Alternating Navigation and Conspicuity Lights

Each motor mount board are equipped with navigation lights. These lights are used to indicate the drone's heading and conspicuity lighting patterns.

Warning

In the event of a motherboard reboot, the motor mount board temporarily loses the power and goes off.

Scheme

Info

This scheme needs motherboard release v1.3.0 or newer to operate in synchronous mode.

Warning

In instances of a CAN communication failure, where the MMB misses the sync pulse, it autonomously takes control of navlights. It alternatively activates controllability and conspicuity lights, resulting in a gradual drift in the sequence over time.

The MMB autonomously manage and control the navigation lights.

The MMB is tasked with configuring colors based on its unique node ID. On receiving the sync pulse, the MMB disables the navigation light and (re)start the sequence from the controllability light.

Configuration Registers

Brightness Control

Note

This brightness control register is only valid for the MMBs with the software version v1.2.0 or above.

For each MMB, the brightness of the navigation light is configurable with the following Cyphal register.

Register Name	Type	Default	Unit	Description
navlight.brightness	natural16	300	%	range from 0 to 1000

Use the following command to adjust the brightness of the navigation lights associated with each MMB.

yakut reg <node_id> navlight.brightness <brightness_value>

# e.g.,
# 1. update navlights brightness for all MMBs simultaneously
yakut reg 1,3,5,7,9,11 navlight.brightness 100

# 2. update the navlights brightness of a MMB with node ID 1
yakut reg 1 navlight.brightness 100

Navlights State Duration

Note

This state duration register is only valid for the MMBs with the software version v1.2.0 or above.

The ON duration of the controllability and conspicuity light and the OFF duration between the states is configurable with the following Cyphal register.

Register Name	Type	Default	Unit	Description
navlight.state_duration_ms	natural16	[1200, 50, 250, 0]	milliseconds	[controllability light on duration, state 1 off duration, conspicuity light on duration, state 2 off duration]

Warning

The navlights feedback publication rate is dependent on the state durations configured. Smaller state durations will increase the publication, results in bus overhead.

The ON duration of the controllability light must be greater than 100ms. If the ON duration falls below 100 milliseconds, the running application will automatically adjust it to a minimum of 100 milliseconds to limit the feedback publication rate.

Use the following command to update the state durations.

yakut reg <node_id> navlight.state_duration_ms <controllability_light_ON_duration> <off_1_duration> <conspicuity_light_ON_duration> <off_2_duration>

# e.g., the following command set ON duration of controllability light to 1.2s, off 1 duration to 50ms, ON duration of conspicuity light to 250ms and off 2 duration to 0ms
yakut reg 1 navlight.state_duration_ms 1200 50 250 0 

# or updating simultaneously to all MMBs
yakut reg 1,3,5,7,9,11 navlight.state_duration_ms 1200 50 250 0

Configurations can also updated through mmb.yaml file. Refer to the Configuration Deployment Section.

User Interface

LED	meaning
Solid Off	Motor Mount Board inactive
Blinking Blue	Motor Mount Board node active

Cyphal

Publication

Note

The publication ports for acceleration and ambient_light is only valid for the MMBs with the software version v1.2.1 or below. These ports will be deprecated and subsequently removed in the future.

Topic Name	Port ID	Type	Priority	Frequency	Description
acceleration	6002	starcopter.AccelerationFIFO.0.1	nominal (4)	Adaptive	Publish arm vibrations (acceleration measurements)
system_status	6004	starcopter.aeric.mmb.SystemStatus.0.1	nominal (4)	5 Hz	Publish system voltages and on-board temperature mesaurements
ambient_light	6005	uavcan.si.sample.voltage.Scalar.1.0	nominal (4)	2 Hz	Publish ambient light as a function of volts/illuminance (V/lx)
navlights_feedback	6007	starcopter.aeric.Navlight.0.1	low (5)	4Hz	Publish navigation lights feedback message (brightness and color). The feedback publication depends on the state durations configured (see navlights state durations)

Subscription

Topic Name	Port ID	Type	Description
navlight_sync_pulse	6076	uavcan.primitive.Empty.1.0	Subscribe to the navigation lights sync pulse

Configuration Deployment

The configurations can be applied via yakut command or ask software development team.

Using Yakut

Required:

1. Configuration file mmb.yaml (locate in the project directory)
2. Setting up Yakut

Apply configurations with:

cat mmb.yaml | y rb <node-id(s)>

# e.g.,
cat mmb.yaml | y rb 1,3,5,7,9,11

Note

the <node-id> can be viewed using the command yakut monitor or, in short y mon.

Further Information

See following diagrams