I am working to restore an older ROV2 that was left abandoned in a university lab. I believe it is an R1, made in 2018 or later. I hope that I am posting this in the right place!
I have so far been able to get QGC, Companion, and ArduSub updated to the latest versions (I think). Those are 5.0.8, 0.0.31, and 4.5.6 respectively. I have established a connection between QGC and the ROV, and have been able to calibrate sensors, and configure the power and leak detector settings. However, when calibrating motor directions, I could not get thruster 5 to work.
I moved thruster 5’s signal cable into a different outpin pin on the pixhawk, and was able to get it to spin. Therefore, the thruster and ESC are fine. I believe the issue is with the pixhawk.
This may or may not be related, but while in QGC, I am constantly being told that “parameters are missing from firmware” anytime I click onto the lights or camera tab, complete with a long list of parameters that I am apparently missing. Also, the “tuning” configuration tab is completely blank. Additionally, QGC is constantly throwing “EKF3 IMU0 forced reset”.
If anybody has any thoughts on how to proceed from here, it would be much appreciated!
Blue Robotics has only teted QGC version 4.2.8 - beyond that you’re on your own FYI - see our supported software versions in the Technical Reference.
It does sound like your channel 5 output is damaged, assuming the ESC was plugged in correctly and not reversed! It should be possible to hunt down a replacement pixhawk clone…. or upgrade your system to a Pi4 + Navigator, the current default hardware! You can also do the motor direction calibration with the vehicle in water from BlueOS (with QGC closed) - since you’re still on the (ancient) Companion that isn’t an option… updating may help things!
Those parameters missing from firmware is an expected issue / message, and is just a nuisance…. We recommend Cockpit for more features and customization!
The IMU forced reset message usually happens with a poor compass and accelerometer calibration - or maybe the pixhawk itself is damaged in that respect as well?
Note that the motors can be reassigned via the SERVOn_FUNCTION parameters. It’s typically not recommended because it’s more confusing to support when motors are not connected where it’s expected, but if you do genuinely have a fried/damaged pin (e.g. output 5) then you should be able to connect the ESC to a different pin and assign it to use the Motor 5 output function.
That’s part of the autopilot functionality, so is unrelated to your onboard computer software
