News New 6dof+ AASD15 Servo Motion Controller

I greet the community of the movement platforms.

Advanced servo motor control unit for up to 7 motors
For AASD Series servo motors

Due to the corona crisis, I found time with the submission and idea of the great thanos controller to develop another. thank you thanos for your great work. My controller has been specially developed for 6dof flight simulators. But it can also be used for all other simulation platforms. The aim was to use the high resolution of the servomotors for a very fine movement with the highest possible resolution in order to achieve a very
realistic flight simulation, but without losing speed and responsiveness.
The controller was mainly designed for the AASD servos. However, it can also be used to operate other servomotors. It can be used to operate all servomotors whose amplifiers are operated by the Step / Dir function.



The following functions are operated by the controller:


Hardware functions

1. Control of up to 6 + 1 servo motors (opt.)
2. Pulse speed up to 550 kHz
3. Step / DIR mode
4. Query and evaluation of torque (for calibration) and error status
5. Display of parameters via LC display 16x2
6. Operation via rotary encoder with push button
7. Switch for signal reception
8. Emergency stop switch for servo functions
9. Power switch for USB signal (in development)
10. Serial USB connection for data transfer
11. 32 bit processor
12. Storage of the setup data
13. 2 LEDs for status display
14. Housing
15. Control unit can be installed 3m away
16. LC display and encoder can also be installed on the mainboard

Software functions
1. Monitoring the status of the motors
2. Automatic calibration of the servomotors
3. Service function for repairing or checking the engines
4. Manual control of each motor individually for testing
5. live Scaling the output signals (master gain)
6. Filtering of the output pulses (EMALP / SPIKE)
7. Offset function for each motor (especially for rotating actuators)
8. Variable parking position
9. Actuators individually adjustable (electronic translation, length of the act., DOF system)
10. Calculation of different gearboxes
11. Calculation of different directions of rotation (CW / CCW)
12. Actuator parking can be set individually.
13. Speeds for calibration, slow speed and high speed freely adjustable (max. 550 kHz)
14.Inverse kinematics with> 1000 calculations per second (for linear and non-linear actuators)
15. Geometry for steward platforms with 6 DOF and 6 actuators individually adjustable
16. Support for rotating actuators and linear actuators
17. Separate scaling and filtering for Surge Sway Heave Yaw Roll and Pitch
18. Reinforcement, EMALP filters, logistics filters
19. Wash-out filter for each axis (adjustable in strength)
20. Evaluation of 24 bit input data (Simtools / Mover)
21. Calculation in 32/64 bit for maximum smoothness of movement
22. 2 different operating modes: direct or firmware inverse kinematics

there is the possibility to connect the display and encoder directly to the pcb. there is the need of installing
and extra online switch.




i will offer the board for sale in the next time if there is interest. there will only be small series on pre-order. first of all, i'm looking for people with different rigs to test the inverse kinematics on other machines. Most of the firmware should be save up to date. the external hand-held device can be made by yourself. i will publish the plans and 3d models.
please ask but actually it may need some time for me to answer.
thx for your interest.

I am interested in one of your boards.
I like the way you did the remote the external hand-held device.
Good luck with your project

I'm sure there is interest. If you can you post a video of it woking and share more details though that would likely peak more interest. And what's its price to compare with others that are currently available for sale?

As a flight simmer I am interested in a controller that will make that experience more realistic with greater resolution but at this stage I only have a small scale prototype. I’m working on that for understanding before committing to a full build. Were you using the controller in the videos you created in your profile?

Yes all my videos showing the use of my controller. i started developing this one last year in november. it was lot of work. i had some real fligths in a c172 and some ultraligths. the feeling with xplane gets very real . msfs2020 motion data is not so good.

i have made some videos for explaining but quality after upload is bad there will be more the next days


1. showing basic startup


2. how the filters can work


Crash filters for xplane are very important this will be my next video.

please ask ,if you want me to explain something special

Great. Thx. So just to understand, like Thanos’ controller, no potentiometers are required because the controller calibrates to set limits within the capability of the actuators?. Is your setup essentially the 750w Ac motors and gearbox connected to the controller. What software do you run between the controller and xplane? Simtools, Flypt mover? Look forward to seeing next videos. Thx again.

Thank you, yes no potentiometers are required. either you use a hard stop for the actuators (checked by the controller) or you use a stop switch, there are extra pins on the pcb for this.

now here are some vid from the filter setups working



the second is shorter an better movement i think

hey, today i got the first pcb series from china. new provider and small changes to the board. I will finish it and test if everything works. I also installed an encrypted bootloader and hardware security against copying the firmware. so there can be regular updates for new functions and bug fixes. Now I would be ready to accept the first orders. But first after the vacation one week. I'll write here when the time comes and where to buy.

Hello, sorry that it has been so long since my vacation, but at the moment time is running out like nothing.

it's ahead i finally finished the controller, a year of development has now flowed into it.

Like thanos, I started with a 2560. however, I did not have background knowledge of programming with assembler.therefore I quickly realized that the 2560 was much too slow for my project and tried something faster, the arduino due at least 32bit and 84 mhz. with this one could shoot at least 200kpps but for 550kbps and proper filters and the inverse kinematics that wasn't enough either.
So I looked again and didn't want to leave the programming environment and now it became a SAME70 with 300mhz as well as cache and fpu. So there is definitely enough juice now. also for future connections such as a tft display or datalogging to sd without hardware adjustments. let's see. the whole firmware is written in c without framework.

I have set up a github channel on which all documents are stored and future firmware is also saved

https://github.com/motion4sim/AASD15A-Servo-Controller-for-Motion-Simrigs

there you will also find instructions and other documents for operating the controller


there will be 2 models, one for the external control unit and one with lcd and encoder on board
these will be compatible, which means that the external control unit can also be connected to the 2nd model

you can also print the external control unit with display yourself and assemble it from just a few parts. soldering skills are required for this.
the instructions and files for 3d printing can be found on thingiverse

https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4641555

there are also the stl files for the controller housings

Video about firmware update process




the next days i will upload some videos of how to connect the drives and operate them.
i will show you how to make the settings for the actuators.

the sale ad is on tindie for review as soon as it is approved i will publish this here.


from the "pre-series" I still have 3 pcb that are all fully functional. they differ in layout and have a usb B connection instead of a micro usb in the final version.
I would sell these boards cheaply please write to me via pm if you are interested

thank you

Hey today i made a new video to show how the pulse speed of the controller correlates to the electronics gear
settings in the aasd drive

if you are interessted read also the description on youtube

Hi, this cyber monday morning here from lockdown germany. hope this ends as fast as possible .

if someone is interessted to buy a controller , tindie has approved my sale.
https://www.tindie.com/products/21727/

Hi had some time this morning to make a video
of how to connect to simtools and use the 2 inputmodes
of my controller

standart input mode and

kinematics




have fun

We finally got a price. I was expecting yours would be less than what is already available and firmly established however so good luck with sales.

How did you source the rest of the components for your setup? Did you make most yourself or have some of them made for you?

Hi what Do you mean? The Parts of the controller? Or the other Parts of my simulator. I think so. The cnc Parts are manufactured by a Company . The others are done by myself. Do you need help for Parts just ask.
LG

Wow man, this slipped under my radar!! very cool project mate!! have you got it working with flypt mover?? that is where the real magic is happening (in the 6dof world anyway haha)

Looks very thanossy though.. what's the difference

Hey thank you for asking , you are rigth thanossy

yes looks a lot like thanos but there is motion4sim inside well i started with a controller from master thanos for my simmotion machines. but especially for flying the movement with large actuators I wanted more. I was also very interested in building such a controller myself. that's why I started developing. the principle is ultimately the same, only by using a 32 bit avr it was possible to increase the actuator resolution to 24 bit in software and increasing resoltution in hardware in factor 10 (550khz max pulsing) and also to calculate the kinematics for 6dof in real time, as does flypt in mover. that gives a few more fps for the game if needed. i think i have solved some details better, like morphing into movement and filters.
The lowpass filters and spike filters are calculated floating point in 32 bit and leave nothing to be desired. especially the spike filter works so well with large actuators that you can safely let small children ride the bull without anything happening. yes, the controller is fully developed in all its properties. If anyone is interested in testing, write to me. there is no risk. watch my videos on youtube.




there are more vids on my channel

enjoy and thank you

PS: mover and flypt is fully supported also simtools

Very cool mate! Thanks for the debriefing, very informative! Does it handle linear actuators at all?