuator at your front right is #1 and they increase in the clock direction until #6, the first one on your front left.
This is the numbering for the interface.
If you put "<Axis1a>" in the serial string, this represents the actuator #1 in the interface, with the above logic.

If what you have in your picture is your numbering, then:

#1 in interface is <Axis1a> in serial and it's your actuator #4
#2 in interface is <Axis2a> in serial and it's your actuator #5
#3 in interface is <Axis3a> in serial and it's your actuator #6
#4 in interface is <Axis4a> in serial and it's your actuator #1
#5 in interface is <Axis5a> in serial and it's your actuator #2
#6 in interface is <Axis6a> in serial and it's your actuator #3

So to send data to your actuator #1, you use <Axis4a>
So to send data to your actuator #2, you use <Axis5a>
So to send data to your actuator #3, you use <Axis6a>
So to send data to your actuator #4, you use <Axis1a>
So to send data to your actuator #5, you use <Axis2a>
So to send data to your actuator #6, you use <Axis3a>

From your settings, you are using 3 Arduinos with SMC right (from your thread)?
If so, that's two actuators in each board.
Then your connection string should be:

[A<Axis5a>][B<Axis5a>][C<Axis6a>] on the board that controls the actuators #1 #2 and #3 of your rig
[A<Axis1a>][B<Axis2a>][C<Axis1a>] on the board that controls the actuators #4 #5 and #6 of your rig

You have <Axis6b>, that might be a copy paste error by youbuddy on your thread

Also, for testing, configure simtools, with just:


And use the interface sliders to verify if everything is correct.
When everything looks correct, you can test some mixing on simtools

Thank you very much for your help.
But it doesn´t help.
I´ve used now these settings:

But there is still the wrong action when i use the blue fader:
Sway moves like pitch
Surge moves like Roll
Heave moves like Yaw
Yaw moves like Heave
Roll moves like Surge
Pitch moves like Sway

And i got another probem
I don´t know why, but however the maximum angle was ignored while i tried to use heave and surge was not back on "0"
So the arm goes over an brokes the connection to the poti.
I think there is a failure in my seetings so the max circle is to big.

Now i first have to fix this hardware problem.
After that i will test again

have i nice weekend
Peer

Are you sure that COM5 is for actuators 4 and 5
COM6 for 6 and 1
and COM7 for 2 and 3?

Because they seem swapped.

EDIT: Wait, let me take a look at SMC software...

EDIT #2:
Ok, SMC3 accepts 3 motors in each board.
You are using two in each board.
So maybe you should send the 3rd axis with zero:

[A<Axis1a>][B<Axis2a>][C<0>]

You have to be sure, that for each board, you have the actuators connected correctly.
First what I said above and next if you have physically connected actuator 4 on your rig to arduino in the Axis1a pins and actuator 5 on arduino Axis2a pins.
Same for the other boards.
Hope I explained what I mean.

@C1500 Yes, don't be scared to switch your com port around. The computer is mostly the one who decide the order. You just have to find it. Mine has to be like this.

Hi
my setup is like this:


So it should be OK
I found 1 mistake in the middle angle
It was 0°, but this means the crank is on the outside.
When i change the value to -170° the grafik semas to be right.

*short test break*

OK, it works
The biggest problem was in front of the monitor
The angles of the Cranks where completely wrong.
Also the revers settings was wrong

With this settings, it looking very good (still have to repair one motor)


Now the movement looks realy good with this interface.

The 3D grafic looks like this:


Thanks so much for your support.

Kind regards
Peer

That´s why I inserted the [C<Axis6b>] as yobuddy explaind me.
But i will try also your [C<0>]

By the way @pmvcda , the lock at lowest position now is working fine. I don't know if it's because of the new version or because I did some change in smc3.

Version 1.6.9

Download on the first post of this topic

Been working on something new... That made me change many internals of the interface.
So here's the new version, with more filters:



-New washout filter calculation.

-Using the filters, it's possible to reproduce a simple motion cuing algorithm.

-Faster pose calculation with changes to add more DOF in the future

-Small optimisations in drawing

-Solved spikes in filters when we changed types

-Corrected problem when going to lowest position

-Now works when minimised

-Roll over changed.
If filtered value reaches limit, it's cropped and stays there, although internally it's still calculated, so it might take some time to see the value moving again.
You should apply filters like washout or high pass to avoid reaching limits.

-Optimised interface visualisation code, way less if's and loops.

-Graphics records data only when visible, so everything is reset if you hide it.

-Changed scale. Now scale is applied only to the final output. It was causing problems on the actuators (and lowest position).

Awesome will try without tomorrow

New version always at the beginning of the week... Tease.

It's the result of more free time at weekends.

An example of settings for LFS:



This is working for me, with my current setup in Simtools.
It's just to give an idea of proportions and filters I'm using, specially in mixing yaw with roll and pitch with surge.

(Note: We can see the yaw roll over in action on the graphic)

Hi FlyPT
For rotary actuators, would it be possible to output in the GUI additional boxes with:

- Angular position of each crank lever after the math (0.00 deg. as horizontal pos. )

- Output position of each actuator scaled to 100 percent (50.00 percent being the middle position)

Thanks

Yes, the % was already on my mind, because of scale.
What I mean is, everything is calculated in degrees and mm and has no relation to the output range, so there's a scale to make values match the rig dislocations.
If we change scale, there's no way to visualize it without rig, only with a % value or the output value in bit range.

The angle is just subtracting the middle value specified on the rig dimensions to the value shown on the interface.
The angle shown is the angle relative to the angle you specified as middle.

Is there a special reason to show it relative to the horizontal instead of middle of the range?
(my rig is linear, so not much experience with rotating problems)

“there's no way to visualize it without rig, only with a % value or the output value in bit range.”

yes precisely

"Is there a special reason to show it relative to the horizontal instead of middle of the range?"

keeping the 0 as horizontal while displaying crank angles could be more consistent for the user as your "heave offset" for middle position takes already the 0 horizontal as reference.

Not really sure if it's answering your question

Once we have those two variables (bit output% and crank angles) we can cross reference if the kinematic operates properly.

Thanks

I mean, I guess the 50 percent output has to be in the “middle” (platform operational starting point) regardless how big is is the heave offset.

I don’t know how you deal with that regarding the scaling factor.

With displayed variables I am asking for it will be transparent

The rotating scale is not working. Made some changes and messed it (both for rotation and linear, although on linear the result should be OK).
I have a new version to upload today. I'm just adding the % you asked on the output.