cmucam3-hardware (#1) - Servos not responding? (#186) - Message List

Servos not responding?

Start by saying thanks for the help on previous problems, got the old school GUI program you sent and it works beautifuly; impressed with the ability to grab virtually any color and see that its tracking that color very smoothly.. However Im now back to my servo troubles.

The servos are not responding to the commands Im sending, when I say "gs 0" it comes back "ACK" "128", so I have my pan system plugged into servo port 0, tilt into servo port 1, I say "so 0 1" comes back "ACK", so I figure a command of "sv 0 100", coming back with "ACK" would make the pan system move; but it doesnt.

I had the pan servos moving to my "sv 0 xxx" commands earlier last week, after I ran the GUI program I cannot get them to respond; the servos are getting the power (when I plug our battery into the servo power plug, the pan system moves a few degrees to its right, every time) also when I physically try to move the tilt system it resists; but it just doesnt seem to be listening to my commands..

Thanks again in advance, Leo

emcc
04/08/08 15:19:36
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  • Message #471

    If the servo is holding its position, then it is getting the PWM pulse from the CMUcam correctly. As a quick sanity check, you should make sure they are plugged into the right ports. Once you have it plugged in (holding a position), try sending your sv 0 100 command to all 4 servos. "sv 0 100" "sv 1 100" etc to make sure the number is correct. People have posted saying that the GUI may not be correctly setting some of the servo ports, so do it from a terminal.

    agr
    04/08/08 20:04:37
    • Message #480

      Ok... heres what seems to be happening; this morning we set up a large white background with sheets had our target (Elmo) in place and camera ready. Plugged everything in exactly as we had it yesterday (yesterday the tracking was working) and turned it on, camera recieved commands but servos wouldnt move. Later discovered that servo port 1 (the tilt) had its servos wires plugged in upside down, PWM white wire in the ground spot and the ground of the servo going to where the PWM should be. This seemed to "kill" our port 1 and port 0. We tried resetting board doing some servo masking command thought maybe something got disabled as a saftey feature or whatever, nothing worked.

      We went into terminal program to do these things, did the "sv 0 100" sv 1 215 whatever nothing moved; finally we plugged the servos into port 2 and port 3; and they receive commands from the terminal program; however now they wont track becasue track is set for ports 0 and 1. Can we force track to work on 2 for pan and 3 for tilt? This is what is happening to my partners board, for my board none of the ports work... Im convinced that I must have plugged the servo wires in backwords on all of my ports and shut them off, does this make sense? When we try to turn servo port 2 off using the "so 2 0" command, then try to move the servo using "sv 2 100", the servo moves... this should not happen. What seems to me is that the ports are getting shut off by a saftey feature or whatnot and are not listening to the "servo output" commands... dont know what else to do...

      Hoping to hear from you very soon, if these boards are fried can we send them in and to get repaired or replaced?

      emcc
      04/16/08 11:22:35
    • Message #481

      We've been working with the Phillips Flash program... erasing the board and reinstalling the cmucam2emulation; when we "erase" the board then do "blank check" says board is blank, then we reinstall the cmucam2 hex file, and afterwords hit the "Compare Flash" says "File Compare Failed"... this means that the program on the board is no longer the same as the hex file we're trying to upload?

      Thanks for your help along the way.. hope we can get this figured out; trying everything possible and reading all the text... but we're not programmers and this camera is new to everyone here.

      emcc
      04/16/08 12:07:17
      • Message #485

        No help with this problem? Seems like there should be a simple solution...

        emcc
        04/22/08 09:15:44
    • Message #472

      Plugged into the ports, gave power, went through "so 0 1"; "so 1 1"; etc then did the "sv 0 100" etc., then tried going the other way of the middle setting... "sv 0 150" " sv 1 150" etc... still nothing though. Im using a 4 cell, 4.8V, 2150mA rechargable battery; from www.onlybatterypacks.com... actual output is 5.46V at current charge. We own an RX controller with a small receiver, I give power to that receiver and plug the pan into the "throttle" command, and the tilt into the "rudder" command, turn on my controller and can make the pan and tilt system move wherever I want; so I know its not a problem with the servos.. the battery im using to give power to the receiver and essentially the servos is supplying 5.38 volts.

      emcc
      04/09/08 10:14:43
      • Message #473

        Just to be sure, you tried sv 2 100 and sv 3 100? What was happening with the LEDs? Were the orange ones rapidly flickering?

        agr
        04/09/08 22:19:58
        • Message #474

          Yep, tried 2 and 3... going by the CMUCam3 Datasheet for connections and whatnot, so im trusting that I have things hooked up correctly. On the 3 pin servo connection the one that stands on its own is the ground, right?... Orange light is dim, never flickers that I have noticed.

          emcc
          04/10/08 10:09:59
          • Message #475

            Ground is the set of pins that stand on their own (closest to the edge of the board). The next row is power and the final row are the pwm inputs from the cpu. I'm not sure what could be your problem. If the servo is holding its position, then the CPU is doing the right thing and it is correctly getting power. When the orange light is dim it is probably flickering very fast (50Hz). If you move the board quickly side to side you can usually see that they are blinking. Do you know the exact model of the servo? Its possible it has a different pinout (there are two main standards).

            agr
            04/12/08 13:30:22
    • Message #477

      Well since my buddy is doing almost the same project; I grabbed his camera and bam, works like a charm, the tracking is a little choppy and it doesnt operate the tilt but I think that has to do with the Masks, and the Parameters, I didnt have time to get into it but it sees and moves. That means theres something wrong with my board?...

      emcc
      04/15/08 08:28:45
    • Message #478

      Ment to add, I have tried mine in the terminal program, thats where I can write the commands "so 0 1" "sv 0 159" etc... for my board, everything works except servo response; for my buddies board, everything works; I can command both the pan and the tilt servos.. The lights; my board holds the green light on; when in GUI tracking color the red light is very bright and is on when it sees color; off or blinks before it goes out of range etc; the outside most orange light is on but quite dim and the next orange light in i cannot see on; for my buddies board the green is on, red works in the same manner; but his outermost orange light is very bright and the next one in has light; we are using the same battery to power each board.

      Thanks for any advice/help you can give, we're going to move on using his board and hope for the best..

      emcc
      04/15/08 08:33:44
      • Message #479

        If you tried your board with his servos and it still doesn't work, then there likely is a problem with your board. You should definitely rule out the servo compatibility being the issue.

        agr
        04/16/08 00:00:02
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