NAZA-M Lite First Flight Problems

[RunnerDuck]

I've just spent the last three months building my Turnigy HAL Quadcopter with NAZA-M Lite MC using a Taranis X9D Plus transmitter and Taranix X8R receiver.

My first attempt at flying it failed miserably. The problem is I have no roll control to speak of. If I move you stick left or right the motors speed up and slow down as they should.

I made a little video of it that may or may not give you some clues.

I was slowly bringing the power up and it suddenly rolled to the left. I discovered that the front left prop came loose and that's what cause the flip. I tightened all props and tried again.

I gradually applied power and I tried liftoff but it started to roll to the right. I checked the props again and they were OK. It tried again while adding more and more left stick. I tried it in Manual, ATTI and GPS modes to no avail.

One thing I did notice was the LED started flashing red as I got up to speed.

Here's a video from my FPV camera hoping you might find a clue.

Here's a picture of my quad:

View attachment 22211

 

[Rotorfreek]

I would put money on one of the following:

Motors plugged into the wrong Naza ports... It should be m1 starting at the front right, then going anti-clockwise to m4.

Your motors are not spinning the correct way. They should be spinning as per the pic I've attached. If not, swap any 2 ESC cables to reverse it.

Check the props are on the correct arms. Now you have sorted the motor spin direction, make sure that as the props spin the leading edge of the prop is at the top of the blade.

Finally do a basic then advanced calibration in Naza on a flat surface, then a compass calibration away from any metal.

Let me know...

Sent by my thumb, a trusty slave to my crazy mind. The above is the ramblings of a lunatic, and should be treated as such. Terms and conditions apply.

 

[RunnerDuck]

Thanks Robofreek, I'll do exactly what you say and report back.

In the meantime you didn't attach your prop-rotation pic

 

[cootertwo]

Yes, usually when I have a Naza Lite that won't fly "out of the box" so to speak, it's usually a wire or more plugged into the wrong slot, and or calibration. And you might want to do your tests on the grass, would be easier on the props, until you get it figured out.

 

[Rotorfreek]

Sorry about that later!!

Sent by my thumb, a trusty slave to my crazy mind. The above is the ramblings of a lunatic, and should be treated as such. Terms and conditions apply.

 

[Gary Seven]

Sorry about that later!!

Sent by my thumb, a trusty slave to my crazy mind. The above is the ramblings of a lunatic, and should be treated as such. Terms and conditions apply.

Hey @Rotorfreek, just wondering how you did this image. It doesn't look like a jpg or gif image upload or anything like that, so how did you do that?

Sorry for the OT post.

 

[RunnerDuck]

The only thing I know for sure at this point is I have the correct props on the correct motors properly oriented and they are spinning in the correct directions. Beyond that I'm not sure.

One question? Is there any way to calibrate the ESC's with the NAZA-M Lite plugged into the Taranis X8R receiver through the SBUS? I know I can do this with my KK2 but not sure about the NAZA.

 

[Gary Seven]

The only thing I know for sure at this point is I have the correct props on the correct motors properly oriented and they are spinning in the correct directions. Beyond that I'm not sure.

One question? Is there any way to calibrate the ESC's with the NAZA-M Lite plugged into the Taranis X8R receiver through the SBUS? I know I can do this with my KK2 but not sure about the NAZA.

@RunnerDuck Assuming your not using the DJI E300 system (the ESC's don't need calibration), you should connect each motor, one at a time, directly to the throttle "channel" you've assigned in the Taranis and calibrate your ESC's. So forget S-Bus for the moment until you're sure you've got all ESC's calibrated.

Of course I use S-Bus as well with the Taranis and the X8R, but didn't have to calibrate. But I think what you would have to do is connect your motors one at a time to CH3 (assuming that's what you assigned in the Taranis and which BTW, NAZA insists on) and go through the procedure. Once finished with all four, then you can connect up via S-Bus and give her a try. You are aware that NAZA insists on the following channel arrangement, right? CH1-AIL; CH2-ELE; CH3-THR; CH4-RUD

HTH.

 

[RunnerDuck]

Thanks Gary for the comments. I'm using Turnigy Plus 30A's. I did program them once when I first started building this quad using only my X8R. I think they should still be calibrated but just thought I'd check.

I do have my channels set up correctly as described above.

I'm not sure I totally understand your procedure with the NAZA. I've never hooked it up without SBUS.

The inputs from the X8R to the NAZA, I assume, would be X8R outputs to A - E - T - R of the NAZA and it has outputs to M1 - M4. So I'm not sure where your Channed 3 comes into play. Obviously I'm missing something here.

Or should I just calibrate them through the X8R as before.

Thanks, I'm still kind of nube!

Ken

 

[RunnerDuck]

Thank you all for the comments. I have checked everything. I unplugged and plugged everything in. I recalibrated my ESC's. I recalibrated the sticks on my transmitter. I recalibrated my MC. I did the" NAZA Dance".

This video is the result of all that effort!

I'm attaching all the screen shots from NAZA Assistant from when I recalibrated it.

I hope someone sees something wrong because something surly isn't right!

View attachment 22260 View attachment 22261 View attachment 22262 View attachment 22263 View attachment 22264 View attachment 22265 View attachment 22266 View attachment 22267 View attachment 22268 View attachment 22269 View attachment 22270 View attachment 22271 View attachment 22272 View attachment 22273 View attachment 22274 View attachment 22275 View attachment 22276 View attachment 22277 View attachment 22278

 

[SleepyC]

If you are 100% sure everything is spinning in the right direction and the props are on right.

TRY...

1st, your GPS puck is no way 8cm from the CG. It's probably 15cm - 20. The CG of your craft is where all the weight centers. Try putting that at around -15cm.

2) Your gains are all set to 100.
Try this: Basic Gains= Pitch 150%, Roll 150%, Yaw 100%, Vertical 105%, Attitude Gains= Pitch 150%, Roll 150%

 

[ChrisErl]

Seeing as this is about the naza lite have you guys seen the hack to flash it with naza v 2 ? From what I read it works well.

 

[Rotorfreek]

Do a quick 2 tests for me...

1. Push both sticks on your controller up and right - all the pointers in Naza should go to the right hand side if so is well.

2. Go to the screen where you select it as a quadcopter and do a 'motor test'. Watch that each motor in turn moves in the number pattern and direction of my previous post.

Sent by my thumb, a trusty slave to my crazy mind. The above is the ramblings of a lunatic, and should be treated as such. Terms and conditions apply.

 

[Rotorfreek]

I've just watched your video again... There is no way your motors and props on the right are on right - there is no lift dispite a lot of spinning! I bet without any doubt that if you hold it down and run the props that one ofb them is blowing air UP. Which means a prop on the wrong arm or a reversed motor direction.

When you go in circles with an issue, its always almost that you've missed a simple issue and think you've already correctly checked it.

Sent by my thumb, a trusty slave to my crazy mind. The above is the ramblings of a lunatic, and should be treated as such. Terms and conditions apply.

 

[TahoeTim]

I ran the video in slow motion. Not enough footage but it looks like the left rear orange prop could be the wrong prop or not spinning up. Maybe your controller is mounted wrong. Is the little arrow pointing forward? Same goes for the gps. Post a video of it on the ground starting up and shutting down. Have someone else look at the motor connections to the Naza.

What about screen shots of the switch showing attitude mode? Did you try launching in that mode?

At least you are making some progress.

 

[cootertwo]

One thing I noticed, looking at your pics, I'd turn off the gimble and the voltage protection, and IOC, for now. I don't know how these would cause the problem you're having, but you need to keep it simple, until you get her flying right. You also have to get that "U" channel on your radio set to at least a 2 way switch (3 way better) and calibrated so you can see the blue light up when you switch from GPS to ATT to manual. I wouldn't mess with the GPS either, for now, especially when trying to lift off. The REAL butt kicker is when all at once everything starts working perfectly, and you can't remember what you did to fix it !!!!! Happens to me all the time. Part of the fun!

 

[RunnerDuck]

SUCCESS!!!

As I get older I realize that I can forget things. Also, being a retired engineer I recognize that fact and plan for it. One of the things I do is label things. That way if I should ever take them apart I’ll have a good idea of how to put everything back together.

One of the things I labeled on HAL was the motor connectors that plug into the NAZA MC, M1 – M4.

One of the recurring threads from people on the forums trying to help me said, “check the prop rotation, check for the correct prop on each motor, check the wiring of the ESC’s”. I did that so many times I was getting blue in the face.

Today while preparing a bunch of pictures of my quad to post on forums so people can see exactly what I've done I checked the rotation of the motors one last time. To verify the directions I went on-line and googled “NAZA-M-Lite Motor Rotation”. Up popped all the pictures I’d seen a million times in the past. I also noticed the motor numbers M1 – M4. Just on a whim I decided to check the wires coming from each motor to make sure they were correct.

Holy Crap!!! I had the labels on M3 and M4 backward! No wonder this thing wouldn't fly.

I plugged the correct connectors into the correct locations on the NAZA and…

TADA!!!

I’m not crazy about the way it flies yet but time and a little “dialing in” should solve that.

Thanks to everyone who helped me with this it's really been appreciated.

Ken

 

[Rotorfreek]

Super

Its always the most simple mistake that you think you've checked! At least the next chunk of work is fun.

From your screen shots I would quickly look at your volt settings if you want a normal flight time...

3.6 v per cell for s1 and a loss will be around 0.4 or so. I set the second self landing voltage as low as it will go - 9.9. I'd rather wreck a battery over have it self land somewhere unsafe.



Sent by my thumb, a trusty slave to my crazy mind. The above is the ramblings of a lunatic, and should be treated as such. Terms and conditions apply.

 

[Gary Seven]

Congrats to @RunnerDuck! In my short time here at multirotorforums this is the fourth time I've seen a thread where the majority of posters were screaming, "check you motor rotation and/or your wiring... you've got something reversed!"

I realize it can be super frustrating but that "ah ha!" moment is just as equally satisfying. Oh yeah, I can relate with the age thing as well (I'm 50-ish). Besides memory issues I have a hell of a time doing close up solder work due to poor up close vision, even when I put my reading glasses on.

 

[Hood49]

I know the feeling with the solder work. You need to get yourself a magnifying glass. Works great.