Syma drone with Raspberry Zero W and RGB LED - syma drone modded with raspberry pi zero w, pi Camera v2.1 and monkmakes RGB LED (aka the squid). Who needs a DJI phantom X for £££ when you can have this, much more fun?
I know a little bit of programming, a little pi, a little electronics and I've put it all together in this project - soldering has been a great skill to learn. It's been a heck of a lot of fun and I'm still working on it. I'd love to hear more from anyone with tips or code comments. This has got to be one of the most enjoyable pi projects I've done and it's inspired me to write this and publish it here - my first github repo.
| Items | Amazon Link | Rough Cost |
|---|---|---|
| Syma drone - X5SC-1 | http://amzn.to/2mC9hP7 | £40 |
| Pi Zero W | http://amzn.to/2ngRIYi | £10 |
| Pi Camera v2.1 | http://amzn.to/2mCuIPO | £20 |
| Monkmakes RGB LED | http://amzn.to/2mCmebz | £5 |
| Items | Amazon Link | Rough Cost |
|---|---|---|
| Soldering iron | http://amzn.to/2mC21CQ | £20 |
| Glue gun | http://amzn.to/2ngUxbL | £10 |
| Multi-tool | http://amzn.to/2ngYbT2 | £20 |
I've added a Pi Zero, Pi Camera and RGB LED to the drone. Everything on the drone is powered from the original drone LIPO battery. To power the Pi Zero I soldered a positive and negative wire from the Pi GPIO header (5V header and ground) directly to the Drone controller board. Pi Camera is connected to the Pi Zero with a Pi Zero ribbon cable, I had to fold it over to get it to fit but seems to work fine. The RGB LED (monkmakes squid) is connected as per this excellent guide.
Currently the rough flight sequence is as follows.
- Drone is powered on (by connecting the drone's lipo battery cable)
- Pi boots, as it's fed off the drone's power
- Pi launches the drone.py python script
- drone.py reads config variables in top of file
- drone.py activates the LEDs to indicate status to pilot
- Take off
- After the green light, drone.py actvates video recording for specified time (default 2 mins)
- LEDs change to indicate video recording finished and photo sequence commencing
- Photo stage begins and camera takes a sequence of high resolution photos
- LED indicates python script nearly finished
- Pi shutdown command is issued (have disabled this currently)
The Pi is on my home wifi network so after the flight I connect to the pi and SCP the files and videos off it.
I've got many ideas for how to enhance this project but need to keep in mind weight at all times. I think I'm at the limit of the payload for this drone as it is. However I'd like to investigate the following.
- GPS module or barometer, primarily for altitude data
- Real time clock module
- Different drone - X8C more powerful
- Buttons/ switches to allow pi to be shutdown properly
- Make the pi a wifi access point rather than a wifi client
- Airborn wifi network ESSID scanner
- Automate getting the photos/ videos off the pi
- Light webserver and interface to access photos/ videos/ data
Yellow wire - there's a yellow wire running from the syma control board that was used with the original camera, you pressed a function on the remote control unit and it signalled to the camera to start / stop recording or take a photo. I wonder if it would be possible to connect this yellow wire to the Pi GPIO directly and have the remote unit send signals to the Pi, e.g. take a photo, or shutdown.
