Base Line ParaDrone Manuel utilisateur
ParaDrone
Flight Operations Manual
2022-02-06
By BASEline
Notice: You are entirely responsible for your own safety and compliance with regulations.
ParaDrone is a free, open-source, community project. No warranty is provided on software or
hardware for any purpose.
Paragliding, powered paragliding, and parachuting are all inherently dangerous activities.
Attempting to combine or go outside of the normal parameters of these sports will expose you to
new and possibly unforeseen hazards. Do not participate without carefully considering all
possible consequences.
Different countries and jurisdictions have different aviation laws. You are responsible for using
ParaDrone in a manner consistent with local regulations.
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Chapter 1: Setup 4
Calibration 4
Chapter 2: Autopilot 5
Planner 5
Chapter 3: Remote control 6
Remote control device 7
Chapter 4: Flight procedures 8
Pilot checklist 8
Groundcrew checklist 9
Remote control 9
Chapter 5: Assembly 10
Materials 11
Autopilot 11
Remote control 12
Tools 12
Cost 12
Motors 13
Printed Circuit Board 14
Software 17
Chapter 6: Implementation details 18
Remote control protocol 18
Appendix A: Board layout 22
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Chapter 1: Setup
ParaDrone controls a glider by pulling on the left and right toggles.
How to attach ParaDrone depends on the design of the glider. For skydiving, clip it to your leg
straps. For paragliding either mount it like a flight deck, or make a long ParaDrone to go under
your legs.
Do not take off with ParaDrone attached to your toggles. Launch first, and then only when flying
safely under a fully inflated canopy should ParaDrone be attached. It’s not going to help on
launch, and will just get in the way and create additional hazards.
Calibration
Differences in hardware and gear configuration means that it is necessary to calibrate
ParaDrone before use. Perform calibration on the ground, with slack in the actuator lines.
Calibration is initiated from the app. Each motor spins forward and then backward. The returned
values are the number of encoder ticks per second at max speed. There can be some variation
in the encoder ticks forward and backward, and left and right. A difference of ~10% is no
problem, but if any of the numbers are 0, that means that the encoder is not sensing direction
correctly, and must be fixed before flight.
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Chapter 2: Autopilot
ParaDrone is designed to autonomously fly and land at a designated landing zone. It will
attempt to fly a standard landing pattern including downwind, base, and final legs.
Landing zone is set using the android app. Click settings ⚙, and then “Set LZ”. Drag the map to
be centered on the intended landing zone, and rotate the map to align the arrow with the landing
direction (into the wind). The app will attempt to fetch ground elevation from the internet, but can
be set manually if needed, or if internet access is not available.
Autopilot will not make any turns below 30m. It will begin flaring to land at 6m above ground
level.
If GPS signal is lost for 60 seconds, ParaDrone will enter a slow right-hand spiral. This is to
keep it from flying far away from the LZ in case of lost signal.
Planner
The planner uses waypoints and dubins paths to approximate paraglider flight paths. It can be in
one of several modes, depending on location, landing zone, and user input. Modes include:
● Idle - toggles to neutral position
● RC - remote control override (lasts for 10 seconds from last control input)
● Auto - autopilot engaged but no plan
● Str - straight ahead
● NaiveL, NaiveR - naive path plan (left or right turn)
● DubinL, DubinR - dubins path plan (left or right turn)
● Waypoint - downwind, base, final waypoint plan
● Final - final approach, toggles up (30m AGL)
● Flare - toggles down! (6m AGL)
The flight planner is designed to achieve several goals. First it should be able to run on low
power microcontrollers. It should fly a pattern similar to a human skydiver. If there is adequate
altitude, the autopilot will set up near the landing zone, and then fly a left or right hand pattern to
land in the indicated direction. At a predetermined altitude of 30m AGL there will be no more
turns and toggles return to full flight position. At 6m AGL it will begin to flare for landing.
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Chapter 3: Remote control
Note: You may need a Remote Pilot Certificate to operate ParaDrone remotely, or an equivalent
in your jurisdiction.
ParaDrone can use LoRa long-range radio for remote operation. LoRa is a protocol that uses
unlicensed radio spectrum to do extremely long range communication with low power
requirements. The Heltec ESP32 LoRa v2 board has a builtin LoRa transceiver. To receive
location updates on the ground, and to send remote control commands to ParaDrone, it is
necessary to use a LoRa gateway between an android phone and ParaDrone.
Ground crew can override autopilot using the android app plus
the LoRa relay device. Toggle position is controlled using the
touchpad at the bottom of the android app.
The touchpad operates in two modes: single-touch and
multi-touch. In multi-touch mode, left and right toggles are
controlled separately from the left and right sides of the
screen. In single-touch mode, touch the right side to pull the
right toggle, touch the center to pull both toggles (for example
to flare for landing).
The app sends the desired toggle position to ParaDrone. The
ParaDrone device tracks estimated toggle position, and will
apply motor control to change to a new desired toggle position.
If ParaDrone loses signal from the app, it will stay at the last
toggle position for 10 seconds, and then revert to autopilot
control.
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Remote control device
The remote control device is an ESP32 microcontroller with LoRa and bluetooth radios. A 3D
printed case is included in the ParaDrone project files, but is not strictly necessary.
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Chapter 4: Flight procedures
Pilot checklist
● Pre-flight
Audio comm check
Battery levels
RC control check
Landing zone set
Satellite messenger on interval, on glider not pilot
Extra hook knife
If top launching with ballast: bring luggage scale
● Pre-jump
Wing configuration (trimmers)
Autopilot mode is idle
Connect toggles
AP control check (make sure its following path)
RC control check? (risk of inducing a spiral?)
Engine off
Set autopilot mode to auto
Audio comm: “Ready to jump”
Wait for all-clear from ground crew
● Jump run
Situational awareness (look around, think)
Check pilot chute! (handle available, not snagged on harness)
Ensure you are fully detached
Count number of steps to unbuckle
What to do if hanging below? Hook knife
Watch out for your speed bar. Consider removing before flight.
Stay altitude aware! Paraglider jumps often end up low!
If in doubt: can always land with glider
● In flight and under canopy
Stay aware of ParaDrone above you. If it went unstable on exit, it may be
spiraling down at high speed
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Groundcrew checklist
● Pre-flight
Audio comm check
Align relay antenna with jumprun/landing
Battery levels
Receiving LoRa data
Landing zone set
RC control check: left turn, right turn, flare
Wind check
Landing direction
Wind limits
● Pre-jump
Audio comm check
Confirm drop location and altitude
Landing zone set
Wind check
Give all-clear
● Jump run
Watch jumper
Watch for instability or entanglement of glider on exit
Monitor flight telemetry data
● Remote control operation
Stay over LZ in a slight turn
Ensure toggles are “up”
Remote control
Under what circumstances should ground crew take control?
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Chapter 5: Assembly
ParaDrone is an open source, community driven project. I do not sell ParaDrones. The design is
intended to be easy to build for any maker.
Many of the components can be substituted with no problem. The battery and motors can be
changed as long as there is enough power to pull the toggles. I found experimentally that
200-300 rpm motors worked best for the forces seen in typical canopies under full weight load.
Battery considerations:
Any battery that is roughly 12v and can supply at least 4 amps of power will do. However, most
LiPo batteries have fire risk if punctured or shorted. Do you want a lithium ion battery fire on
your lap? No? Then use a LiFePO4 battery. We use four AA-sized LiFePO4 batteries, intended
for solar lamps but work well for this purpose.
Warning: you must either: 1) Use LiFePO4 fire safe batteries; or 2) include a cutaway system for
ParaDrone in case of fire!
The length of the fishing line used for the toggle attachment depends on the glider being used.
Typical control stroke lengths are in the range 70-120cm. Length also depends where the
device is mounted on the glider. Creativity is required for how to mount on your gear.
The software will pull the toggles all the way down until the knot is hit on the line. If this is
beyond the stall point of the glider, you can tie a knot in the line to raise the bottom point. Stroke
length above the knot can be configured through the app.
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