Arduino day 2015 and Crazyflie glove controller

Last Saturday it was Arduino day 2015 and it happens that the Arduino office in Sweden is in the same building as ours. So we where invited and presented Crazyflie. It was a really fun event with a lot of interesting people passing  by and we had a lot of fun.

Arduino day 2015

There was also Helium balloon, which gave us a perfect occasion to use the blimp hack we did more than a year ago. We attached a brunch of ‘Arduino colored’ balloon to it and flew it around using the Deviation TX. It is definitly something we have to port to Crazyflie 2.o.

blimp_scaled

Finally as the event was hosted by Arduino, and we do not have Arduino compatibility (yet … ; ), we thought we would make something with Arduino and present it. We ended up making a Crazyflie Controller using an Arduino and using a thumb stick and ultrasonic distance sensor that was lying around the office. We attached everything to a glove to make it a ‘wearable’ controller.

arduino_glove

 

 

glove_action glove_closeup

The glove is working as follow: you place your hand over a hard surface (concrete floor or table), click the thumb-stick button to set the zero and from now-on rising the hand higher will increase the Crazyflie thrust. Then the thumb-stick can be used to steer the Crazyflie. The program is quite simple and implemented in a single loop.

Technically the most work has been put in enabling the serial port of the Crazyradio so that the Arduino can send commands to the Crazyflie using the Crazyradio directly without a computer. As there is a lot of pins available on Crazyradio and a voltage regulator capable of accepting up to ~16V, the aim has always been to be able to use it as a radio module for other system. Our first thought was PPM input, but now serial control will also be possible. We are still cleaning up the code and working on other new functionality on the Crazyradio. We plan to release a new firmware soon that will support PPM, UART and a more efficient USB protocol to communicate with many Crazyflies using one radio dongle.

8 comments on “Arduino day 2015 and Crazyflie glove controller

  • Hello, we have working “glove” controller. In fact it’s a form of a bracelet, so it’s more usable. We also have a Crazyflie client built in Java FX with integrated weather forecast using opensource service :-). So you know that in 2 hours there will be a rain for example.

    Wireless CF hand controller

    But we still have three Crazyflie 1.0 and didn’t have spare money to order Crazyflie 2.0. We also do a lot of other projects. If you would support our development, we could make it for you. We have also 3d printer for customized design using various materials.

  • Where can I find documentation about “Crazyflie glove controller”?
    Or is there a discussion in the forum?

    Crazyflie is e great project! RESPECT!

  • Hi,

    Do you know when the updated firmware for the crazyradio will be available?

    I would like to use the Crazyflie in a motion capture environment. Vicon cameras would track its position and send it to a real time control station (Speedgoat). If I could interface the crazyradio to the real time control station with UART or PPM, that would simplify things a lot!

    Thanks,

    Alexis

    • Hi Alexis,

      I have had weird problems integrating all functionalities in the Crazyradio so this has been a bit delayed.

      If you are interested I can upload a firmware that can send packet with the UART (no reception). This is the one I used with the glove and it would work to control one copter.

      /Arnaud

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