OpenXVario flight reports

[rainer]

@kilrah: thanks, going to have a look at that.
@Joao: great, thanks for the flight report. good to see that you finally got a glider and didn't crash it

[jhsa]

that's where you are wrong.. I did Twice

João

[rainer]

oops

[Flaps 30]

there was Thermal everywhere above the field. I'm a beginner on thermal flying but with the help from this vario I went from about 80 meters to about 170 meters (558ft) in no time.. the glider is quite small so I decided to bring it down.. that was difficult

Easy fixes for that. You ought to invest in a glider with a wingspan of around three to four Metres so you can see it at height. Thermals are easier to stay in as you get higher, as they expand fairly quickly. Getting down.. No problem. With a better glider you can install flaps and use crow braking, or go for air brakes/spoilers on the top surface of the wing.

I gotta say, I was getting bored as well.. 20 minutes without doing some rolls and loops and without hearing the sound of an engine was too much for me..

Bored! .. Fehh.. You had a long flying session using free fuel and there is nothing stopping you doing aerobatics with a glider. Remember that you said that it was difficult to get down... How about doing some lovely spins to loose height?

I would have loved to have got out today. Sadly I had to wait for a phone call before I could go out, then a client wanted to talk about a problem and that was it.. Time gone. Ohh well. We have at least another week of this heatwave in store. So out with another bottle of Pear Cider..

Ohh! ... I know that this is the wrong place to ask.. But.... Has the software been done to allow us to use a voltage sensor and a current sensor with the Arduino?

[jhsa]

Yes.. the latest version supports voltage and current sensor.. I use it as both sensors with the other planes that don't make me so bored..
One thing I missed today was the noise..
will have enough silence when I go under. Now I want to enjoy noise.. And airplane engine noise is music for my ears anyway

João

[tilmanb]

You fly the wrong glider, or you fly it wrong. :p bored my ass.

[Flaps 30]

One thing I missed today was the noise.. Now I want to enjoy noise.. And airplane engine noise is music for my ears anyway

You can get the model below at a reasonable price. It makes engine noises on take off as long as the battery is good.

Aircraft.JPG (37.52 KiB) Viewed 12555 times

Flying a glider requires finesse and an understanding of the air around the aircraft. The Vario goes some way to help you understand the way it works.

[Kilrah]

The Vario goes some way to help you understand the way it works.

And then some will say the vario is only for cheaters

[Rob Thomson]

True.. But then... Does that make full size glider pilots cheats?

I personally see the big lift before the various tells me. But it I
Is really useful when scratching

Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk 2

[hageha]

Joao has a plane like this, but he told me that belongs to his son!
Meanwhile, I have four open Vario in use, great!
Thank you Rainer

[jhsa]

You fly the wrong glider, or you fly it wrong. :p bored my ass.

Both As I said today was the first time I flew thermal.. It was ok.. Some get bored, some don't.. personal taste
But good that I started on gliders.. Cos now I was invited to fly the club's tow plane and that is more my thing

João

[BBvideo 425,350]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P-b2LUh6 ... e=youtu.be[/BBvideo]

[ReSt]

That glider, isn't that a Scheibe Spatz ?

Reinhard

[jhsa]

Yes, I think so.. very nice and very well built.. My friend stayed up in the air for over an hour easily.. shame on the vario he was using.. with the receiver hangging on his neck we don't need that, do we? we have much better !!!!

João

[rainer]

Ohh! ... I know that this is the wrong place to ask.. But.... Has the software been done to allow us to use a voltage sensor and a current sensor with the Arduino?

The new version of the oXv is the openXsensor. Its in a seperate folder on google code, you can downoload all the files in there and upload it to your oXv hardware. i just did not have the time to write new wiki+instructions for it. but it seems to work good and includes additional support for the current sensor, a voltage divider and a lot of changes to the vario code.

[tilmanb]

You fly the wrong glider, or you fly it wrong. :p bored my ass.

Both As I said today was the first time I flew thermal.. It was ok.. Some get bored, some don't.. personal taste
But good that I started on gliders.. Cos now I was invited to fly the club's tow plane and that is more my thing

Thermal planes can be a bit slow and floaty.
Personal taste of course, but gliders are not slow or lumbering if you don't want that. No incident that pylon racers look like gliders for example.
I had days where fatigue was what forced me to stop flying insane aerobatics all day at the slope.
I prefer that over the 20min of terror I get from fighting the winds and gravity.
My £0.02

[jhsa]

Naaa, I'm joking.. I used to fly aerobatics on slope when I lived in Portugal.. That was very nice. Had a good gliger for that though..
it's just that for Flaps30 everything that doesn't use free energy, makes noise , or is flown with the thumbs is S**t so I was just teasing as well

[mpjf01]

Ohh! ... I know that this is the wrong place to ask.. But.... Has the software been done to allow us to use a voltage sensor and a current sensor with the Arduino?

The new version of the oXv is the openXsensor. Its in a seperate folder on google code, you can downoload all the files in there and upload it to your oXv hardware. i just did not have the time to write new wiki+instructions for it. but it seems to work good and includes additional support for the current sensor, a voltage divider and a lot of changes to the vario code.

Is there any advantage in using this for those of us who just have the vario hardware?

[jhsa]

if you want to measure voltage or current as well, yes. You will need to add the sensors of course. Then just turn then on in the code. On my little glider i'm using. Vario and voltage. On my acro, I use voltage and current sensors. It is very flexible. Rainer, am I selling the product well?

[mpjf01]

In a previous post it was said that there had been "a lot of changes to the vario code". Presumably this was for a reason that may or may not be intended to improve performance, reliability or some other thing of benefit to users. My question was intended to establish whether or not those of us just using the vario needed to update to this later version.

[ReSt]

In version 191 I'm getting compile errors with:
openxsensor:
in void setup()
'INPUT_PULLUP was not declared in this scope

in openxvariojeti:
in void setup()
JetiUartInit() was not declared in this scope

while openxvarioplay and openxvario compile without errors.

Up to now, I never tried to compile anything else than openxvario, so I don't know if something of my setup is missing.

Reinhard

[rainer]

In version 191 I'm getting compile errors with:
openxsensor:
in void setup()
'INPUT_PULLUP was not declared in this scope

in openxvariojeti:
in void setup()
JetiUartInit() was not declared in this scope

while openxvarioplay and openxvario compile without errors.

Up to now, I never tried to compile anything else than openxvario, so I don't know if something of my setup is missing.

Reinhard

you are probably using the wrong version of the code.
please check here: http://openrcforums.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=86&t=3852

@mpjf01: you dont NEED to update the vario code. if its working good for you that's fine.
If you update, you are for now using a test version. so no guarantees given ( never give them anyway, so.... ) the oXs is faster in reaction to height changes. and is basically a complete re-write of most of the functions.

@Joao: a little more enthusiasm for the thermal gliders and you are hired

[jhsa]

[tedbmoss]

I tried the new frsky vario and the winged shadow new vario as well as two of the openx varios. Not an extensive test yet but the openxvario seems to be the best to me.

[Flaps 30]

Built up a third Vario a few days back. All seemed fine and stable on the ground. Three flights made with it and all three showed that there was a problem with it. The vario beeps seemed fine, but the altitude readout wasn't reliable.. It would report what seemed the correct height and then seconds later give a height a few thousand feet higher than what it did before, yet the vario gave no indication of any height changes. The changes happen at random along with the actual differences from what I see as being right and what it says. Not sure what is going on for now. New sensor on order and it should be with me in a few days. When it arrives I will build up another unit to put in the glider to try again.

The two other units in other gliders read back the altitude correctly as proved yesterday.

[Rob Thomson]

Any chance the unit was not covered in uber dark material?

Believe sunlight can make that happen.

Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk 2

[Flaps 30]

I have suffered the Sun problem and yes, if a bright light falls on the pressure sensor you will get false readings. In the case here the sensor is under an opaque canopy.