Autopilot for passenger cars

PX4 Autopilot Flight Controllers 💻
1

Hi,
Can the Pixhawk controllers can be used for Autopiloting the car? If yes, can you pls help me by giving some pdf literature explaining the same.

Regards,
X Ignatius

2

@Ignatius rover is supported in px4: https://docs.px4.io/v1.9.0/en/airframes/airframe_reference.html#rover

3

@Jaeyoung-Lim,

Thank you very much. Is there any step by step procedure which can be followed, if I need to develop from the scratch.

Regards,
X Ignatius

4

You can start with going throught https://docs.px4.io/v1.9.0/en/getting_started/
then depending on what you want to do take a look at https://dev.px4.io/v1.9.0/en/setup/getting_started.html

5

Hi,

The cable which comes along with GPS/Compass sensor, switch, etc., are very short in length. Can I extend this cable using additional cables. Will there be any effect in the control system due to long cable length. Since I will be using this in a Real car(Not a toy car), all the cables must be extended to get connected to the pixhawk controller.
Can I proceed doing it.

Regards,
Ignatius

6

Hi,

The cable which comes along with GPS/Compass sensor, switch, etc., are very short in length. Can I extend this cable using additional cables. Will there be any effect in the control system due to long cable length. Since I will be using this in a Real car(Not a toy car), all the cables must be extended to get connected to the pixhawk controller.
Can I proceed doing it.

Regards,
X Ignatius

7

The compass sensor is communicates via I2C and will suffer if you extend the cable length - the clock and data lines will be subject to noise and possible crosstalk. The GPS is a serial connection and could also suffer - but you could improve this using a shielded, twisted pair cable.

These systems weren’t designed to be run these kinds of lengths (more than a few inches), which is why cars have all the sensors and systems connected via CAN, which is designed for these distances.

8

Thanks for your comments. Can I still use the short length cables inside a car, so that I can avoid noise problems as you said. Do you have any pictures of pixhawk connected inside the car.

Regards,
Ignatius

9

It sounds like your best approach is to start with building a small rover where your safety risk is much lower, and once you understand the basics you can start scaling it up.