Saturday 3 October 2015

Flight mode selection issue and fix

There's a bug in Companion 2.1.2, 2.1.3 and 2.1.4 which impacts my current F3F, F3J and E-Soar setups. If you open the EEPE file in one of these versions you may find that one or more flight modes cannot be activated in the simulator. The error will also be present after uploading to your transmitter.

The problem has been fixed in Companion 2.1.5 so if you have this version or later, you need not read further.

Cause

Companion mis-translates a logical switch definition, more details on Github.

The fix

The easiest solution is to upgrade to Companion 2.1.5 or higher. As a matter of good practice, you should reflash your Tx to OTX 2.1.5 at the same time.

However, if you have already uploaded the setup to your transmitter, the fix is easy:

1. Select the affected model memory
2. Open the Logical Switches menu.
3. Highlight the following logical switch:
  • E-Soar: L5
  • F3F: L5
  • F3J : L6
The logical switch operator will be "a < x". The first parameter should be a channel number, but the bug places a blank.
Missing first parameter in "a < x" logical switch

3. Replace the missing parameter as follows:
  • E-Soar: L5 -  'CH17'
  • F3F: L5 -  'CH18'
  • F3J : L6 -  'CH23'
And that's it.

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hi there. I cant arm the motor with the new version? :/

RC Soar said...

Mod above works fine for X9D as described, no probs arming motor. Please re-check your setup, if this doesn't help then email me the .EEPE and I'll have a look.

Anonymous said...

Problem solved after calibrating the inputs on the taranis

thx Mike for your help

Anonymous said...

Hi Mike,

your "Taranis setup for 6-servo F3J / TD gliders" is graet !

But can you explain, what "zoom"-flightmode is ?

RC Soar said...

Glad you like the setup:) Zoom mode is for the top part of the tow as the model comes off the line. A few pilots asked for this, but it can be disabled if you don't need it - see Section 10.3 in the F3J 2.0 Setup Guide.

Anonymous said...

Hi Mike,

"Zoom mode is for the top part of the tow as the model comes off the line."
Yes, you described it in your excellent setup guide with helpfull checkboxes.

But what is going on in Zoom mode ? What should flaps and elevator do ?
Is it for this horrible trajectory you see at F3J-competitions as the model comes off the line ?

RC Soar said...

I kept Zoom mode simple as not everyone needs it. It doesn't require any special setting up, however being a discrete flight mode, it gets its own elevator trim setting, which was the main reason for including it.

Any extra functionality, e.g. fade-in/out, Zoom-specific camber, would require mods, however they should be relatively easy to add. Camber for example could be customised, by adding mixers to the appropriate channels with the Zoom mode check box ticked. The Excel documentation should help here.

Mark said...

What I've seen most folks do in zoom is a flight configuration similar to speed, a minimum drag configuration to maximize the height achieved during the zoom phase.

Mike - I've taken your F3J template, merged in some aspects of your electric configuration (mainly the motor arming logic), plus added some other things that I find useful for my F5J (Xplorer2.5) glider:

1) Motor activated (after arming) by switching into "launch" mode.
2) Motor deactivated by either switching out of launch mode or 30 seconds.
3) Flight timer started after motor deactivation.
4) All normal F3J flight modes, including camber adjustments during zoom (not sure if this is really useful for F5J, but I added that for my F3J gliders, so...).
5) Emergency motor activation, after successful arm/launch, by going into launch mode and pulling SH.
6) Selective switching of altitude and vario audio (SG).

Is this something you'd like to have back, to share with the community?

RC Soar said...

@Mark: F5J mods sound cool - following up by Email. Thx.