Eagle – filled circles
When you draw a cicle in Eagle, it normally has only the outline… here’s a quick trick to fill it: Right click on the circle and choose Properties: Set 0 as the Width value:
4ld: The first flight
Here’s a short video about the first flight – using the GPS flight mode – of my quadricopter:
4ld: the landing gear
The frame I chose for my quadricopter is a clone of the DJI’s F450 model. I could therefore buy and install on my quadricopter the original DJI landing gear, made by four plastic legs and the mounting screws: The gear adds some space between the quadricopter and the ground, making the landing easier. It also allows to mount…
4ld: Naza-M Lite to Naza-M v2
In some previous blog posts, I described the flight control board I chose for my quadricopter, the DJI Naza-M Lite. DJI also produces a more advanced control board, the Naza-M v2. Some users discovered that the two control boards share the same hardware components and that differ “only” for the software they run: You can’t directly upload the Naza-M firmware on…
Packt eBook Bonanza Campaign
I’m happy to share the new Packt’s $5 eBook Bonanza: from December 18th, customers will be able to get any Packt eBook or Video for just $5. This promotion covers every title and customers can stock up on as many copies as they like until Jan 6th: The offer obviously includes also my eBooks 😉
4ld: here are the propellers!
The last step of the building of my quadricopter is to add the propellers, connected to the motor’s shaft using screw clamps: It’s very important to mount the correct propeller depending on the direction of the motor: a label (CW = clockwise, CCW = counterclockwise) is often printed on the propellers; if not you can follow one of…
My Ghostbusters collector’s edition
This year is the 30th anniversary of the first Ghostbusters movie (1084). To celebrate the event, Lego is selling – thanks to the Lego Ideas project – SET 21108 that includes the ECTO-1 and four minifigs: I had the idea to create my personal collector’s edition for the blueray (from Amazon) of the two movies using that Lego set: a plexiglass display case with…
4ld: receiver and flight controller configuration
Last setup steps on my quadricopter waiting for a better weather to fly… I connected the receiver to the Naza Lite: channels CH1…4 of the receiver go to the ports A, E, T, R of the flight controller, while the channel CH6 must be connected to port U. After having downloaded the Naza Lite Assistant software and the USB drivers from the DJI…
Raspberry Pi as a wireless Access Point
I’m working on a project based on a Raspberry Pi, controlled by an external device (laptop, smartphone…) and therefore I was looking for the most universal way to connect the device to the Raspberry. Thanks to a small usb->wifi adapter you can transform the Raspberry in a wireless access point that broadcasts a wireless network your device…
Yún – USB wifi adapter
The Arduino Yun has an embedded wireless network card. Unfortunately, that card doesn’t support an external antenna. If you take a close look at the board, you may notice a connector similar to the U.FL one normally used to connect an antenna: That connector, as someone explained on the official forum, is only used for testing purposes and it’s not…