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Forum Index : Microcontroller and PC projects : MicroMite Autopilot for Snoopy’s Boats
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Robin Lovelock Regular Member  Joined: 12/02/2017 Location: United KingdomPosts: 45 |
Hi Folks. It's many years since I made active use of any forum, but I thought it might be useful to join this one, for a brief period at least. If you might be interested, please make a brief visit to my "Home" page on www.gpss.co.uk then to the new page relevant to this forum: my new "MicroMite" page on www.GPSS.co.uk/micromit.htm I welcome direct email from anyone who is not nervous about revealing their full name, year of birth, and nearest town. I often CC my reply to guys who I already know, who are working on the same topic. Alternatively, just chat to me, or about me, on this thread, and I'll try to respond if needed. Many Thanks in advance. Robin www.gpss.co.uk p.s. sorry that links above are not "hot". Robin on www.gpss.co.uk and www.gpss.co.uk/micromit.htm |
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bigmik Guru  Joined: 20/06/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 2870 |
Hi All, I invited Robin to `The Back Shed Forum' as he is involved in a very interesting project, along with a another bloke, Roy Vaughn, to design a model yacht (approx 1.2m Hull) to self navigate across the Atlantic from England to the USA. Apparently this is some rather large competition that, to date, no one has successfully achieved. Robin's current designs are based on the PIC-AXE and he is hoping to convert them to a Micromite based `brain'. Clickable links for his pages are below: Robin's Home Page www.gpss.co.uk The `Snoopy' Project http://www.tsogpss.co.uk.gridhosted.co.uk/autop.htm And his MicroMite experiments. www.GPSS.co.uk/micromit.htm Robin is using GPS to, hopefully, plot a course for his destination. Here is a picture of a French competitor somewhere out in the Atlantic  Please welcome Robin, and I am sure he will welcome any and all input we may have to his project. Kind Regards, Mick Mick's uMite Stuff can be found >>> HERE (Kindly hosted by Dontronics) <<< |
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Zonker Guru Joined: 18/08/2012 Location: United StatesPosts: 761 |
Welcome Robin to TBS..!!  What an awesome project you doing...! So, how are you going to control the craft...? Servo channels..? Do tell us more..!! Is it a sailing craft..? How does it handle BIG waves..? Good to have you on board fine Sir..!!  |
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| bigmik Guru Joined: 20/06/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 2870 |
Hi All, Sorry a couple of links did not work correctly. Here they are again. Robin's Home Page www.gpss.co.uk The `Snoopy' Project http://www.tsogpss.co.uk.gridhosted.co.uk/autop.htm And his MicroMite experiments. www.GPSS.co.uk/micromit.htm Regards, Mick Mick's uMite Stuff can be found >>> HERE (Kindly hosted by Dontronics) <<< |
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| Paul_L Guru Joined: 03/03/2016 Location: United StatesPosts: 769 |
Welcome Robin! Why would anyone want to come here???? The Vikings got here, hung around for a little while, and left in disgust! Do you have a secret longing for a good pastrami sandwich? Maybe some southern fried chicken? Perhaps some New England Clam Chowder? Or, just maybe, you want to drive on the right side of the road instead of the wrong side for a change. I worked in Engineering at Pan Am for a quarter century, a quarter century ago. If I could I would send you a complimentary ticket on Pan Am flight 101 and stop all this strain and angst. Some idiots, like myself, try to justify fooling around with electronic gizmos on the pretext that they are doing something good for mankind. I have, since 2014, been fooling around trying to build a gadget to control a geothermal heat pump that heats and cools my house, using, in succession, a PDP11, a mishmash of Picaxes, and now a much more powerful Micromite. You, in your retirement, have decided to bypass the greater good for mankind argument and do something really offbeat! I think that's wonderful. If you ever get over here come up for a visit. I'm located about 75 miles north of that mess they call Manhattan. I'm sure that, acting in concert, we can dream up even more oddball ideas about how to waste a lot of time and make the neighbors shake their heads in disbelief. Paul in NY |
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| srnet Senior Member  Joined: 08/08/2014 Location: United KingdomPosts: 164 |
I have written some LoRa code for Micromite. LoRa is low cost and very long range radio telemetry. Its being used a lot for high altitude balloon tracking in the UK, distances of greater than 400km have been achieved, 1.5kbs @ 10mW only. A low data of 100bps is enough for tracking data, that would be good for more than 1000km. I am not suggesting LoRa would be of any use mid atlantic, but for local off-shore testing it could be useful, in that you could get a lot of diagnostic data back and interact with and send commands to the boat many kms away. Lots of info on LoRa here; http://www.loratracker.uk/ Drop box with code and reports here; https://goo.gl/IeEiC1 $50SAT is Silent but probably still working. For information on LoRa visit http://www.loratracker.uk/ |
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| Robin Lovelock Regular Member Joined: 12/02/2017 Location: United KingdomPosts: 45 |
Hi Guys ! What a lovely surprise to see these postings, and I've just tweaked the top of my "MicroMite" page, at 0800 GMT/UT, which may make it clearer. I must also ask my "Team-Joker" friends to consider signing up to this Forum. Hopefully, with a bit of help, I'll see how easily I can paste in things like hot links. I'll change my profile to go to the MicroMite page. Thanks Mick and any others who sent me a direct email: I've got a few waiting in my in-tray, including related to UK NHS charity activity. So replies will be later this morning. SRNET: yes, I recognize your tag from the Picaxe forum, and the good advise you gave years ago, when I was programming around bugs in the Picaxe firmware. e.g. having to switch clock speed, around the program loop, because the firmware. We may stick to the Picaxe, since it works, but software on the MicroMite is so familiar to me, and the guys I'm working with, I'm sure we will not need help from you: but thanks. Any software help,particularly on this forum, would probably be limited to avoiding or programming around firmware bugs. Paul_L: I reckon I detect a yanky accent ? I trust you've visited the "Snoopy" page and read that message near the top from Snoopy to you guys ? If you send me a direct email, with your address, or that of a local landmark, I'll send you back a list of the nearest guys on my links page: probably within walking distance. Sometimes guys already know each other. Taa for the invite, but the last USA trip our family had, was when wife June and eldest daughter Samantha, flew over for a shopping trip to NY, just after 911, with smoke still in the air. See our "Family" page. Dick might have popped in, during last years 3 months tour of USA in a camper van with wife Liz. He visited on or two guys. There is a video of a lady engineer from SF area with Snoopy at Bray Lake last year. PDP11s ? Ahh - those were the (NATO then EASAMS) days :-) Zonker: Great to hear from you: Check out the "Snoopy" pages - will keep you busy for hours :-) Finally Big Mick: Thanks mate - I'll be replying to your direct email soon, but I think it was there mostly to alert me to the postings here. Luckily, I seem to have set up my profile OK, with the postings also coming in as direct emails. Thanks for all your help: one of your boards was given to me by Phil, the UK MicroMite supplier who visited here before Christmas, soon after Roy did all that good work. I gave Roy the board, along with a scrap of veroboard and components. Maybe Roy will advise me on what magnifying glass and light I should use. My eyes ain't so good for soldering work as they were in the early 1960s ! :-) That'll do for now: I'll do my emails, then may try pasting pictures and links. Hopefully someone local like Roy will get me up and running with one or two "production" standard MicroMite AutoPilot boards, to which I can simply connect those 5v devices, of GPS, Compass, Servo, and TTS, which Roy has already got working, with his own simple autopilot application. The difference is for me, that I can almost just paste in old GPSS/GPSSppc code to get something working anywhere in the World - not just west of Greenwich and North of Equator. Maybe even Alex in deepest Siberia might give it a try, after his local lakes have thawed out. Yes, he's one of those dots on the map counter. Don't be fooled by those counters at the bottom: I came up as "Slough" on the map - not far from Sunninghill. But that Feedjit table on the right said Scotland this morning ! :-) Thanks All Robin www.gpss.co.uk/micromit.htm p.s. Mick: my email reply to you bounced, but no harm in my putting it here .... Thanks Mick. Just getting around to your email after all my other ones. You've probably seen my posting on TBS and I've alerted guys like Roy to it. Yes, your MuP is what I passed on to Roy, given me by Phil, and when I was at Roys, he too looked at it closely. My gut feel is that with the right tools and skills, a bit of veroboard is probably all we need. Yesterday I put a link to your stuff near the bottom. I have to tidy up the page, in slower time, but priority is for me to get hardware working again. This morning I put my multimeter set to ohms, and could not see a short between serial in and out to the USB. Maybe Phil will use his time to make one up: I was expecting him to after his meeting here - for publicity stunts. It seems he has a magazine article published somewhere, so that's naturally taking his time. If you know what the mag is, I might get a copy. Thanks again. Robin www.gpss.co.uk On 12/02/2017 23:42, Mick Gulovsen wrote: > Hi Robin, Roy, > > I have put a little bit of a teaser after your post on TBS (the Back Shed) and I hope it will gain some momentum for your work. etc,etc Robin on www.gpss.co.uk and www.gpss.co.uk/micromit.htm |
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| Paul_L Guru Joined: 03/03/2016 Location: United StatesPosts: 769 |
Hi again Robin, Yes, you detect a Yankee accent, yes, I have perused your web site, yes, I noticed that you have kindly incorporated a Union Jack into the design of the sail on Snoopy in order to annoy Yanks. This does not really annoy me, except for the fact that I believe that it might be upside down. The Aussies and Kiwis who frequent this establishment have exhibited great wisdom by designing their flags so that anyone can immediately recognize that it is upside down. The reason this does not annoy me is that I am basically a Polack from Brooklyn. We spend an inordinate amount of time being confused just by trying to remember our names. If I remember correctly Sunninghill is about 10 miles southwest of Heathrow, down near Ascot. I rented a room and a spare Mini from a Pan Am mechanic when I was working in Heathrow for 9 months back in 1969. I was the junior guy in the engineering department so I got assigned to get the local technicians up to speed on the brand new 747 aircraft. The Inertial Navigation System had them flummoxed so they flummoxed me with their British slang. As I said I am located about 75 miles north of Manhattan in Dutchess County near a crossroads called Fishkill Plains. The IBM microprocessor fab is about 4 miles southwest and the mainframe plant is about 6 miles northwest. The nearest sizable city is Poughkeepsie. Fishkill is of Neiderlander origin meaning a stream with lots of fish. It's too bad that June and Samantha had to be here just after 911. That fire stank to high heaven! There's another Paul hanging around this establishment so to avoid confusion I sometimes sing off with my real name. Later. Pavel Artur Jan Waclaw Lepkowski |
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| WhiteWizzard Guru Joined: 05/04/2013 Location: United KingdomPosts: 2794 |
Hi Robin, Good to see you on here  Let me propose that you use one of BigMick's MuP PCBs (I prefer version 2) plugged onto a piece of vero-board. All you 'other modules' can then sit on this vero-board too with just a few short wires to simply link the modules to the relevant MM pins. The above is just so you have a working prototype with which you can write your code. It is not worth doing a 'dedicated' PCB until you have reached this stage IMHO. I have not offered to do a PCB because the 28pin MicroMite (plus power, plus a single capacitor) is all you need to get started. And with a USB module connected to pins 11 & 12 you are then able to code from a computer. The MuP 2 simplifies all this! The MuP 3 I gave you before Xmas (and now with Roy) is also suitable to use but there is a bit of coding on the built-in USB module. For this reason, the MuP 2 is my recommendation for your application as the USB module I supplied you can plug directly into it. Let me know if you want me to assemble you a MuP2. You will need to add the vero-board but I will supply you with some female sockets & header pins to make this task easy. WW (Phil) For everything Micromite visit micromite.org Direct Email: whitewizzard@micromite.o |
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| Robin Lovelock Regular Member Joined: 12/02/2017 Location: United KingdomPosts: 45 |
Hi Pavel (Paul_L) Great to hear from a Polak ! Yes - you got Sunninghill well targeted. My brother-in-law Michael Campion ( see 2016 Newsletter ) worked at Heathrow, doing aircraft maintenance, and that may have been when you were there. I don't see any harm in us sharing things with the others, and sometimes it can be very educational - or at least amusing. You remind me to contact several others, including my sister Sally and other Poles, and some will probably be very interested in this MicroMite project. First - where you are - I'll take Fishkill Elementary School as a location at 41.6040 -73.8322 and I dont's see anyone within walking distance who I knew ... I think the closest people to you on our email links pages www.gpss.co.uk/gpsslink.htm are probably : Joseph Hunter 7.3 km west Perry Hatch 11 km north Bryan Montgomery 14 km north east Izzy Rivera 19 km east Gary Carter 20 km north <-- coincidence - my car mechanic on www.carmech.co.uk Anthony Koestler 25 km south east (1 km = 0.62 miles. 1 mile = 1.61 km) Remember they may not have used GPSS or exchanged emails with me for some time. Polish Guys who I must contact now include, Andy in Poland - if you watch that Pocket PC animation on my "Home" page, you will see a glimpse of his PPC. Andy got us to visit Sicily the first time, over 10 years ago. Stefan Kwiatkowski who worked for me at EASAMS - we went to his wedding near London 30 years ago - the rest were Poles. June's grandma in Sunninghill had a Polish lodger, Jan from WW2 years. We have lots of Poles around us now. Back to technical and defence systems technology: during the 1970s, when working on "Dr Strangelove" related things with USAFE guys, returning from 'Nam, we discussed a new Polish Fighter Aircraft, that was giving us some concern: it seems that there was risk of their advance technology being put into MIGs by the Russians. It seems they took out a patent for their air-to-ground comms to use a LEADING wire antenna. Guess that'll do on winding up Poles for now :-) Robin www.gpss.co.uk p.s. thanks Phil (White Wizard). Yes, your MuP suggestion is already discussed in the earlier postings and discussion with Mike. It will be great if you can put a hardware solution together quickly, but I think you need to look more closely at the requirement. You may find veroboard quicker: but I don't mind how you do it. Something similar in size and either with Futaba flying leads or compatible groups of 3-pin groups, so we can easily plug in those devices for testing. First tests are on a tea tray, followed rapidly by being popped into one of Snoopy's boats. If we adopt a solution, for an Atlantic Attempt, Futaba plugs are replaced by soldered joints, and the whole module might get sealed in resin - or even candle wax ! If and when we have hardware available, I'll publish relevant sections of code. e.g. input/output lines that should be almost trivial. Sorry that the Autopilot software ( already in that old Pocket PC ) will not be open source. Robin on www.gpss.co.uk and www.gpss.co.uk/micromit.htm |
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| Paul_L Guru Joined: 03/03/2016 Location: United StatesPosts: 769 |
Robin, Try 41.6104, -73.8131. I fool around with the Polish thing just to confuse you Limeys. Like most Yanks I am really a North American Mutt. My paternal grandfather was from Kracow, his wife was from Prepryat famous for its breeding reactor, my maternal grandfather was from Bremerhaven, and his wife was from York England. Hitler was right, there is a master race. It's the North American Mutt. We've been working for a quarter of a millenium trying to get it to breed true. We're not doing too terribly well though. Paul in NY |
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| srnet Senior Member Joined: 08/08/2014 Location: United KingdomPosts: 164 |
Well indeed, the PICAXE Works. I have been involved in a couple of PICAXE applications where reliability was paramount, first $50SAT itself and more recently I wrote the beacon software for the Tupod launcher that was ejected from the ISS a few weeks back; Tupod launcher PICAXE was chosen for the Tupod launcher as PICAXE on $50SAT itself proved to be extremly reliable and simple to code. However there does come a point where the application complexity increases and other platforms become more attractive, but be careful. For instance, a lot of the tracker stuff I have done recently is on Arduino, the big issue with that platform is you are often depending on multiple libraries of unknown\unsupported providence. I have discovered (so far) at least one bug in the Arduino DUE part of the compiler to which there is no solution, but its possible to work around it. $50SAT is Silent but probably still working. For information on LoRa visit http://www.loratracker.uk/ |
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| Robin Lovelock Regular Member Joined: 12/02/2017 Location: United KingdomPosts: 45 |
Wise words SRNET. Yes, reliabilty is important when guiding rockets like Arianne, missiles like Sea Wolf, or aircraft like Tornado, and some of our Team-Joker were responsible for their software, in the days where one man did the work of ten to 100 today. See the Barossa Operation video on my AsOnTV page. Paul: I got a good reply from Andy in Poland who will be looking on this forum. See my "AVL" page and that Spy Shop in Wroklaw Poland. Today, I even had information about MicroMite from Alex in Siberia, Russia. But most of today was spent with Dick ( near top of "Snoopy" page ) and with the Mavic camera drone which first we tested inside my house, flying through doorways, and then over at Bray Lake. It has interesting technology and in next two days I hope to upload a nice youtube video. There is overlap with MicroMite because Dick had programmed the Bray Lake waypoints into the Mavic, and we expect to use the Drone soon for filming Bray Lake tests - maybe with a MicroMite Autopilot. Now I must eat, before my wife June and I go out for our Italian lesson. No Problem with my Italian Homework - google translate helped me ;-) Robin www.gpss.co.uk Robin on www.gpss.co.uk and www.gpss.co.uk/micromit.htm |
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| isochronic Guru Joined: 21/01/2012 Location: AustraliaPosts: 689 |
Robotic craft crossed the Pacific some time ago, eg wave powered and more recently solar powered as well eg http://makezine.com/2016/08/22/solar-powered-autonomous-boat/ |
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CaptainBoing Guru Joined: 07/09/2016 Location: United KingdomPosts: 1986 |
What an entertaining site you have Robin! I have spent an hour going through the vids and articles - great stuff - wish you all the best with the project. I love some of the inovative solutions you have - the tacking software must have been great fun to develop. all the best and welcome to the Micromite - it is going to be great |
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| Robin Lovelock Regular Member Joined: 12/02/2017 Location: United KingdomPosts: 45 |
Thanks Guys. Yes Chronic, the guys in that Microtransat list, linked from near top of my "Snoopy" page will know of these attempts, but checkout the differences. Thanks to Captain Boeing. All: check out the new "Snoopy Drone" video now near to of "Snoopy" page on www.gpss.co.uk/autop.htm Sorry I've not managed to do hot links, etc yet. I hope to report MicroMite progress soon, after getting together with Roy today. Robin www.gpss.co.uk Robin on www.gpss.co.uk and www.gpss.co.uk/micromit.htm |
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| Robin Lovelock Regular Member Joined: 12/02/2017 Location: United KingdomPosts: 45 |
Fantastic News Guys ! Roy's MicroMite based autopilot works ! Please visit my MicroMite page under the [www] button or www.gpss.co.uk/micromit.htm It is completely software and plug compatible with my requirement, unchanged since that page was set up, just a few days ago. Tomorrow I expect to update the page with results of my later tests. Maybe someone can provide quick, concise details of how to make the program restart when 5v power is removed then re-applied. i.e. it will NOT be connected to a PC, other than for program load: testing will be on a tea tray or boat. Yes, I'm very much in the market for anyone who can provide ready built hardware modules with Futaba flying leads. They will need to look in detail at the components I am using, and I'll be happy to provide those as needed. They are already on the "Snoopy" pages. There will be no business potential at all in it - just credit where credit is due. Thanks to all of you - particularly the banter :-) Robin www.gpss.co.uk Robin on www.gpss.co.uk and www.gpss.co.uk/micromit.htm |
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| WhiteWizzard Guru Joined: 05/04/2013 Location: United KingdomPosts: 2794 |
OPTION AUTORUN ON For everything Micromite visit micromite.org Direct Email: whitewizzard@micromite.o |
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| Robin Lovelock Regular Member Joined: 12/02/2017 Location: United KingdomPosts: 45 |
Brilliant Phil: "OPTION AUTORUN ON" in my desk diary for tomorrow morning. That's how a forum should work ! What was that magazine ? I'd like to take a look. Robin www.gpss.co.uk Robin on www.gpss.co.uk and www.gpss.co.uk/micromit.htm |
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| WhiteWizzard Guru Joined: 05/04/2013 Location: United KingdomPosts: 2794 |
Robin, Take a look at your emails when you get a minute! For everything Micromite visit micromite.org Direct Email: whitewizzard@micromite.o |
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