Picopter

It's a tiny quadrotor helicopter!



Update Feb 25 2012: Warning, I may have discovered a bug inside the CadSoft EAGLE 6.1.0 software that may make the PCB look slightly different. My design files are meant for 5.11 so use that instead. You have been warned.

Main Features:

• X mode flying
• MPU-6000 gyro & accelerometer sensor for flight stabilization
• USB battery recharging on the transmitter, the copter plugs into the transmitter to recharge
• When the copter plugs into the transmitter, the user can synchronize to a random radio frequency
• Controlled using a Wii Classic Controller, which plugs into the transmitter
• Running a modified MultiWii firmware, which is open source, written with Arduino and Processing

Dimension Specs:

• Square center body is 1.5" by 1.5"
• Propellers are about 45mm in diameter
• Diagonal motor to motor distance is 110mm
• Motors are supposedly "X-Twin" spare motors, they come with the propellers

Electrical Specs:

• Flight battery is a single Li-poly cell, 3.7V, 350mAH, 20C
• Controller battery is a single Li-ion cell, 3.7V, 1000mAH
• Uses ATmega128RFA1 microcontroller for both copter and transmitter
• This particular ATmega has a built-in 2.4GHz transceiver, 16 possible channels, 250kbit/s or 2mbit/s max depending on the standard being used.

Design Highlights:

• The "arms" and "body" are connected by locking slots, making them easy to build and repair
• Motors slide right into the arm
• Two layer 1.6mm thick FR4 PCB used (this is the default for a lot of PCB manufactures), the components are all on a single side (easy to assemble)
• All open source project, schematics + PCB + code all available. Heavy use of Arduino and Zigduino involved.

This is actually the 2nd such tiny quadrotor helicopter I've built. The first one worked well and I'm extremely proud of it, but it did have several flaws, enough flaws to justify a remake. This Instructable documents "version 2", but you may see pictures of "version 1" in some places.

Step 0 Come up with puntastic name
Pico... Copter... You get the idea. This project was originally named "PalmQuad" since it's small enough to fit in your palm, so if you might see some mention of this name in the code or pictures.

I originally finished building "version 1" in November, and wrote the Instructable in November. Then I went on vacation for a few weeks, and also school just started. Now it is February and I just finished "version 2", but since I've already written the majority of the Instructable, I have some bits of "version 1" text that I'll just cross out like this, and then update it with the changes in "version 2".

All project files are available to download in this instructable "step". It contains files for "version 1" only for reference purposes, please only use "version 2" files. Although I really recommend you only take my concepts and design everything from scratch yourself instead, just so there's absolutely no mysteries in your project.

If you are wondering about the lack of a flight video, see step 6 for an explanation.

Oh and I noticed that "AdBlock" stops Instructables from showing you all my pictures, so please turn it off.

Step 1: Version 1's Build Log

This instructable will focus on building version 2 due to the flaws in version 1, but I have a lot of pictures taken during the construction of version 1, I'm putting them all in this step. I think it's a good idea to show people my other techniques so everybody can learn from both the benefits and mistakes.

Version 1 is soldered using the reflow soldering method (see my other instructable: http://www.instructables.com/id/Hack-a-Toaster-Oven-for-Reflow-Soldering/), version 2 was not due to time constraints and l didn't bring my oven to school. I managed to solder the QFN chips with a heatgun.

In version 1, the flyback diode for each motor was mounted onto the arms, but in version 2, the flyback diodes are in the main quadcopter body PCB instead.

In version 1, the propellers required a drilling before they fit onto the motor. The motors in version 2 comes with the propellers pre-attached so the drilling is no longer necessary. However, please read step 6 to see why you should use the motors from version 1 instead.

Comments

[Tharun4818]

can you give step by step instructions, its for my son's school project and i want to thelp him but unfortunately i only to operate a computer

[ckhurana46]

sir ,
from where to get those 2 green plates 1 for quadracopter and 1 for transmitter and what is there plate number .plz tell fast i wanted to make and sir as i wanted to order somethings at digikey.com there are comming 3 options all are same but there is comming tape and reel,cut tape and digi reel. which one i should select...... plz tell fast sir plzzzzzzzzzz

[ckhurana46]

sir plz tell me name of all parts and their types used in making picopter.plz mail me the list at [e-mail] . plz tell me fast. i love makin this type of things

[ride on toy dude]

How much did this project cost?? My friend got one of those really cool Parrot AR Drones and i want to build something similiar so we can do cool stuff with them. Maybe even launch this thing off of the botton of the big one. Where did you order the custom PCBs?? would love to build this!

[The nerdling]

kits?

[diwib]

Just fyi:
I ordered all parts at Digikey, Sparkfun & ebay and ended up paying 190 euro incl. shipping to EU and printing 3 qc/tx pcbs. I was expecting something among 100 euro but I didn't want to go back after ordering the first parts :)
Batch ordered, a kit might cost something around 150 euros I'd guess.

It's amazingly easy to find everything you've listed here; no exotic parts or anything, in fact, hardest part is finding a cheap li-po.

Do you have any idea how much payload this thing can carry? Or what flight time you achieve with whatever battery you're using?

Impatiently waiting for my orders... 8)

[EncasedDeath]

Any chance you have the parts list still? I seem to be overlooking it or just don't know where to look. Thanks.

[Bongmaster]

want :0 how much? :3

[1dog789]

i want one too :D

[1dog789]

how much would it cost to buy one from you?

[crazyscottnb]

would you consider makeing this as simple kit that can be bought. You would make some serious cash.Also is there a way that bluetooth can be implumented into the circuit somehow.

[PGTBoos]

great little device, like to see it flying

Maybe i got an idea for you to use different propellers.
The problem with these propellers is that people put their fingers to near to it, or they get damaged when you hit something during flight, Maybe you remember thse kid toys :
http://www.papstar-products.com/papstar_pe/prodpic/4-Toys-Flying-propeller-18909_b_0.JPG

i think if you raise the outer circle a bit (strip of thin hard sheet) it would improve the blade too (better earodynamics for end of proppellor.)

[raykholo]

Very neat.

Instead of using jumper blocks, have you considered these plunger switches?

http://www.goldmine-elec-products.com/prodinfo.asp?number=G15214

They're less of a hassle and they'll fit the same footprint assuming you're using 2 * thru hole .1 inch headers. If you're using SMT headers for the jumpers, still doable but will require bending the switch pins and perhaps a dab of hot glue.

[sachin456]

hi,sir i need quadcopter's blank circut's print can iget it sir

[sachin456]

please sir please sir help me

[sachin456]

sir can you write the list of parts used in the circut board

[sachin456]

sir can you write the list of parts used in the circut board

[ckarcz]

if you can't find this stuff on here, what makes you think you can build this thing?

[supercapacitor]

A complete product and a true feat of engineering. This is excellent!

[gu2n_ok]

hai frank you make all this by your self .... wow it's cool i want the make this where i can get the component???

[frank26080115]

You can get the components by searching DigiKey for the part numbers I provided, they have almost everything. Some of the stuff you can't find, you'll need to visit SeeedStudio, SparkFun, and Google.

[gu2n_ok]

For the mainboard ?? Were I get that?

[frank26080115]

You have to send the design to a PCB manufacture to have it made for you

[TripleQ]

you make this circuit board all By yourself?you are amazing,my dream is make a flying tiny robot but too bad i not pro in electrical : (

[WesleySwain]

Are you planning on producing these boards to sell? If so, I will gladly buy one!

[frank26080115]

I would like to try, maybe attempt a "Kickstarter project" or something.

[since76]

You NEED to put this on Kickstarter! :)

[Kryptonite]

I would back this, and then buy it for sure.

If possible, selling two versions of this, one being a 'assembly kit' while the other a 'ready to use', would be a brilliant idea!

[nagutron]

Kickstarter could be a great way to do this. You'll need a solid business plan and some flashy videos of your prototype flying well, but I think you'd get a lot of interest now that quadcopters are all the rage.

[Retro Correct]

I agree, this could really take off on a service like kickstarter. it's small, open source, uses standard inputs from the wiimote, well designed, and developed privately to be a legitimate tool/aircraft. The geek media is clamoring for stuff like this, especially since the release of the quad copter videos at Upenn.

-yes there is a pun

[ericj]

Hey Frank-

Quick question about using the USBTinyISP to flash the AVR chip. The Adafruit docs say that the USBTinyISP can't flash larger than 64K sized chips, and the ATMega128rfa1 looks like it's 128K.

You didn't experience any problems though it sounds like? Just wanted to doublecheck as I'm about to pick up the ISP programmer from Adafruit.

Thx! Awesome project!
Eric

[frank26080115]

Oh... err, funny thing, it "works", you can write to the chip, I know I can because I wrote the bootloader to it, the bootloader resides in the absolute last section of the memory. So it can definitely write all 128KB

But the problem is reading the 128KB, it won't work, which means you cannot really perform the verification step, and AVRDUDE will think that it failed since the verification fails. In reality, it might have failed, it might have worked, you have no way of knowing unless you do a lot of testing. In the end, I just check if my bootloader is working, and then use the bootloader from that point onwards.

[ericj]

Awesome, I figured as much. Just wanted to double check...

Thanks!

[ms10]

nice splendid picocopter

[de-tech]

Hey frank great picopter, I can't till I have the money to make one. I have a DX6i spektrum. Is it possible to make the copter work with it? If so, how do you do it?

[frank26080115]

There might be a way but I don't recommend it. You should really do a complete redesign if you want to try. But if you really want to hear how I would "hack" my own circuit to do this right now... then...

You need to get a special Spektrum receiver that outputs a single PPM signal that combines all the channels.

If you get one small enough, you can probably mount it onto the quadcopter itself and wire it to one of the SPI pins available on the docking connector. Or else you wire it to the docking connector of the transmitter circuit. I would probably create a entire "Spektrum Addon Module" that docks with the transmitter circuit.

The software needs to be modified to read the combined PPM signal. I've done this many times before. It's a piece of code that continuously measures pulse widths using a timer and pin change interrupts.

So if you have a tiny receiver, the quadcopter can take commands from the Spektrum directly, but if you don't have a tiny receiver, then my transmitter circuit can act as a relay for the commands.

Both methods will be highly experimental and require a lot of testing

[frank26080115]

check these out http://deltang.co.uk/

[de-tech]

Yeah, I going to need to redesign the picopter to make it work with the spektrum. I'm thinking of using a Rx31 receiver and an atmega128A. I'm going to need to look into the receiver some more though to see which best suit the copter, and do you think the atmega128A going to work for this project. I don't need the 128RFA1 sense I would not be using the RF. Plus it has more I/O port and I could use it for each of the receiver channel. Or do I still need to find one that use single output for the receiver.

[frank26080115]

you are going in the right direction

Almost any ATmega should work, do a comparison with the ATmega328P, if it has the same or more timers, and the same or more memory, then it should work.

[de-tech]

Thanks for the help. This is perfect I have arduino uno that have atmega 328p chip. I can do all my testing on it before buying the parts. However, can you help me on that PPM signal coding, when every you have time. Or give me some hint on were I can get some information on this stuff. Thank again.