[WIP] Limited airmode #22706

MaEtUgR · 2024-01-30T17:27:30Z

Solved Problem

It's always hard to enable airmode on a product, project, ... because it can amplify any problems with rate control instability like wrong autopilot orientation, wrong motor directions, strong oscillations. That's also why it's disabled by default and should only be enabled after initial test flights. Also once airmode is enabled the minimum thrust can be lowered to zero because it's only there to keep rate control authority.

Solution

Instead of disabling airmode by default and having a minimum thrust commanded to the motors all the time I suggest to always have a limited airmode which can only have as much of an effect as the minimum thrust had before again configurable.

Changelog Entry

Feature: Limited airmode

Documentation: Needs to be updated: https://docs.px4.io/main/en/config_mc/pid_tuning_guide_multicopter.html#airmode-mixer-saturation

Test coverage

I got hung up in unit testing of corner cases. Unsaturation behaves slightly different than before. I'm convinced it's better but couldn't proof that yet.

dagar · 2024-01-30T23:10:42Z

Old mixers?

MaEtUgR · 2025-04-22T14:28:32Z

Initial commits from this pr were merged already here: #21256
I'll update this pr to continue working on it.

github-actions · 2025-04-25T14:53:32Z

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Updated: 2025-05-05T13:50:51

This reverts commit f7dadd9.

…uplicating definitions

from information previously only available in the commit message.

hamishwillee · 2025-04-30T06:57:36Z

Documentation: Needs to be updated: https://docs.px4.io/main/en/config_mc/pid_tuning_guide_multicopter.html#airmode-mixer-saturation

Yes it does. I was thinking though perhaps we pull airmode into its own section of multicopter tuning. That might seem even more relevant if this is something that we expect people to read (now you made this change). At the moment most will not read that doc, because the assumption is that the autotuning does most of what people need.

…r readability

…ture This makes it much easier to go through allocation secnarios in one line with comprehensive numbers.

…st cases to improved fixture

…s into new unit tests

MaEtUgR added the Multirotor 🛸 label Jan 30, 2024

MaEtUgR self-assigned this Jan 30, 2024

MaEtUgR changed the title ~~Limited airmode~~ [WIP] Limited airmode Jan 30, 2024

dagar self-requested a review January 30, 2024 20:47

github-actions bot added the stale label Mar 1, 2024

MaEtUgR mentioned this pull request Mar 25, 2024

[control-allocation] parameterize yaw margin #22776

Open

MaEtUgR mentioned this pull request Nov 20, 2024

Centralize yaw margin #23982

Merged

MaEtUgR force-pushed the maetugr/limited-airmode branch from 3fa95d5 to ca786e8 Compare April 25, 2025 14:48

MaEtUgR added 5 commits April 25, 2025 17:19

ActuatorEffectivenessRotorsTest: add Hexarotor X

6a7e53e

Revert "Remove inclusion of rotors in library to enable test (#24286)"

f42f925

This reverts commit f7dadd9.

ControlAllocationSequentialDesaturationTest: fix include instead of d…

2cbf10e

…uplicating definitions

control_allocator: fix PID dependency definition

4582bf8

ActuatorEffectiveness: add comments to EffectivenessUpdateReason

cb8bb6b

from information previously only available in the commit message.

MaEtUgR force-pushed the maetugr/limited-airmode branch from ca786e8 to 929581d Compare April 25, 2025 15:42

MaEtUgR added 8 commits April 30, 2025 14:55

control_allocation: Consistently replace with ActuatorVector alias fo…

97f110a

…r readability

ControlAllocationSequentialDesaturation: add unit tests

1dd92ee

ControlAllocationSequentialDesaturation: adopt improved unit test fix…

677fe5c

…ture This makes it much easier to go through allocation secnarios in one line with comprehensive numbers.

ControlAllocationSequentialDesaturationTest: convert existing unit te…

80f4f61

…st cases to improved fixture

Temporarily add old multirotor mixer test to take over the exact case…

20c863c

…s into new unit tests

Draft for adding back original unit test cases from old multirotor mixer

4a9fadc

Draft for limited airmode

75f7f19

Random tests I was last checking

9fa2040

MaEtUgR force-pushed the maetugr/limited-airmode branch from 929581d to 9fa2040 Compare May 5, 2025 13:45

hamishwillee added the Documentation 📑 label May 7, 2025

MaEtUgR mentioned this pull request Jul 1, 2025

Improve multicopter sequential desaturation unit testing #25138

Merged

mrpollo removed the Documentation 📑 label Sep 12, 2025

mrpollo removed Multirotor 🛸 labels Sep 12, 2025

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[WIP] Limited airmode #22706

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[WIP] Limited airmode #22706

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MaEtUgR commented Jan 30, 2024

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Changelog Entry

Test coverage

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