Manual Flight/Drive

Overview

During the development mode (and only during development mode) an Experimenter may take manual control of a vehicle in order to test other aspects of their experiment. For example, if an experimenter wishes to see at what range a portable node disconnects from a fixed node, the experimenter can simply command a vehicle to go to a distant location from the fixed node while monitoring the radio link (in a different window). 

The actions taken while flying (or driving, for rovers) in manual mode are not repeatable in the testbed. Furthermore, none of the usual checks for validity are tested in manual mode: an Experimenter can fly a drone for as long as they desire (even after the battery shows 0%), can fly them at any altitude, without regard for geofences, or even crash the drone into the ground. If you do crash your virtual drone, reset the corresponding CVM to get a brand new drone back.

How to Fly or Drive with QGroundControl

Bottom Slider

All actions in QGroundControl (for safety reasons) require that you bottom slide a slider from left to right after you select the command. Nothing happens until you slide the slider.

Drone Takeoff

The key to manual flight is to use QGroundControl. If the vehicle is an UAV, the first action is always to take-off with the UAV. By default, the UAV takes off at 10m (but you can select a different altitude on the right slider). To takeoff, press the takeoff button, then slide the slider at the bottom. If the UAV does not arm, check that the UAV is in an armable mode (e.g., STABILIZE, ALT-HOLD, or LOITER). If you have to change the mode, click on the current mode (next to the flying text on the upper left bar) and change it. In the figure above the mode is "Guided". You can change the mode by clicking on the same "Guided" text and selecting a different mode.

Upon successfully taking off, you'll see the drone being armed, and the altitude increasing in the top left of the black window at the bottom of the screen (where it says 10.0m in the figure above)

Rover Arm

For obvious reasons, rovers don't take off. Instead they have to be armed. Before you can move a rover around, you need to arm it. To arm the rover, left click on the green status in the upper left corner (next the the Q) where it says "Ready To Fly", then press the "Arm" button that appears. Finally, slide the bottom slider to complete the operation.

Moving Around

To fly the drone at a desired location (or drive the rover), simply left-click on the map at the desired location and select "Go Here". The slide the bottom slider to confirm.

Land

To land, select the "Land" from the left-side bar, then confirm with the slider. The drone will land at it's current location. For the last 10 m the UAV will descend at a lower speed (0.5m/s). The rover doesn't need landing :-). 

RTL (Return to Launch)

To command the drone to return to its location where it was last armed, select the "RTL" button on the left-side bar (under the Land button). Then confirm with the slider. The drone will first climb at a safe altitude, then return to launch, then land, then disarm.

Select a New Altitude

To select a new altitude, first select "Action" in left-side bar (bottom-most button), then slide the bar on the right side to select a new altitude. Finally, slide the bottom slider to confirm. The drone will move vertically up or down to the new desired altitude.