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About the Course
Drone Racing is a week-long course where students initially learn drone flying on a simulator, build an FPV drone complete with transmitter and video goggles, and also build a programmable LED hoop for use in races.
The aim is to get the students:
- Learning to fly FPV drones really well
- Learning the component parts of drones and how to assemble them
- Learning some simple programming in the Arduino environment (used for the LED hoops)
Health and Safety
This course involves a small amount of soldering, so the following precautions need to be taken
- Soldering irons will be kept off/unplugged unless being used
- Students are warned about the dangers of soldering etc (see below in the comments about running the session)
- You should be aware (as should the students) where the closest cold water tap is in case of burns
- Students wash hands when they go on breaks if they have been soldering
- Staff are always vigilant for inappropriate use of the soldering irons
The drones themselves present a small hazard of hitting a person. The following precautions need to be taken
- Either FPV goggles or safety glasses need to be worn when in an active flying space
Additionally, the lithium batteries present a hazard of fire and explosion:
- Batteries are only charged using chargers that have been built by the campers (and checked by you!)
- An empty lipo charging bag is available to dump batteries into in case of fire
- Batteries are checked for signs of damage, and disposed of (in ammunition box). In particular 'puffiness' of cells and physical damage to batteries indicates they need not to be used again
- We don't use the supplied parallel charger, but instead the chargers that the students make
- The only exception to this is using the supplied chargers to charge one battery at a time each before the start of the course, so that you have charged batteries ready to go.
- Batteries should not be charged when unattended (during breaks, for example). Batteries should instead be charged during the next class session when the students are doing something else other than flying).
- Batty charging should be done with the batteries (and charger) inside one of the supplied lipo charging bags in case of fire.
- A suitable fire extinguisher should be located close by and the tutors aware of correct usage. Most common extinguishers are suitable as the batteries contain little actual metal lithium content, so even water can be used in an emergency.
Other Safety Issues:
- The students must not use the conduit cutter - it is partly safety-related (you could chop off a finger if you're super uncoordinated ... don't laugh that does apply to quite a few at Tech Camp), and also partly so you don't end up with hundreds of bits of unusable PVC conduit cut to the wrong length.
- The same applies to the LED strip. It is super dangerous to cut this for children. Cutting it releases toxic gases deadly to those under the age of 18 but doesn't harm adults at all. Also the tape is super expensive and we don't want hundreds of bits of unusable tape at the end as well.
Please see:
General Workshop Risk Assessment
The Kit List
Student consumables (per student to take home at the end)
- 1 x Drone electronics kit (transmitter, receiver, motors, props, 3xbatteries, camera, fpv goggles)
- 4x AA batteries (for transmitter)
- 1 x Micro USB cable (for programming quad and using transmitter as game controller)
- 6 x 10cm jumper wires (green/black/red)
- 0.5m hookup wire (for soldering practice)
- 1 x 4 track PCB connector (for soldering practice)
- 3m (max) x PVC conduit (for making LED hoop - comes in 2m sections, so up to tutors to hand out as needed and cut efficiently - no more than 3m for each person)
- 1 x USB power bank (for powering hoop)
- 0.4m black hookup wire (to join LED segments)
- 1 x Drone frame
- 1 x set of Laser cut acrylic hoop connectors
- 3m (max) x LED strip (comes in 5m sections so as with conduit, up to tutors to cut/manage efficiently)
- 2 x Rubber Bands (To Attach Battery - includes one spare)
- 1 x Arduino Pro Micro (for LED hoop controller)
- 2 x double-sided pad (two for camera mount, two for pro micro)
- 1 x laser-cut camera mount (pre-bent)
- 1 x pilot license card
- 1 x USB memory stick, for taking home programs and simulator software
- 1 x course badge
- 2 x charger PCBS (with a 4.7k resistor, a battery connector and a 2.5cm piece of heatshrink tubing each)
Student tools (one each, not to take home)
- 1 x Safety goggles (for soldering and flying)
- 1 x Safety mat (for soldering)
- 1 x Pen (for pilot license and conduit marking)
- 1 x Headphones
Student tools (one per pair, not to take home)
- Soldering iron with stand
- Small amount of solder (around 30cm wound in a loose loop)
- Small Phillips screwdriver (PH00)
- Side-cutters
- Wire strippers
- Ruler
- Tweezers
- Small blob of blue-tac (for holding PCBs when soldering)
General class kit
- Pair of scissors (for cutting neoprene spacers if needed)
- Conduit cutter
- Measuring tape
- Permanent pen (for naming transmitters, etc)
- Ball of string (for rigging hoops)
- 1 x Stamp per tutor
- 1 x Multimeter
- 1 x scissors
- 2 x flathead screwdrivers
- 1 x set of dry wipe pens
- 4 x spare safety glasses
- One 5m extension lead per 8 students (for soldering irons)
- 1 x 4-way power board per 4 students (for soldering irons)
- 2 x Lipo charging bags (on for charging, one for dropping in batteries in case of fire)
Pre-Camp Setup (By Tech Camp)
- Laser cut acrylic hoop parts
Student Logins
All students will need to login to this online system to access the course material. They can login using the following details (everyone logs into the same account):
Username: droneracing@techcamp.org.uk
Password: techcamp
They can continue to login with these details to access the material at home after the course if they want to.
IT Systems Check
- Chrome is installed with cleanflight app and connects to flight controller board via USB (if it doesn't, you may need to install drivers from here: https://impulserc.com/pages/downloads)
- FPV Freerider works (with USB controller)
- Arduino is installed, and can program a Pro Micro board successfully
- Student login works for this website
- All videos work in the student guide
- Check following websites are available:
- courses.techcamp.org.uk
Troubleshooting Arduinos:
The type of Arduino we are using at camp can be relatively easily 'bricked' (made inoperational) through programming alone as the USB programming connection firmware is running on the same chip as the students' code. This can typically happen if a student selects the wrong board (running at a different clock speed), or if their programme is sufficiently buggy to completely halt the microcontroller. In this case, the Arduinos can often be unbricked by pressing the upload button and immediately after, quickly shorting out the RST pin on the module to the GND pin next to it (with a screwdriver, etc). If you hear the USB enumeration sound and the device programmes, you have fixed it. If not, try again, with a slightly longer or shorter delay between pressing the upload button and shorting out these pins.
Preparing Yourself
Like any practical course you'll find this much easier to teach if you have run through it yourself as completely as possible first. Even if you're experienced with electronics and programming this will allow you to find out which parts of the course are tricky. Also, when we're running a course for the first few times there may be the occasional mistake or parts of instructions that are not clear and this is a great way of identifying them.
As a minimum, you'll need to:
- Read through this guide completely and be comfortable with it
- Read through this guide again! A huge amount of work has gone into it so make sure you're really confident how the course should be run, and things to watch out for.
- Read through all of the students' guides to see how all the practical sessions work.
- Get very comfortable wth flying a drone on the simulator - you should complete all of the training exercises yourself on the simulator before you arrive at the training day. (unless at our residential camps where we have an additional training day before the camp - even so, it is still preferable to practise before the event if possible) The simulator sessions are documented in the section below on 'Simulator Sessions'. For this you will need the software and a USB game controller (please contact Tech Camp if you would like us to loan you one). If you are working at a non-residential venue, we will send you an actual controller which will be the same one that the campers use, which you can use to practice with. It cannot be stressed how important this practice is. If you are not good at flying when the children arrive it will be difficult to help them. It is not trivial learning how to fly drones in 'acro' mode and requires considerable practice.
- Try creating the programs for the hoop using the Arduino IDE, and programming the test hoop if we have sent you one.
As a tutor you will not actually physically build the drone or hoop yourself as the build is fairly simple, but you should read though all steps of the guides as completely as possible so you know what needs to be done without having to refer to the guide every time a student asks a question.
As the start of many sessions is tutor-led you'll also need to run through your delivery of the course a couple of times - ideally out loud, but at least in your head. If you are working with more than one tutor, you will want to decide between yourselves how to split the tasks/explanations in this initial part of the lesson.
Tutor Training Day
When you arrive for the tutor training day (at Winchester this will be before the students arrive, for other camps it will be a number of weeks before the first camp), we will go through some general things (like child protection training), but the bulk of the day will be on preparing yourself for teaching the course.
What will I receive?
If you are working at a non-residential venue, you will receive a controller for practising flying using the simulator, spare batteries for the controller, and a small section of LED hoop pre-assembled for you to try out the hoop programming lessons.
If you are working at a residential venue you will not receive any equipment in advance, however there will be plenty of time and equipment to try out the practical elements of the course during the first few days of camp.
How will we check that you are prepared?
We will expect you to:
- Explain to us some of the concepts in the tutor guide - i.e. you need to be able to tell us how the course is organised, what some of the important points are about safety and efficiently operating the courses, and be able to answer questions about these things intelligently!
- We'll ask you to demonstrate your flying skill by flying (ideally in Acro mode) around the desert course in the shortest time you can! If you can only do it in self-levelling mode, this is OK.
- We'll ask you to show us your Arduino code for the hoop and show it working on the test hoop.
What will we show you?
- We'll demonstrate the soldering technique used in the lessons and give you a chance to have a go. You'll try the soldering test board (making the 'spider'), and try soldering a dummy power lead and camera to the drone controller board. You'll also try changing the surface-mount resistor on the charger board.
- We'll show you the physical drone and give you a chance to fly it
Any additional time will be spent practising flying - on the real quadcopter if possible as well as the simulator, and if the training day is immediately before the commencement of the course, organising supplies, and getting things ready.
Pre-course Setup
This workshop needs both soldering and work at a computer. As the instructions that the students need to follow are online, ideally the soldering equipment would be nearby the computers. However if space does not permit, and there are plenty of spare desks elsewhere in the room you could set up separate soldering and computing areas but be aware that there could be a lot of movement between the stations so this is not ideal.
If working in a classroom without computers (when using Tech Camp laptops) it is important that there are no trip hazards caused by laptop, soldering iron and extension lead cables. Generally if you have choice of classroom layout you will want to have the tables around the perimeter of the classroom, or at least small rows of tables coming out directly from sides of the classrooms (no side aisles) so that any cables can come from the wall to the tables without crossing a walkway.
For each student pair, set out:
- 1 x Soldering iron in stand
- 1 x Small loop of solder
- 1 x Phillips screwdriver
- 1 x Pair of sidecutters
Each student should also have near the soldering equipment:
- 1 x Safety mat
- 1 x Pair of goggles
The other components can be handed out when the students arrive. This both saves time in producing all the kits before hand but also gives you an opportunity to interact with the students, explaining what particular parts are, etc.
It is important the soldering irons are set to a suitable temperature. We recommend around 280 degrees for most of the soldering, but you may need to increase the temperature to around 340 degrees when soldering the power leads to the controller board as they are thick pieces of wire, and one of the traces on the PCB (the GND trace) sinks quite a lot of heat away from the iron.
Tech Camp Work Saving Policy
To minimise the possibility of lost files and work, and reduce the impact of campers losing their memory stick after the course, please follow these guidelines:
- Campers should create a folder in 'My Documents' on the computer they are working on for the week, and rename it to their full name
- They should use this as their working directory for the week, working from it and saving all of the things they make/use in that folder
- At the end of the week they should then just copy the entire folder onto their memory stick to take home
- This folder should be left on the machine after camp (machines are either imaged specially for us or we have our own logins depending on venue)
- This way, if a camper loses a memory stick after they leave there is a chance we can get their data back by just looking on the computer they were working on.
Rules for Students
- Students must use soldering equipment properly (see below)
- If they lose components they must find them! It's very easy for small components to be dropped, so looking around the work space (and on the floor) should be the first thing done when they claim not to have something. We have limited numbers of spares.
- Drones should not be taken/flown outside of class time, and only flown during classes under direct tutor supervision
- Drones should NEVER be flown outside. They are small (very easily lost), and very light-weight (very easily caught by the breeze). They are expensive and will not be replaced if the students lose them
- When flying of drones, only students who are wearing suitable protective eyewear should be in the same room. It is sufficient to wear either safety goggles or FPV goggles. At some venues it may be appropriate for the pilots to be in a room adjacent to the drones, although this will make it more tricky/time-consuming to fetch the drones when they crash/get caught.
- Students should never leave batteries on charge unless supervised during the classroom sessions.
Guidelines for Tutors
Running a practical course like this is always tricky, but this course has some moments that you'll want to watch out for ...
- For some students this might be their first experience of soldering so they need some direct instructions and some close supervision when they first try this out (see below).
- Don't give 'spare' components out to students - the supplied kit list should be stuck to.
- Don't ever give to the students the large reel of solder - always keep this in a tutor-only area and hand out small amounts as they need it. (It's not unusual for students to see what happens when they push the soldering iron directly onto the solder reel ... what happens is that the solder strands all quickly melt together and the once useful and expensive reel has to be binned, leaving you with a course to run and no solder to use!)
- Also, remember that the students shouldn't be cutting either the PVC conduit or the LED tape.
- You have been provided with a multi-colour set of 'loom bands' for attaching batteries and cameras. Make sure each child has a different set of colour combinations as this is a really good way of identifying who owns each drone.
- As always, if anything gets broken, flag it up to the Technical Manager as soon as possible so that spares can be checked if needed.
- You have been provided with a sharpie for marking the names on each student's equipment. Please do this as you hand them out - particularly for things like transmitters, chargers, fpv goggles as it will avoid arguments later!
- Sometimes at Winchester, you need to plug the headphones into the computers before booting up, otherwise the sound won't work at all (will have a red cross in taskbar and not output until you reboot with headphones plugged in).
Remember ...
- Students must only use the drones under direct tutor supervision. They should not be taken home by them until the end of the last session.
- You should always check no batteries are being left charged when the classroom is unattended. Lithium batteries are flammable and have been known to start fires.
- When charging the batteries with the supplied parallel chargers, only batteries at a similar state of discharge should be connected to the same charger. Generally this is accomplished by flying the drones until the batteries are depleted, and then charging all depleted batteries together.
- Drones should never be flown outside
Running the Sessions
The course is split up into a number of tasks:
- Learning on the simulator
- Building the drone
- Building the LED hoop
- Programming the LED hoop
- Flying the drone
The simulator work is by far the largest component, making up roughly 50% of the time. This is to make sure that the students are very skilled at flying by the end (and at least reasonably skilled by the time they try the real drone).
The sessions are split up as follows (sessions 1 & 2 are the ones before lunch, sessions 3 & 4 are after lunch):
Easter
Day | Session 1 | Session 2 | Session 3 | Session 4 |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Hoop Build | Hoop Build/Programming | Simulator 1 | Simulator 2 |
2 | Simulator 3 | Hoop Programming | Simulator 4 | Quad Build + Programming |
3 | Simulator 5 | Quad Testing | Simulator 6 | Drone Racing |
4 | Simulator 7 | Drone Racing | Simulator 8 | Drone Racing |
Summer
Day | Session 1 | Session 2 | Session 3 | Session 4 |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Hoop Build | Hoop Build/Programming | Simulator 1 | Simulator 2 |
2 | Simulator 3 | Hoop Programming | Simulator 4 | Hoop Programming |
3 | Simulator 5 | Quad Build + Programming | Simulator 6 | Quad Testing |
4 | Simulator 7 | Drone Racing | Simulator 8 | Drone Racing |
5 | Simulator 9 | Drone Racing | Simulator 10 | Drone Racing |
Note: this is only a suggestion - you may like to build the drone earlier in the week in case anything goes wrong, as this is the most time-consuming and complex task and if anything goes wrong with the hardware you then have more time to contact the tech team to resolve/send spare parts, etc.
- Tutors introduce themselves / kids introduce themselves
- Optional welcome activity
- Explain what they will cover in Drone Racing and get them excited - they will learn about:
- How to build their own drone
- How to fly it - both on a simulator and in real-life
- How to do some simple soldering whilst making the LED-hoop
- How to programme a microcontroller to control the LEDs
- How to programme and tune their drone
Let them know that around half their class time will be spent on the simulator and explain the reason for this - flying a drone, particularly in the professional 'acro' mode is difficult and needs considerable practice. In addition:
- It will mean they are much less likely to crash ther drone and damage it
- It is essentially playing a game, so it is fun!
Simulator Sessions
The simulator software can be accessed here.
We have licensed to use this software at camp and included in this license is the ability for each child to take their own copy of the software home. Before the session you will need to copy the software onto each of their USB drives. The software does not need to be installed but can be run directly from within a folder on a drive.
We are using a combination of some of our own videos to teach the children, and also some that are available here.
The children will step through using the order specified in the online guide. There is no reason that all students will be at the same stage every day, but it is helpful if there are no students who jump hugely ahead. If some are much quicker at learning, you can set them challenges related to the session they are doing, or they can simply compete against themselves to see how fast they can do each one. They can also compete against each other for some races and you can set up a 'leader board' with the fastest times. You will need to verify this, but it should be quite simple as once they complete one lap and land they can let you know - their lap time (and other settings) should be visible on the screen for you to check. Another idea is some of the fastest learners can help the other ones with flying tips if they are of a suitable temperament!
Having most of the students at the same stage has multiple advantages:
- You can introduce each session with relevant demonstrations/instructions that make sense to all of them
- You won't have the fastest learners getting half way through the week saying that they are bored and have 'done everything' - this is a critical problem to avoid.
The overall plan is as below. Please note if you are running this at Easter, that:
- The Easter camp doesn't have as many sessions, so you won't necessarily finish all simulator tasks
Session | Plan |
---|---|
1 | Learning in self-levelling mode: 1) Left stick only, 2) Left stick with pitch |
2 | Self-levelling mode continued : 1) Both sticks, 2) Both sticks in high rate |
3 | 3d-person camera view: 1) Through gate and back - no yaw, 2) Adding in yaw |
4 | First video lessons from Joshua Bardwell (numbers 1-6) |
5 | Try desert course in acro as fast as possible! |
6 | Joshua Bardwell lessons 7-12 |
7 | Meadow course |
8 | Two towers course |
Any remaining sessions | Courses in the following order: Island / Playground / Carpark |
For the true experts if time permits: | 3rd person camera view in Acro mode - very tricky! |
Whilst the students are learning in this order they will have a 'Pilot License' that they are filling in with the date and times they've finished each session, and a space for you to stamp some challenges. This helps keep them on track without racing ahead (you can see very easily if they have skipped out some parts), and also they quite like the license at the end as a record of their achievements.
You will need to hand out these cards (and pens) at the start of the first session. You will also need to hand out the transmitters, batteries and USB cables at the same time. Make sure you label the back of the transmitters neatly using a sharpie to avoid arguments!
Another good way to motivate students to do well and practice is to have a leaderboard on the whiteboard, with the best current times for each course in each mode (e.g. best time for desert in self levelling low rates, high rates, and acro low and high rates and so on). You can even do a prize at the end of the week for the best times if you want to!
Hint: When the students (or you) are learning to fly on the simulator, if it is hard, you can make the transmitter controls less sensitive. Go to 'Custom Settings', press 'Sluggish', and reduce the 'Throttle' to 30, the 'Yaw' and 'Pitch/Roll' rates to 120 degrees/sec, and set the self-levelling max angle to 25 degrees. This should make it quite a bit easier to fly.
Another Hint: When learning, to make it simpler still (assuming you have reduced the rates as above), a good trick is to immediately pitch forward (push the right stick forward to a suitable position) and then LEAVE your right thumb fixed in this position for the whole flight. This way you'll only move the let control and should be able to still fly well. This will give you practice with 'feathering' the throttle to maintain height and using the left/right movement of this same control to steer. Concentrate on following the course around the circuit (i.e. if going through two gates that are not aligned, try to fly in a smooth sweep between them so you 'line-up' the second gate before getting close, rather than flying straight for it and then hitting it at an acute angle).
Make sure if you have reduced the rates to practice, you put them back up when you are getting good, so that you have experience flying more 'snappy' rates when you get to flying the real thing!
Building the Hoops
- Ask them how many have soldered before?
- Ask those who have to give some safety tips to the rest of the class. You will want them to suggest (or you) at least the following:
- Where the hot parts are - you need to be very explicit here, showing them the difference between the metal parts and the plastic parts and tell them if they touch the metal parts it will hurt!
- The irons must always be kept in the stands when not being used
- The irons must only be used to solder parts as per the instructions
- The irons must not be used to make 'solder blob monsters', melt plastic or other materials (it releases toxic gas as well as damaging things) or as a weapon!
- The irons must only be turned off after use
- If they do burn themselves they need to go to the closest water tap and run their hand under running water (show them where this is - the tap that is, not their hands ...)
- They need to wash their hands at the end of the session.
- Tell them that if they haven't soldered before, you'll be there to help and that they should let you know when they're ready to solder for the first time so you can help.
- Soldering needs demonstrating carefully before the students need to do any (if they haven't already in a previous session). The controller boards are expensive and easily damaged. Make sure that you don't allow any students to start on soldering unless you are happy they can do this. Talk with the students - those who have done much soldering at Tech Camp before might be OK, but for others get them to practise. The 'blob of solder/strip & twist and tin wire/re-melt blob to attach and hold to set' technique is used several times. Students practise using a small PCB and some spare wire at the start of the hoop building section. This is great to do as a demo and then a short 'prove you can do it' session before anyone starts on the soldering.
Handing out the components
As mentioned, handing out the components as you need them may take up a few minutes of class time but it will allow you to explain something about them right at the start when you've got their attention. You will want them to put each part in their bowl as you hand them out, to keep them from being lost.
Here are the parts to hand out. The bracket text indicates some suggested things you might want to mention:
- Set of acrylic parts - connectors and feet (tell them what they're for, and about the protective plastic)
- Pro Micro board (tell them it's programmable / Arduino compatible, etc)
- 6 x jumper wires of each colour (red/black/green)
Note we are not handing out PVC conduit or LED tape - this is for the tutors to cut. Get the students to measure and mark their tubing using a ruler and ballpoint pen, and then bring it to you to cut. You will need to measure and cut the LEDs strip as it is expensive and we don't want to make mistakes! Note also that we are not (yet) handing out USB cables and power banks - the tutors should check the construction of the LED hoops before powering up.
Now they should follow the hoop building guide. They will come and ask you when they need PVC conduit and LED tape cut. Please make sure you effectively use the 'leftover' ends of LED tape as best as possible - it is expensive. If you are feeling particularly conscientious, you may like to make some longer sections of tape from leftovers - you can join it by soldering together two ends of tape - just make sure the pads line up and all the arrows face the same direction! Be sure to check their soldering practice boards before giving them the wire they need to start soldering the tape together.
When they have finished the build, you MUST check it before they power it up - after you have checked it you can hand out the USB cable and power bank, and they can proceed with the 'hoop programming' tutorial.
If the hoops are dropped or knocked over it is possible the ends of the pipes can snap - some liberal application of hot glue is an easy way to fix this!
Hoop Programming
This session primarily involves the students running through the 'hoop programming' tutorial. You will need to be able to offer assistance when they come up with ideas they want to implement and to help them debug their programs, so make sure you have run through the tutorials yourself and are comfortable with writing and debugging Arduino programs for the LED hoop.
There is a link to the completed code (for tutors only) here.
Quad Build
N.B. Before the students commence the build, you will need to prep the frame and strip the wires on the camera. See the separate part preparation guide for how to do this. Depending on the age and ability of the students and your confidence/experience in teaching soldering you may also want to solder the battery wires onto the PCB for them. Please seek advice if you are not sure.
The quad build session primarily involves students working through the relevant tutorial. Some things to watch out for:
- Wires on motors are a little fragile - they should be handled carefully
- Soldering needs demonstrating carefully before the students need to do any (if they haven't already in a previous session). The controller boards are expensive and easily damaged. Make sure that you don't allow any students to start on soldering unless you are happy they can do this. Talk with the students - those who have done much soldering at Tech Camp before might be OK, but for others get them to practise. The 'blob of solder/strip & twist and tin wire/re-melt blob to attach and hold to set' technique is used several times. Students can practise with a (small, and re-used) strip of LED tape and some spare wires if you are not confident they are experienced. This is great to do as a demo and then a short 'prove you can do it' session before anyone starts on the quad.
- Remember safety - check they remember safety instructions for soldering. They should not be allowed to fly the drones in the classroom after assembly - at most, you as a tutor may test their drone after assembly to check it is flying well.
During the quad-building session, the campers will also be making two lipo chargers. This is a fairly simple build as we supply charger modules, but we do need to get the campers to replace one of the tiny surface-mount resistors on the module. This is to set the correct charging current. If this is not done, the charger will be dangerous as it will charge too quickly.
Note there are some steps at the start that the tutor will need to do before the students arrive. This includes:
- Cutting and stripping the battery connector cables
- Cutting 2.5cm lengths of the clear heatshrink tubing
- (Perhaps: replacing the resistors if the students find this difficult)
After building the chargers, it's important that the students take them to you to check both visually and functionally. If it looks like they have soldered everything correctly, you can try charging a battery and check the charging current that is drawn is between 250 and 300mA (for a dead battery).
There are more details of all of these steps in the students' guide.
Quad Configuration
There are two videos in the student guides re: configuring the transmitter/binding and setting p the parameters in Cleanflight, but for a short-form summary, see below:
To Configure TX and bind:
- Go to 'Sys' menu and check under 'Models' that 'Model 1' is selected (video says Model 2 - it doesn't matter which as long as you know which one you are setting up
- Select 'RX Bind'
- Hold button down on quad board whilst powering up
- Press back button on TX to finish binding
- Go to 'Function' menu and then 'Aux Channels'
- Make sure Ch5 is set to SwD
- Make sure Ch6 is set to SwC
- Go to 'Failsafe' menu and make sure it is on for channels 1-4. All will be set to 0% except Ch 3 which should be set to -100% (by dropping throttle to minimum)
Setting up Parameters on Cleanflight:
- Start up Cleangflight and click Connect
- Check when you move drone the picture moves
- Place flat and click Calibrate Accelerometer
- Check on Configuration screen that all looks OK (brushed motors in particular)
- Turn on TX
- Click on Receiver and check graphs move if you move both sticks and access both of the right-most switches* Go to 'Modes' menu
- Set 'Arm' to Aux 1 and when arm switch (right one) is flipped down, adjust so it is in the 'arm' range (on the right)
- Set 'Angle' to Aux 2 and check up position of this switch (second from right) is in the middle of the configured position (on the left of the graph)
- Set 'Horizon' to Aux 2 and ensure sliders are in the 'middle' position and check by moving switch
Quad Testing
This session is really getting the children comfortable with basic flying of their drones. By this stage they should have a reasonable amount of experience on the simulator. At most venues you will be moving to a different room/area for drone testing/flying. Make sure you are familiar with the Health and Safety section above - i.e. safety glasses (or fpv goggles) to be worn for anyone in the same room where drones are flying, precautions about unattended lipo charging, etc. Once you get into the drone testing and flying sessions you will need to think ahead to make sure batteries are able to be charged in class time where there is supervision (simulator sessions) so they are ready for the drone racing sessions.
As previously warned you will not be much help with this phase unless you are reasonably skilled at drone flying, so make sure you've run through the simulator lessons and are confident flying yourself.
As before, drones should never be flown outside the designated (indoor) flying area. They are easily lost and expensive to replace.
Drone Racing
After some initial test flights the drone racing side of things is up to you - how you layout the course, what challenges you give to the students, etc. Here are some ideas:
- Initially keep it super simple - make sure there is a large space to fly, and try to just go around in simple circuits. Make sure there are as few obstacles around as possible, and ideally high ceilings, as fine control of altitude is one of the more tricky things to master
- Once students are happy with basic flying, you can introduce obstacles - it's possible to use tables/chairs, etc (e.g. flying under tables, between legs of tables that are turned upside down, etc). You may well also want to use the LED hoops that the students have made themselves. These can be used free-standing or rigged with string if you want higher hoops.
- For extra difficulty once you have some experienced pilots, you can connect multiple rooms (going through doorways), and have points where the drones need to turn around sharply and go back in the opposite direction through a hoop that is suitably placed.
- To add a competitive element, consider timing runs through the circuit. This is a good way to involve bystanders - you could have a few students flying and a few timing (one for each pilot). Make up a 'leader board' if you like to keep track of your pro pilots!
- Make sure at all times you look out for safety issues - you need to ensure that bystanders are safe as well as students (and of course tutors)
- Finally, have fun!
General guidelines when racing
1) Drone racing is tricky to learn. It’s always best if the students get as much practice as possible on the simulator before flying the real drones. You can download the simulator here: http://shorturl.at/oJ369. It uses the usb game controllers included with the supplies. They will probably require calibration before using.
2) When flying the real drones, the larger the area the better - we recommend at least a high-ceilinged ‘double classroom’-sized space, but something like a sports hall is better still. It even works well flying around an atrium area/foyer etc, as long as other people aren’t going to be walking around when you’re flying.
3) Before doing FPV flying, it’s useful if the students do some line of sight flying first (without the goggles). One good technique to make it feel like FPV flying is for the students to walk directly behind the drone as they fly it. This way they will always be viewing it from the same direction as they would when viewing through the camera.
3) When they progress onto flying with the goggles, you can have a maximum of four flying at the same time but you might want to start off with fewer - even just one or two until they get better at flying. It's up to you to work out a frequency plan for the four drones. It's better if you have at least 35MHz between each channel - that way they are less likely to interfere with each other. You'll want to try this out with a few drones (and a few pairs of goggles) without the campers around so you are confident changing the frequencies of the drone cameras using the button and also the goggles.
4) Make sure you’ve always got plenty of batteries charged before you start. You will probably receive depleted batteries, so putting them all on charge ASAP is a high priority. Keep clearly labelled bags etc for charged and uncharged batteries.
5) To make a drone racing circuit, you might like to try using objects like tables and chairs to fly around/through
6) Once students get good, you might want to do some timed races - either using a stopwatch or perhaps just the first to finish a lap (or multiple laps).
Extension Challenges
There should be plenty to keep the students occupied in this course. If anyone is ever at a loose end, they can practise on the simulator, and once all students are confident on the simulator there should be plenty of flying time available with the real quads.
There are also plenty of Joshua's lessons that the students can go through after number 12.
Do let us know though if you come up with any good ideas for challenges either on the simulator or with the real drones and we'll add it to this guide. It would be great to incorporate your ideas as well!
Taking Everything Home
Make sure the campers take everything they should home - this should include:
- Their own drone
- 3xlipo batteries
- 2xusb cables (short black and long white)
- drone transmitter
- FPV goggle set
- LED hoop
- A few spare loom bands
Packing Up
Your supplies should always be packed up as neatly as they came! This means:
- Components are in labelled bags, and grouped in bigger bags
- There should be no bags of unsorted components
If any components are broken they should be clearly labelled. Generally inexpensive components do not need to be kept and returned but if there are problems with things like flight controllers, they do need to be kept and clearly labelled so that we can either organise replacements or investigate what went wrong / how to prevent similar issues occurring in the future.