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SimpleBGC Software User Manual

1. Digital inputs MODE Serial decoders Mapping PWM out RC ROLL SumPPM VIRT CH1 Q Q Servo1 gt RC PITCH S bus is Q Servo2 gt RC YAW Spektrum VIRT CHx Servo3 FC ROLL O Servo4 gt FC PITCH PWM decoders Mix Angle control gt gt ROLL c9 gt Mx PITCH gt AB YAW gt Mapping amp i E 4 i Command 2 HIGH 9 CMD MID gt nz oi ee Analog inputs E 1 ADC1 a T Ext FC signal i ADC2 FC ROLL tet ADC3 FC PITCH 2013 2014 Basecamelectronics 29
2. It is normal that gimbal can start to vibrate when PID values come close to theirs maximum If any motor looses sync due to strong oscillations you can help to restore it by hand without interrupting the process In some cases you can get better result i e higher PID gains if you remove high frequency resonances before starting automatic tuning See section Digital filters for more details LED is flashing during tuning process When process will finish its job LED will light ON and new PID settings will be transferred to the GUI There is also a corresponding menu command that can start PID auto tuning without connection to the PC 2013 2014 Basecamelectronics 8 Adaptive control of PID gains This settings group lets to adaptively decrease PID gains when the system becomes unstable due to high PID gains For example system may be tuned very well in certain position but it may become completely unstable in different position Self excitation may cause strong vibration that may negatively affect gimbal construction and may be even dangerous for the camera Also when vibration accidentally comes it may brake whole footage Possible workaround is to use adaptive PID control RMS error threshold 0 255 RMS root mean square error state variable effectively shows the level of vibrations When it exceeds this threshold adaptive PID algorithm comes into action Recommended value is 10 15 Attenuation rate 0 255 the
3. Increase POWER parameter During fast YAW rotating camera deflects by ROLL and then slowly gets to horizon Bad accelerometer calibration Sensor is not in parallel with motor axes Make advanced ACC calibration by 6 positions Align sensor with motor axes During fast motion with acceleration camera deflects and then slowly gets to horizon This is normal effect of accelerations Try to increase Gyro Trust in Advanced tab YAW arrow slowly spins in the GUI Slow drift is normal less than 1 degree minute It s because of gyro drifts over time Note to sensor Immobility during gyro calibration Re calibrate gyro Camera slowly drifts by any or all axes just after power on Bad gyro calibration Re calibrate gyro Clicks and crunch are heard during work LED is synchronously blinking I2C errors present Errors are possible if sensor wires are too long or motors outs affect sensor by capacitive linkage Shorter sensor wires Lower pullup resistors value on the sensor board Install spike LC filter on motor outs make 2 3 turns of motor cable through ferrite coil Install spike LC filter on sensor wires the same as motor filter High frequency oscillations Feedback self excitation as a result of high D parameter Check the graphs to understand on what axis is the problem and lower D value Low frequency oscillations Feedback self excita
4. for example you can use AUTO function in the GUI Just place stick in center and press AUTO button Actual data becomes new center point Press WRITE button to apply settings o Dead band adjusts a dead band around neutral point There s no control while RC signal is inside this range This feature works only in SPEED mode and helps to achieve better control by eliminating jitters of stick around neutral point o Expo curve adjusts the curvature of an exponential function that allows to get precise control from RC in the range of the small values but rough and strong control near endpoints Works only in SPEED mode e Limit Accelerations this option lets to limit angular accelerations in case of hard RC or Serial control useful to prevents jerks or skipped steps smoother camera control less impact on the multirotor s frame The less is value the smoother is camera rotation under control e PWM Output allows to pass any of virtual channel decoded from serial input signal to special pins that can output PWM signal On the SimpleBGC 3 0 boards these pins can share PWM output function with other functions Servo1 FC ROLL Servo2 FC PITCH Servo3 RC PITCH Servo4 AUX1 To enable servo output on any of these pins make sure that its not specified as RC input in the GUI This feature may be useful if you connect RC receiver by single wire and want to decode signal to the separate PWM channels When connect
5. its dedicated for hand held systems only NOTE that this option is ignored if you connect second IMU mounted on the frame because the data from the second IMU is more precise than from motors Follow Flight Controller camera is controlled from RC together with the mixed signal from an external flight controller FC Almost every FC has servo outputs to drive a gimbal It feeds the information about the frame angles to this outputs in the PWM format that all servos understand SimpleBGC can get this information and use it to control a camera It is necessary to connect and calibrate external flight controller see EXT FC GAIN settings After calibration you can setup the percentage values for ROLL and PITCH axis so the camera will follow frame inclinations Follow PITCH ROLL this mode is dedicated to ROLL axis mode hand held systems FC connection is not required In this mode the position of the outer frame by PITCH and ROLL is estimated from the motor s magnetic field This means that if motor skips steps position will be estimated incorrectly and operator should correct camera by hands returning it to proper position You should use this mode carefully for FPV flying because if the camera misses its initial direction there is no chance to return it back automatically locked to the ground E soft transition hie carriers J TEN El follow frame o Follow ROLL start deg Set the angle in
6. 5 PEE RIGHT FJ Skip Gyro calibration at startup CALIB ACC CALIB GYRO Configure Camera IMU Frame IMU MOTORS ON OFF Cycle time 0 02 0 05 I Parameters successfully loaded from board The GUI contains different functional blocks 1 Configuration block in the central part of the window organized by tab e Basic Basic gimbal stabilization settings Adjusting these settings is usually adequate to achieve good camera stabilization e Advanced More precise tuning options e RC settings to control the gimbal roll pitch yaw orientation with RC inputs e Service Specify the behavior of the MENU button located on the controller board or mounted externally and tune the battery monitoring service e Follow settings related to special mode of the camera control when it follows frame e Monitoring real time sensor data monitoring This screen is extremely helpful in tuning your gimbal performance Firmware Update Firmware and GUI software versions and update options e Upgrade lets you to check the fresh version of firmware and upgrade if necessary e Filters settings to setup digital filters for PID controller Connection COM port selection and connection status Profile Profile selection loading re naming and saving Control Panel graphic visualization of gimbal orientation angles in three axes e Black arrows are displaying the angles blue arrows are a 10x time
7. GUI and even to upgrade firmware remotely MAC OS users GUI uses a serial communication that needs to create a lock file To allow it you should to do the following steps 1 Start terminal navigate to Applications Utilities and double click on Terminal 2 Make folder var lock by command sudo mkdir var lock 3 Change permissions by command sudo chmod 777 var lock 4 Allow to run non signed applications in System Preferences Security amp Privacy General Allow Applications downloaded from Anywhere Running application Follow these steps to connect your main controller board to the GUI software e Connect the mini USB cable e Start the GUI select correct COM port from the list and click Connect After the connection is established all board settings and profiles will be loaded into the GUI You can re load the current board parameters anytime by clicking the READ button e After adjusting parameters in the GUI you should write them to the controller board by clicking the WRITE button Only the current profile parameters will be saved to the board To return to the default settings select from menu Board Reset to defaults This command restores default setting for active profile only and does not affect general settings and calibration data To completely restore factory setting choose Board Erase EEPROM command This command erases all settings in all profiles and all calibration data
8. To do this in the GUI go to the tab Monitoring and switch on the following graphics RMS ERR R RMS ERR P RMS ERR Y Slow tilt the camera downward until vibrations occur Most growing graphic will show the necessary axis In the example it is RMS ERR P Pitch axis 2 When in steady state vibration mode look at frequency indication check another variable in the same tab FREQ P It shows the main frequency of vibration in our case it has value 100 Another way is to use spectroscope for example as application for smartphone that takes audio signal from mic but it helps only if vibration is well audible 3 On the tab Filters fill out the parameters of the first notch filter for Pitch axis Frequency 100 Width 10 checkbox Enabled is switched on 4 Write the parameters to board The vibration has been significantly reduced and its frequency shifted to 105Hz Change the frequency of the filter to 105 Hz Now the frequency shifted to 95 Hz Set back value of the frequency to 100 and increase the bandwidth to 20 Now vibration on this resonance frequency is completely gone Note you need to set the bandwidth as narrow as possible Too broad bandwidth can result in decreased PID efficiency 5 Having closed one resonance continue increase gain of PID Responsible for gain are the parameters P D Second resonance occurs on frequency 140 Hz when we tilt the camera upward Fill in values for second notch filter for PITCH axis to
9. e To choose a different profile with different settings select it from the list of profiles located in the upper right corner of the GUI window You can store different settings as 5 different profiles onto the controller board You can switch profiles saved on the board by choosing the profile in the GUI by pressing the hardware MENU button or from RC transmitter You can give names to profile to better distinguish them Custom names are stored in the GUI settings starting from 2 41 version names are stored in the board too Remember that some settings are common for all profiles and can not be saved on a per profile basis Parameters such as sensor orientation hardware configuration RC inputs and motors outs are the same across all profiles and are called general settings further 2013 2014 Basecamelectronics 2 GUI overview Ia SimpleBGC GUI v2 42 b3 alan mium x File Board Language View Help Connection Profile COM27 v Disconnect Lock1 U Rename Load Board version 3 0 Firmware 2 42 b4 basecamelectronics com Basic Advanced Service Follow Monitoring Upgrade Filters PID Controller Motor Configuration P POWER INVERT NUM POLES 189 0 05 ROLL 499 gj 28 182 0 15 PITCH 429 rj 28 v a v 01 YAW 130 e mij 28 v 189 AUTO Adaptive PID gains control Sensor rj ROLL FJ PITCH J YAW Axis TOP RMS error threshold 40 Attenuation rate 50 Recovery factor
10. in real conditions frame vibrations wind etc 2 Calibrating the sensor Gyro is calibrated every time you turn the controller on and it takes about 4 seconds Try to immobilize sensor camera as hard as you can in first seconds after powering on while signal LED is blinking After powering on you have 3 seconds to freeze gimbal before calibration starts If you activated option Skip gyro calibration at startup gyro is not calibrated every time and controller start working immediately after powering up Be careful and recalibrate gyro manually if you will notice something wrong with IMU angles Calibrating Accelerometer You must perform ACC calibration only once but it s recommended to recalibrate it from time to time or when the temperature significantly changes e Simple calibration mode set the sensor horizontally and press CALIB ACC in the GUI or menu button if it s assigned LED will blink for 3 seconds Try not to move sensor during calibration At this step no matter how camera is leveled You are calibrating the sensor not the camera e Advanced mode recommended perform calibration in simple mode as above Then turn sensor in order that each side of sensor looks up 6 positions at all including base one Fix the sensor in each position press CALIB ACC button in the GUI and wait about 3 4 seconds while LED if flashing The order does not matter but the base position always goes first because the simple calibr
11. in your motor s bell During the auto calibration process described above this value is automatically detected However this value is sometimes not correctly determined during the auto calibration process and will need to be verified and possibly corrected manually Most brushless gimbal motors are built with 14 poles or magnets and utilize a DLRK winding scheme Count your motor magnets and enter this value if the value is not correct in the GUI e Sensor Specify your IMU sensor board s orientation and position on the gimbal For a standard IMU sensor installation look at the gimbal from behind just like the camera will view out from the gimbal Viewing the gimbal in this way the UP and Right direction will match the Z and X axis You can place the IMU sensor in any direction keeping its sides always parallel to the motor axis be very accurate here it is a very important to precisely align the sensor and mount it firmly Configure your IMU orientation in the GUI The correct configuration should result in the following 2013 2014 Basecamelectronics 5 Camera pitches forward the PITCH arrow spins clockwise in the GUI Camera rolls right ROLL arrow spins clockwise in the GUI Camera yaws clockwise YAW arrow spins clockwise o Skip Gyro calibration at startup With this option the board starts working immediately after powering i
12. issued for your board Q Can I upgrade firmware from Mac or Linux A Yes starting from GUI 2 42b7 But check the note above Q My board has no USB connector but has bluetooth Can upgrade firmware A Yes you can upgrade via Bluetooth the same way as USB Integrated module already configured properly to work for upgrade External modules need to be configured to 115200 baud even parity If you have problems with re connection to bluetooth under Mac OS you can try to upgrade in the manual mode using FLASH jumper as described above Q I am using external bluetooth module and it works fine with the GUI Can I upgrade firmware through it A Yes if you configure module to Even parity To work with GUI it may be both Even and No parity setting but to upgrade firmware it should be configured in the Even parity only Look for instruction for your module how to configure it Q Is it required to disconnect battery when upgrading firmware A No there is no matter if board powered from battery or from USB only Q After upgrade my GUI can t connect to the board What to do A Its important that firmware and GUI both have matched versions Changes in the firmware usually require changes in the GUI so old GUI will not work with the fresh firmware You can download matched GUI from our website Link to matched GUI generally provided in the description of the firmware Q I got error during uploading CreateProcess e
13. magnification to provide higher precision Red marks show target angles that gimbal should keep e Thin blue lines shows the maximum peak deflection from the central neutral point 2013 2014 Basecamelectronics 3 e Blue digits show peak deflection amplitude Using these numbers stabilization quality can be estimated e Vertical red bars to the right of the scales show actual power level from 0 to 100 e Gray arrows shows the angle of a stator of each motor if known READ WRITE buttons are used to transfer setting from to board MOTORS ON OFF button is used to toggle motors state At the bottom of the screen tips status or error messages in red color are displayed Overall cycle time and I2C error count is also displayed 8 Battery voltage indicator with warning sector Language menu The GUI starts in the English version of the user interface To change the interface language choose one in the language menu and restart the program View menu You can change a visual theme from the View menu For example when using GUI outdoor better to switch to one of the high contrast themes Further in this manual each tab is described in details At the end of this manual you can find step by step tuning recommendations 2013 2014 Basecamelectronics 4 Basic Settings Note Before tuning your controller install the camera into the gimbal firmly and ensure your gimbal s center of gravity is leveled as muc
14. more stable You may chose which axis to tune Best result may be reached only if to tune each axis separately But for the first run you can tune all axis at the same time If you want to use your current settings as start point select Start from current values Otherwise values will be set to zero in the beginning Select Send progress to GUI checkbox to see how PID values change in real time during tuning process Select Log to file to write PID values together with some debug variables to the file auto pid log csv It may be analyzed later to better understand system behavior There are number of tools to plot data from log files for example http kst plot kde org How it works Tuning process does simple job it gradually increases P I D values until system enters in self excitation state It means maximum possible gains are reached Than it rolls back values a bit and repeats the same iteration 2 times Averaged good values are stored as PID settings During process you should firmly hold your gimbal in hands You can place it on the support but check that it provides strong hold not less than your hands After about minute of work you can see that PID values have grown big enough and camera is stabilized Now you can slightly tilt handles in all directions to emulate real usage conditions Find point where self excitation is maximum and continue tuning system in this point a worse case position
15. more this value the more PID gains are decreased Choose this value big enough to quiet system quickly Effect of different rates is shown on the picture err threshold 10 a rate 10 rate 50 rate 100 o 10 35 60 BE 11D 135 16D 185 210 235 260 285 310 335 360 385 410 435 43I 485 Recovery factor 0 10 defines how fast PID gains are recovered back when the system becomes stable Too low value may increase a chance that vibration comes back in short time Too high value may cause worse operation because lowered PID values are kept longer Recommended value is 5 6 You can enable this feature selectively for each axis 2013 2014 Basecamelectronics 9 RC Settings tab SimpleBGC board provides very flexible configuration of remote controller It supports up to 5 digital inputs including one that supports most popular serial protocols and 3 analog inputs It can also output RC signal in pass through mode or by Serial API commands Full RC routing diagram you can find in the Appendix C of this manual e RC Input Mapping here you can assign hardware RC inputs to virtual control channels There are 5 hardware digital inputs provided on the board for RC Radio control connections and 3 analog inputs for connecting joystick Each input you can assign to control any of three channels one for each axes and one command channel If control for an axis is not needed leave the option at no input e RC ROLL pin mo
16. poles because all further calculations use this information For YAW axis it allows to fine adjust a camera heading relative to a frame heading For PITCH and ROLL axis there is an option to calibrate offset automatically To do this power on system hold frame leveled and press AUTO 2013 2014 Basecamelectronics 12 button Don t forget to write setting when finished If the camera after power on is not leveled you need to adjust the offset setting v p wih indi SPEED adjust the speed of the camera rotation in the follow mode Don t set big values that motors can not handle if motor does not produce enough torque it will skip steps and synchronization will be broken In this case acceleration limiter may help to have big speed but do not miss steps e LPF adjust low pass filter applied to control signal If this value set high fast movements of the handle will be smoothed But it requires careful operation near stop point otherwise camera will overshoot after you stop rotation of the handle Operation in the Follow Mode At system startup in the follow mode keep the frame horizontally and manually adjust the camera to the horizontal position and adjust it s heading Camera easily jumps between the magnetic poles Rotate the camera by hands to desired horizontal position it will stick to the nearest magnetic pole Gently rotate a
17. the frame heading estimated from the second IMU may drift with time and auto correction may not work in all cases If the sensor is placed below YAW motor it does not help YAW axis stabilization but works more reliable In this position there is additional option you can choose from Below YAW PID source It means that if Frame IMU is mounted below YAW motor it can be used as data source for PID controller In some cases this can give better result than the main IMU because mechanical system IMU Motor becomes more stiff when its length is shorter and its closed loop operation becomes more stable Like the main camera IMU the frame IMU may be mounted in any orientation keeping its axis parallel with motor s axis Configuring the frame IMU To configure the frame IMU first of all set its location in the Advanced tab Sensor area Write settings to the board and go to the Basic tab Press the button Frame IMU Sensor Axis TOP Y RIGHT Skip Gyro calibration at startup CALIB ACC CALIB GYRO Configure Camera IMU Frame IMU If the second IMU is connected properly this button becomes active It means that all IMU settings now affect on the frame IMU Change sensor orientation axis TOP RIGHT and write setting to the board if necessary board will be restarted After restart calibrate the accelerometer and gyroscope like you did it for the main IMU For the accelerometer you can do simple calibration or ex
18. to stop motors when the voltage drops below it Compensate voltage drop set this option to automatically increase the POWER parameter which controls the output power goes to the motors when the battery loose voltage due to discharge process Set defaults for select the battery type to fill the fields above with the default settings for selected type NOTE you can add the voltage sensor to old boards in DIY way by soldering a voltage divider 33k 10k 33k goes to the battery 10k goes to the GND and common point goes to the pin 19 of the 328p MCU if this pin is grounded de solder it first 2013 2014 Basecamelectronics 16 Buzzer On some boards there is an output to the buzzer or buzzer is installed on board that is triggered on some events like notification on errors or confirmation for user actions Events are configured turned ON or OFF in the GUI You can connect an active buzzer only which has an internal sound generator working from 5V currents below 40mA check this Digikey product search for example If you have no buzzer connected there is an option to beep by motors Motors can emit sound only if powered and turned on Status LED There are 2 LEDs on board Red led lights when the power for MCU is present Green blue LED signals show actual state of the system e LED is off pause before calibration to take hands off or to level gimbal e LED blinks slowly Calibration is in action Fr
19. A2 A3 and accepts analog signal in range from 0 to 3 3 volts For example joystick variable resistor provides such signal Connect A1 A3 to the center contact of variable resistor 3 3V and GND to side contacts See Connection Diagram for more info o VIRT CH XX In case of RC ROLL pin mode is set to multi channel signal format you can chose one of the virtual channels e Control targets o ROLL PITCH YAW controls the position of the camera o CMD allows to execute some actions You can configure 2 or 3 position switch on your RC for specified channel and assign it to CMD channel Its range is splitted into 3 sections LOW MID HIGH When changing the position of your RC switch signal jumps from one section to another and assigned command is executed The full list of available commands is described in the section MENU BUTTON of this manual o FC ROLL FC PITCH is used to mark any of PWM inputs to be a signal from the external flight controller See External FC gain section for details e Mix channels you can mix 2 inputs together before applying to any of ROLL PITCH or YAW axis It lets to control the camera from the 2 sources joystick and RC for example You can adjust the proportion of the mix from 0 to 100 e ANGLE MODE RC stick will control the camera angle directly The full RC range will cause a camera to go from min to max angles as specified above If RC stick doesn t move camera stands still The s
20. WA BAsEcCAM SimpleBGC Software User Manual Board ver 3 0 Firmware ver 2 42 GUI ver 2 42 2013 2014 Basecamelectronics Connection to PC To connect board to your PC you need a miniUSB cable First time a USB cable is plugged you need to install the appropriate software driver If your PC does not install the driver automatically install one manually from this link http www silabs com products mcu pages usbtouartbridgevcpdrivers aspx After you install the driver and connecting the board a new virtual COM port will be created You need to choose this COM port in the SimleBGC software GUI to initiate the connection It is safe to connect USB and main power battery simultaneously But be very careful to not reverse the polarity of the main battery because in this case it will burn out controller and may damage your PC There is also a possibility to use Bluetooh To Serial adapter HC 05 HC 06 Sparkfun BlueSMiRF and comparable to connect to the GUI and tune the board remotely There is a special connector on the board that matches the same one on the BT module It is marked as UART and contains pins 5V GND RX TX You can solder BT module over it or use extender Male Male 4pin cable IMPORTANT NOTE Bluetooth module must be configured at 115200 baud rate and Even parity generally its not set by default refer your module s user manual to find how to configure it With these settings you will be able to connect to the
21. ation cancels a result of advanced calibration You have not to press WRITE button calibration data is written automatically after each step NOTE Precise accelerometer calibration is a very important for horizon holding during dynamic flying or YAW rotation 2013 2014 Basecamelectronics 23 Z A Z x Z JX X i Ze gt ZX gt X 4 Tuning basic settings e Connect the main power supply e Set POWER according to the motor configuration see recommendations above e Auto detect number of poles and motors direction Do not proceed to next step until proper direction will be detected e Adjust PID controller To check stabilization quality use peak indicator in the control panel shown by the blue traces and blue numbers Incline the frame by small angles and try to minimize peak values by increasing P and D to its maximum You may use gyro data from Monitoring tab to estimate stabilization quality too Better to tune PID with the Follow Mode turned OFF for all axes Suggested algorythm for PID tuning 1 Set 1 0 01 P 10 D 10 for all axes Gimbal should be stable at this moment If not decrease P and D a bit Than start to tune each axis sequentially 2 Gradually increase P until motor starts oscillate you may knock camera and see on the gyro graph how fast oscillation decays Increase D a little it should damp oscillations and decay time decreases The
22. cancel this band too the same way as above 2013 2014 Basecamelectronics 19 In this example we have not needed to set filters for the other axes But it can happen that resonance occurs on more than one axes Then you will need to set filters on both axes possible with the same frequency Low pass filter Magnitude dB and Phase Responses ME EE P ETE re ee ES 2 1334 eS Se 27 0903 e al ea er sal kek eee EE Zu kw ka NE 52 0473 T in B 30 t 1 21 24 N mm dm mm mm mm ee tee ee tebe 77 0042 2 E Ej S amp 40 i r oe Ne 101 9611 E 50 F p5555552 n mnn n mm n mm mm md mm mkm md mm mm n md mm kx m 126 9181 Filter 1 Magnitude Filter 1 Phase 0 0 1 0 2 0 3 0 4 0 5 0 6 0 7 0 8 09 Normalized Frequency xx rad sample Applying this filter can be needed for large gimbals heavy cameras with high moment of inertia or for gimbals with reduction gear The working frequency range for them are lower than of the lightweight gimbals But factor D of PID regulator increases feedback the more the higher frequency At a high frequencies the response of the mechanical system can be not sufficiently precise and fast because of many reasons high frequency resonances propagation delay of mechanical impact nonlinearity due to the backlash and friction etc Due to this the system tend
23. de allows to configure several formats of incoming signal for RC ROLL pin o Normal incoming signal is in the PWM format that most RC receivers generally outputs o Sum PPM some receivers may have this signal output It is a PWM format modification in which every channel transmits sequentially through one cable In this case you do not need to connect other channels read your receiver s user manual to check if it has SumPPM out o Futaba s bus receivers made by Futaba may transmit data in special digital format up to 16 channels by one wire Connect it to RC ROLL pin o Spektrum another digital multi channel protocol that is used to communicate Spektrum s satellite modules with the main module and in its clones Because there are many modifications of this protocol it may not work as expected in the first versions of SimpleBGC firmware but we will work on correct implementation in next versions There is a dedicated socket on the board marked Spektrum that matches standard connector You should bind satellite module with the transmitter manually e For each control targets you can choose appropriate hardware input from the drop down list o RC ROLL RC PITCH RC YAW FC ROLL FC PITCH hardware inputs on board that accept signal in the PWM Pulse Width Modulation format excepting RC ROLL see above Most RC receivers output this signal type o ADC1 ADC2 ADC3 dedicated analog inputs marked on the board as A1
24. degrees of the camera PITCH ing up or down where the ROLL axis enters follow mode Below this angle ROLL is in lock mode o Follow ROLL mix deg Set the range in degrees of the camera PITCH ing where the ROLL axis is gradually switched from the lock mode to follow mode see picture Hint to completely disable follow for ROLL set these values to 90 0 To permanently enable follow for ROLL regardless of the camera PITCH ing set values to 0 0 Follow YAW the same as above except it can be enabled only for YAW axis For example you can lock camera by ROLL and PITCH axis by selecting Disabled option but still control camera by YAW by enabling Follow YAW option There are additional settings to tune follow mode Dead band degrees you can set the range where the rotation of an outer frame does not affect the camera It helps to skip small jerks when you operate gimbal by hands Expo curve you can specify the strength of the control when outer frame declines from neutral position For example when the expo curve is enabled i e is not flat small or medium declination of an outer frame will cause very fine control But the strength of control exponentially grows when angles of declination becomes close to 60 degrees It gives a big freedom in camera operation from fine and smooth control to very fast movements OFFSET it is a very important to properly configure the initial position of the motor s magnetic
25. eeze gimbal during this process e LED blinks fast system error stabilization cannot be performed To check error description connect to GUI e LED blinks fast for short time confirmation for user action e LED is on normal operation mode e LED is on but blinks irregularly I2C errors appears Check in the GUI I2C errors counter Also additional LEDs may present to signal serial communication on RX and TX line 2013 2014 Basecamelectronics 17 Monitoring tab In this tab you can see raw sensor data stream logical RC input levels and some debug information e ACC X Y Z accelerometer data e GYRO X YZ gyroscope data Helps to determine quality of P and D settings Disturb gimbal by hand and see trace If it looks like sine wave D setting is too low and gimbal tends to low frequency oscillations If some noise is always present even without any disturbance D setting is too high and gimbal tends to high frequency self excitation e ERR ROLL ERR PITCH ERR YAW stabilization error graph Same as peak indicators on the control panel and shows maximum deflection angle Each graph can be turned on or off scale can be adjusted for Y axis You can pause the data transmission at any time You can receive extended debug information from the board by selecting the checkbox Receive extended debug info Useful information you can get from the board e RMS ERR R RMS ERR P RMS ERR Y RMS amplitude of gyro sensor da
26. er from 90 to 90 degrees If you are not satisfied with the speed of movement adjust the I term setting for PITCH in the Basic tab Try the SPEED mode and feel difference with the ANGLE mode Connect and tune remaining axes the same way as required 6 Testing gimbal in real conditions Connect controller to the GUI and turn ON multirotor motors holding it above your head Check the vibrations on the camera by using Monitoring tab ACC raw data Try to decrease the level of vibrations using soft dampers NOTE Brushless motors versus traditional servos provide faster reaction but less torque That s why it s hard for them to fight against wind and air flows from props If you are developing multirotor frame by yourself try to avoid this influences for example lengthen arms a bit or tilt motors away from center or place camera above props in case of H frame Also bear in mind when copter moves with high speed an air flow is deflected and can affect the gimbal 2013 2014 Basecamelectronics 25 Possible problems and solutions Problem Possible causes Solutions Motors don t spin Power supply is not connected Supply polarity inverted POWER set to 0 Check all connections Set POWER between 50 200 Camera is trying to align but falls back Camera is not balanced It s an error in motor windings or one phase is broken POWER is not high enough Balance camera Check motor winding
27. h as possible e P I D PID regulation parameters for all axes o P describes the power of disturbance response Higher values means a stronger response reaction to external disturbance Raise this value until the stabilization quality of fast disturbances will be adequate If the P value is too high oscillations of the axis will start to be present These oscillations will get worse if there are vibrations that reach the IMU sensor board f oscillations occur raise the D parameter by 1 or 2 units and then try to raise the P value again o D The D value reduces the reaction speed This value helps to remove low frequency oscillations A D value that is too high can cause high frequency oscillations particularly when the IMU sensor is exposed to vibrations In special cases it may be filtered out by digital filters see below o The Il value changes the speed at which the gimbal moves to incoming RC commands and to move the gimbal back to neutral Low values result in a slow and smooth reaction to RC commands and to getting back to neutral Increase this value to speed up the movement e POWER maximum voltage supplied to the motors 0 255 where 255 means full battery voltage Choose this parameter according to your motor characteristics Basic tuning o Motors should not get too hot Motor temperatures of over 80C will cause permanent damage to motor magnets o A Power value that is too low will not
28. h flying it is recommended to set low values 40 80 which will give more stable horizon for longer time For aggressive flying it s better to set higher values 100 150 o Accelerations compensation enable it to use a physical model of multirotor to compensate accelerations during flight This option works only when external FC is connected and calibrated e Serial port speed changes baud rate used for serial communication Decrease it when using over the air serial adapters that can t work on maximum speed The GUI can auto detect the baud rate configured in the board e PWM Frequency sets the PWM frequency used to drive motors by power stage Two basic modes are available Low Frequency in audible range and High Frequency 22kHz outside audible range Recommended mode is High There is also third option present Ultra high 7 30kHz e Motor outputs you can assign hardware motor outs for any of stabilization axes For example you can use second controller for YAW stabilization and set it up this way ROLL disabled PITCH disabled YAW ROLL OUT and connect a YAW motor to hardware ROLL OUT e Sensor o Starting from 2 42 this setting is replaced by Low pass filter in the Filters tab o Gyro high sensitivity Increases gyro sensitivity twice Use this option for big sized DSLR cameras in case if your PID settings are close to upper limits but stabilization still not good Increasing gyro sensitivity equals
29. ing regular hobby servo to these ports there are two options where to get 5V to supply them o Connect external power for example from 5V BEC to the central pin of any of RC inputs and cut de solder jumper J1 that passes 5V from internal voltage regulator to them WARNING two power sources joined together may burn each other because switching DC converter is used to provide 5V supply for the board and it may conflict with the external power source o Close solder jumper J1 and get 5V from internal voltage regulator WARNING before connecting servos check their total maximum current rating and compare it with the current rating that board can provide on the 5V line you can find it in the hardware specifications of the board for regular Basecam SimpleBGC 32bit version it is 1A 2013 2014 Basecamelectronics 11 Follow Mode tab There is a special control mode when the camera follows for a tilting of the outer frame but eliminates small frame jerking Several modes of operation are possible Disabled camera is locked to ground and may be rotated only from RC o Estimate frame angles from motors it use magnetic field for rough estimation of frame tilting Helps to increase the range of the frame angles where the gimbal s operation is stable To proper operation in this mode it is strictly required to calibrate Offset setting see below Like with the Follow mode its not recommended to use this option in flight
30. ion before flight if there is no RC control connected Motors toggle Motors ON Motors OFF commands to change the state of the motors Reset controller Frame upside down configures system to work in upside down position New configuration is stored to EEPROM and applied even after restart To switch back to the normal position execute this command again Look down points camera 90 degree down or maximum allowed limit under 90 configured by the MAX ANGLE parameter in the RC tab Home position returns camera to the initial position that is configured by the NITLANGLE parameter in the RC tab WARNING There is a special action if you press menu button 10 times in series full erase of all settings Use this option for recovery only if board is not accessible from the GUI Battery Monitoring On the all 32 bit boards and some 8 bit boards there is a voltage sensor installed to monitor the main battery voltage It is used to apply voltage drop compensation to make PID stay stable during whole battery life cycle and to make low voltage alarms and do the motor cut off when the battery becomes discharged Calibrate adjusts the rate of internal multiplier to make measured voltage more precise You need a multimeter to measure the real voltage than enter this value in the calibration dialog Low voltage alarm set the threshold to make alarm when the voltage drops below it Low voltage stop motors set the threshold
31. lower is decay time the better 3 Repeat step 2 until D reaches its maximum when high frequency vibration appears you may feel it by hands and see noisy line on the gyro graph Current P and D values are maximum for your setup decrease them a little and go to step 4 4 Increase until low frequency oscillation starts Decrease a little to keep gimbal stable Now you found a maximum for all PID values for selected axis Repeat from step 1 for other axes 5 When all axes are tuned in static try to move gimbal s frame emulating a real work You may notice that cross influence of axes may make gimbal not stable In this case decrease a little PID values from its maximum for axes that looses The result of good tuning stabilization error is less than 1 degree when you slightly rock a gimbal s frame 2013 2014 Basecamelectronics 24 5 Connecting and configuring RC Connect one of the free receiver s channels to RC_PITCH input preserving right polarity In the RC Settings tab Set SORCE PWM Assign RC_PITCH input to PITCH axis Leave all other axes and CMD as no input For PITCH axis set MIN ANGLE 90 MAX ANGLE 90 ANGLE MODE checked LPF 5 SPEED 10 not used in angle mode Connect the battery to the main controller and receiver and check that RC PITCH input receives data in the Monitoring tab slider should be blue filled and reflects to stick movement Now you can control the camera from your RC transmitt
32. nd tilt the frame Turns within 45 will control the speed of the camera from 0 to 100 Camera rotates in accordance with the SPEED settings until it s angles are not equal the frame s angles or until given restrictions will be achieved If the camera moves unpredictably perhaps its the wrong direction of rotation of the motors and you need to change the Reverse flag in the Basic tab To achieve the smooth motion increase the LPF parameter in the RC tab increase Expo curve and decrease the SPEED and the Acceleration limits For more dynamic control change these settings in the opposite direction In case of failure of stabilization due to external disturbances the camera can completely lose synchronization with the frame In this case it is necessary to return it to the proper position by hands IT IS VERY IMPORTANT to keep the frame horizontally because at this point the frame s zero angles are calibrated You can switch between modes on the fly by activating different profiles Camera will keep their position between modes 2013 2014 Basecamelectronics 13 Advanced tab e AHRS options influencing on camera angle determination accuracy o Gyro trust The higher is value the more trust to the gyro data compared with the accelerometer data when estimating angles It can reduce errors caused by accelerations during moving but also decreases gyro drift compensation resulting in horizon drift over time For smoot
33. nect to the board normal way 2 Choose firmware file 3 Press FLASH button and wait for process to be finished Upgrading under Mac OS and Linux Starting from 2 42b7 its possible to upgrade firmware from GUI under Mac OS and Linux and virtually any other OS Open source tool stm32ld is used to upload firmware to the board NOTE If its failed to run tool under your OS you can compile it from sources located in the SimpleBGC GUl bin stm32ld src folder Place a result to the SimpleBGC GUIbin folder renaming it to stm32ld mac for Mac OS stm32ld linux for Linux family and stm32Id for any other OS 2013 2014 Basecamelectronics 21 FAQ and Troubleshooting Q Firmware uploading process was interrupted and board is not working now not responding to GUI Is it fatal A No its not fatal for your board moreover its impossible to damage board such way You just need to upload special recovery firmware You can find it in the firmware folder named simplebgc recovery 32bit or download from our site Refer to instructions how to upload firmware in the manual mode Then you can connect to the board and upgrade to any version as regular Q know from somebody that there is fresh version but don t see it when checking for updates Why A Its normal There are may be beta versions available for beta testers only or may be different versions for different boards You will receive only stable versions
34. peed of rotation depends on the SPEED setting and the acceleration limiter setting 2013 2014 Basecamelectronics 10 e SPEED MODE RC stick will control the rotation speed If stick is centered camera stands still if stick is deflected camera starts to rotate but does not exceed min max range Speed is slightly decreased near min max borders Speed of rotation is proportional to stick angle and the SPEED setting RC control inversion is allowed in both of control modes e INVERSE Set this checkbox to reverse direction of rotation relative to stick movement e MIN ANGLE MAX ANGLE range of the angles controlled from RC or in Follow mode To inverse the control set higher value first and lower value second For example if you want to configure a camera to go from leveled position to down position set 0 90 or 90 0 to inverse To disable constraints in SPEED mode set MINANGLE MAX ANGLE 0 e LPF Control signal filtering The higher is value the smoother is reaction to the stick commands This filter cuts fast stick movements but adds some delay e INIT ANGLE if RC control is not configured for any axis or there is no signal system will keep initial angle specified in this field e RC Sub Trim allows to correct transmitter inaccuracy o ROLL PITCH YAW trim central point trimming Central point here is PWM 1500 It s better to trim it in transmitter But in case of it is not possible when using joystick
35. provide enough force for the motor to move the gimbal and stabilize the camera adequately A low power value will be most noticeable in windy conditions when the gimbal is not well balanced or if the gimbal suffers from mechanical friction Slowly lower the Power parameter to find its optimal value Find the lowest value that still provides good stabilization and adequate holding torque o Raising the power equals raising the P value of PID settings If you raise the POWER value you should re tune your PID values as well e Additional power that will be add to the main power in case of big error caused by missed steps It helps to return camera to the normal position If main power additional power is greater than 255 the result is limited to 255 e INVERT reverse motor rotation direction It s extremely important to choose the correct motor rotation direction to not damage your gimbal To determine the correct direction set the P I and D values to 0 and the POWER values to 80 or higher if your motors don t produce enough force to hold move the camera Level the camera tray horizontally and click the AUTO button in the Motor configuration settings The gimbal will make small movement to determine correct motor rotation direction Wait for the calibration procedure to complete Then re set your PID values and tune your Power values e NUM POLES Number of motor poles This value needs to be equal to the number of magnets
36. rror 14001 A Some required libraries are missed in your system You need to install Microsoft Visual C 2008 x86 redistributable http www microsoft com en us download details aspx id 5582 2013 2014 Basecamelectronics 22 Step by step setup sequence 1 Adjusting the mechanics Mount the camera on the tray and balance the gimbal in all three axes Stabilization quality strongly depends on balance quality To check your balance pick your turned off gimbal in hands Make fast motions along all axes try to catch resonance point and swing the gimbal If it is hard to do gimbal is balanced correctly NOTE Good balance and low friction can scale down power consumption and keep good quality of stabilization If you rewound motors by yourself it s recommended to check winding Remove motors from gimbal connect them to controller and set parameters P 0 I 0 1 D 0 for each axis and set enough POWER Connect main power supply Motors should spin smoothly while rolling the sensor Little jitter is normal due to magnetic force between rotor and stator cogging effect Pay great attention to sensor installation Its axes must be parallel with motor axes Pay attention to mechanical links They must be a VERY RIGID and backlash free Sensor provides feedback data for stabilization and even any little freedom or flexibility will cause delays and low frequency resonances This can complicate setting of PID and cause unstable work
37. s by all axes for 10 30 seconds 2013 2014 Basecamelectronics 14 o Push AUTO button again to complete calibration Calibration will stop automatically after some time too New gains will be written into EEPROM and shown in the GUI NOTE You may skip this step and leave zero values at initial setup 2013 2014 Basecamelectronics 15 Service tab Menu Button If you ve connected menu button to BTN connector on the controller you can assign different actions to it Action is activated by pressing button several times sequentially 1 to 5 clicks by pressing and holding long press Available actions Use profile 1 5 loads selected profile Calibrate ACC the accelerometer calibration works the same way as button in the GUI Calibrate Gyro gyroscope calibration Swap RC PITCH ROLL temporary swap RC inputs from PITCH to ROLL In the most cases only one PITCH channel is enough to control a camera in 2 axis systems Before a flight you can assign control from pitch channel to roll and make a camera precisely leveled Activating this function again swaps channels back and saves roll position in the static memory Swap RC YAW ROLL like the previous point Set tilt angles by hand motors will be turned off after that you can take the camera in hands and fix it in the new position for a few seconds Controller will save and hold the new position This function may be useful to correct camera posit
38. s to self excitation when gain increases Low pass filter reduces the gain at a high frequency and increases stability of the system But as drawback low pass filter results in phase delay which grows negative near the crossover frequency and can negatively affect the PID stability This is a reason of the complexity of configuring this filter and its usage is not always justified Up to 2 42 version parameter Gyro LPF was responsible for LPF and provided a first order filter Now it is not used and changed to a second order filter with more precise tuning of frequency and independent configuration for each axis 2013 2014 Basecamelectronics 20 Firmware upgrade tab To check if the firmware upgrade is available connect the board and press CHECK button You will receive information about all available versions of firmware and can choose version to upgrade When selecting a version in drop down list its full description is displayed in the text area below To upload selected version to the board press the UPGRADE button Uploading process will be started Generally it takes about 10 30 seconds to finish WARNING Do not disconnect USB cable or break wireless connection while firmware is uploading If you get error during uploading firmware CreateProcess error 14001 you need to install Microsoft Visual C 2008 x86 redistributable from this link http www microsoft com en us download details aspx id 5582 There is an op
39. t on using the saved calibration data from last gyroscope calibration call However stored calibration data may become inaccurate over time or during temperature changes We recommend you to re calibrate your gyro from time to time to ensure the best performance Second IMU sensor There is an option to install the second IMU sensor on the gimbal s frame The advantage is more precise stabilization you may use lower PID s to get the same quality and knowing of frame tilting that greatly helps for 3 axis system to extend the range of working angles Second IMU should be connected to the same I2C bus as main in parallel Sensors should have different I2C address Main IMU 0x68 Frame IMU 0x69 On the Basecam IMU address 0x69 may be set by cutting the ADDR bridge located on the back side of the sensor y QUIT amp w QJ cU gu im Mounting the Frame IMU There are two options where to place the second IMU below YAW motor and above it In case of 2 axis stabilization there is only one option above ROLL motor 2013 2014 Basecamelectronics 6 Frame IMU above YAW mmm YAW MOTOR below YAW above ROLL FOLE PITCH N CUN Camera IMU If the sensor is placed above YAW motor it helps to stabilize ROLL PITCH and YAW motors But the system becomes less stable during long work because
40. ta In case of oscillations it helps to define which axis is unstable Its may be not so clearly from raw gyro data because oscillations may have high frequency far above a frame rate that GUI can receive and display FREQ R FREQ P FREQ Y the main frequency of oscillation If RMS ERR is too small this parameter is useless 2013 2014 Basecamelectronics 18 Digital Filters tab This tab contains settings to configure digital filters that can help to improve quality of PID controller operation Notch filters a a n Magnitude Response dB a o 7 2 z oa qm z Notch 1 wide Notch 2 narrow 0 0 1 0 2 0 3 0 4 0 5 0 6 07 0 8 0 9 Normalized Frequency xx rad sample These filters can reject narrow bandwidth They can help in case when the system has a pronounced mechanical resonance Raising the extent feedback gain oscillations will appear first on the mechanical resonance frequencies and does not depend on variations of P I D settings In this case using one or several notch filters can help to increase feedback gain and get more accurate and stable work of PID regulator But this filter will be useless if oscillations appear in the broad frequency range In this case it is better to use low pass filter Example my gimbal works stable but when camera tilts downward 60 degrees strong vibration occurs and does not allow to increase gain of PID 1 First detect which axis causes vibration
41. tended 6 point calibration You may notice that right panels with arrows are displaying now angles not for the main but for the frame IMU Also in the Monitoring tab accelerometer s and gyroscope s data go for the frame IMU It helps to properly configure an orientation of the sensor and check its calibration 2013 2014 Basecamelectronics 7 PID auto tuning This feature will be helpful for the beginners who experienced difficulties with PID tuning Before you start automatic tuning its very important to properly configure hardware of your system motor outputs Power Inverse and Number of poles latest 2 setting may be detected automatically as described in the user manual Also main IMU position should be configured and accelerometer and gyroscope should be calibrated Plug in a battery connect board to the GUI and press Auto button in the PID parameters section You will see dialog window where you can setup auto tuning process PID auto tune configuration Sm Better stability Better precision Adjust axis FI ROLL I PITCH i YAW Initial values Start from zero 2 Start from current values Send progress to GUI _ Log to file START STOP CANCEL Slider at the top defines the target of tuning If its close to Better precision it will try to achieve maximum gain and keep it If close to better stability it will find maximum gain and than decrease it by 30 50 to make system
42. tion as a result of high D parameter or high P Lower P increase D GUI cannot connect to the board Wrong COM port selected GUI and firmware versions doesn t match Try different COM ports Upload the latest firmware and download matching GUI version 2013 2014 Basecamelectronics 26 SimpleBGC 3 0 32bit connection diagram IMU SENSOR GND BATTERY EE L4 ac E B BUZZER 5 12V E FRAME IMU EU IMU SENSOR pb c ess Enes CAM STAB ROLL CAM STAB PITCH SWOI 5v 06 6 00 ee e e e e e e FLIGHT CONTROLLER OPTIONAL e CAM CONTROL ROLL SumPPM SBUS e e e CAM CONTROL PITCH e CAM CONTROL YAW RECEIVER YAW PITCH ROLL MENU BUTTON j l e 5 1 e FERRITE RING ional if I2C errors JOYSTICK 1 3 2013 2014 Basecamelectronics SimpleBGC 3 0 32bit bluetooth connection Settings Baud rate 115200 Parity Even or None Data bits 8 Stop bits 1 BLUETOOTH To upgrade firmware via Bluetooth only Even parity will work Starting from firmware ver 2 41 None parity is supported too Note that by default most modules configured with None parity PITCH ROLL 2013 2014 Basecamelectronics 28 SimpleBGC 32bit RC signal routing diagram firmware ver 2 42
43. tion to configure system to check updates automatically When new version will be issued you will be prompted to upgrade to it If automatic upgrade fails for example there are may be problems to upgrade using Bluetooth connection under Mac OS you can try to upload firmware in the manual mode You can find downloaded firmware in the SimpleBGC_GU firmware folder and upload this file in the manual mode Uploading firmware in the manual mode This option intended to special cases when the board becomes bricked GUI cannot connect to it and you need to upload special recovery version of firmware or when you experienced problems with automatic upgrade Use this mode carefully and only if you understand what you are doing Disconnect any power source USB cable Close set FLASH jumper on board attach jumper to 2 pins marked as FLASH shorting them Connect board to PC by USB cable Run GUI select COM port but don t connect and go to Upgrade firmware Manual tab DO NOT PRESS CONNECT IN THE GUI IF JUMPER IS CLOSED If pressed you need to repeat all steps from the beginning Poh gt 5 Choose firmware file hex for Windows bin for all other OS Select board version its v3 x for 32bit boards Press FLASH button and wait for process to be finished Open remove FLASH jumper If board is alive you can connect to the GUI you can upload firmware in manual mode without setting FLASH jumper 1 Con
44. to multiplying P and D values by 2 This option has no noticeable effect for 32bit boards o Frame IMU set the location of the frame IMU See Second IMU sensor section of this manual e External FC Gain Gain value for matching the gimbal data from your flight controller optional For better stabilization and utilization of some additional features the knowledge about the frame inclination angles is required SimpleBGC IMU doesn t provide such information Most of FC have servo outs for connecting gimbals This outs should be connected to SimpleBGC controller through EXT ROLL and EXT PITCH inputs o Activate gimbal outs in FC and set range limits for angles you generally fly for example 30 degrees of frame inclination should equals full servo range about 1000 2000 o Deactivate all filters and smoothing of FC gimbal settings if present o Inthe RC tab make sure that inputs EXT ROLL EXT PITCH doesn t used to control gimbal i e are not chosen as source for any other RC control task o n Monitoring tab check availability of EXT FC ROLL EXT FC PITCH signals and make sure they are split to axes correctly Frame roll angle tilting should cause EXT FC ROLL change in approximately 900 2100 range The same is for pitch o Connect power supply and setup stabilization as described above tune POWER INVERT PID o Push AUTO button in External FC Gain group and smoothly incline aircraft s frame to different direction

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