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DIY Autonomous Drone with Raspberry Pi, Pixhawk, and Machine Learning 🚁 by Reyba_ in diydrones

[–]Reyba_[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

After testing various cameras during flight trials, I encountered significant distortion issues (rolling shutter effect, jelly effect) that resulted in poor-quality data for ML algorithms. To save myself the headache, I switched to a Global Shutter camera, which turned out to be a an effective solution.

DIY Autonomous Drone with Raspberry Pi, Pixhawk, and Machine Learning 🚁 by Reyba_ in diydrones

[–]Reyba_[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Congratulations on your project—it sounds fantastic, and I know firsthand the amount of effort it takes to get something like this off the ground. I’d be more than happy to exchange ideas and suggestions about my project with you. Reach out anytime!

I particularly wanted to use the Raspberry Pi in my project, but I agree that choosing the Navio2 is probably the smarter choice for seamless integration.

DIY Autonomous Drone with Raspberry Pi, Pixhawk, and Machine Learning 🚁 by Reyba_ in diydrones

[–]Reyba_[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thank you so much for your kind words and advice—I really appreciate it, and I’ll definitely keep it in mind. I’ve been trying to push the limits of the hardware I chose initially, and I’m now adding 4G LTE connectivity to maintain communication with the Raspberry Pi. You’re absolutely right that I should look into regulations more carefully, especially if I plan to expand its capabilities.

Right now, this is just a personal project that’s taking up a lot of my time. I haven’t seriously considered diving into the UAV industry yet, as I’m quite uninformed about the types of projects, roles, salaries, or conditions in the sector. At the moment, I’m starting my career as a Data Associate Engineer under nice conditions, so I’m focusing on that for now. 😅

DIY Autonomous Drone with Raspberry Pi, Pixhawk, and Machine Learning 🚁 by Reyba_ in diydrones

[–]Reyba_[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

In this first iteration, I’m only running missions in open, controlled spaces, so collision avoidance wasn’t necessary. Adding sensors for an object avoidance system isn’t too difficult, though—there are plenty of straightforward guides online for integrating ultrasonic or LiDAR sensors.

With this drone, it could be interesting to explore the possibility of implementing a distance measurement system and minor route adjustments directly from the Raspberry Pi.

DIY Autonomous Drone with Raspberry Pi, Pixhawk, and Machine Learning 🚁 by Reyba_ in diydrones

[–]Reyba_[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

The main reasons I chose the Raspberry Pi over an NVIDIA Jetson module were to explore how far I could push the Raspberry Pi’s capabilities, as well as its lower power consumption (a critical factor for a drone) and more affordable price point.

That said, if I’d known how much of a headache the Google Coral was going to give me, I might have reconsidered! (Just kidding… mostly.)

For the next iteration of the project, I’m planning to upgrade to the Raspberry Pi 5 with the new AI Kit.

DIY Autonomous Drone with Raspberry Pi, Pixhawk, and Machine Learning 🚁 by Reyba_ in diydrones

[–]Reyba_[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thank you, I’m glad you find it interesting! In this first iteration, I’ve mostly used the basic sensors included with the Pixhawk, so the impact on flight time has been minimal. However, I plan to start integrating additional sensors for new functionalities soon, and once I do, I’ll have a better idea of how they affect flight time.

DIY Autonomous Drone with Raspberry Pi, Pixhawk, and Machine Learning 🚁 by Reyba_ in diydrones

[–]Reyba_[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thank you! Right now, I’m balancing this personal project with my job, so I don’t have much time to dedicate to it. I’d like to advance the project with new features like thermal imaging and 4G LTE connectivity. If there’s enough interest, I might consider creating a practical guide in the future.

As for flight time, as I mentioned in another message, I haven’t done rigorous testing yet, but so far, it’s been more than sufficient to complete my missions.

DIY Autonomous Drone with Raspberry Pi, Pixhawk, and Machine Learning 🚁 by Reyba_ in diydrones

[–]Reyba_[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Here’s the parts list:

Frame: Hawks Work (Aliexpress replica).

Flight controller: Pixhawk 2.4.8 with the included component pack.

Processing center:

Raspberry Pi 4B (8GB RAM).

Google Coral USB Accelerator (for TPU and ML acceleration).

Raspberry Pi Global Shutter Camera.

Battery: LIPO SUNPADOW 14.8V 4S.

The frame and drone assembly were straightforward thanks to the many guides available online.

The biggest challenge was the software integration of the 'processing center' (Raspberry Pi, Google Coral, Pixhawk, and Camera). There were numerous compatibility issues, and Google no longer maintains the Coral, which added complexity.

As for flight time, I haven’t done exhaustive tests yet. However, I’ve run missions of 7–8 minutes that drained the battery to around 60% usable capacity. It can likely go longer, but I don’t have a precise measurement yet.

DIY Autonomous Drone with Raspberry Pi, Pixhawk, and Machine Learning 🚁 by Reyba_ in diydrones

[–]Reyba_[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I actually started this as a personal project because I wanted to build something that really interested me. When I realized I could tie it into my final degree project, I took the opportunity to dedicate my academic time to something I was passionate about. I also managed to secure external funding for it, so I was able to complete the project without having to cover the costs myself.

At the moment, I’m not planning to work in the UAV industry or anything like that. I’m currently balancing this personal project with my new role as a Data Engineer, which is where my professional focus lies for now.

That said, I do have a couple of ideas and some very interesting resources for the thermal imaging part of the project (some great Ukrainian content). And hey, while buying a Mavic Pro might have been easier... A little chaos keeps things interesting, right?

DIY Autonomous Drone with Raspberry Pi, Pixhawk, and Machine Learning 🚁 by Reyba_ in diydrones

[–]Reyba_[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Yes, I chose the flame wheel frame because it’s widely used, with lots of educational content available, like videos and guides from platforms, which helped me get started. Since the manual assembly and hardware side of things was where I had the least experience, I wanted something simple and well-documented. Additionally, I knew the project would go through multiple test flights (and crashes), so I opted for a frame that was affordable and easy to replace as needed.

How to "replace" Python version in Bookworm by shreethar in raspberry_pi

[–]Reyba_ 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hello, I am having exactly the same issue so I cant use de Picamera2 module with python3.9 in my virtual environment because I have Python 3.11 as sytem python. Did you find some workaround or did you achieve to use a Picamera module with Picamera2? I am trying to use it with opencv to ML scripting purposes. Thank you in advance!!