Pixhawk with Taranis and X8R receiver

Help
1

A recent custom had some good questions about buying a pixhawk :bird: that I figured would be useful to share incase anyone else has similar questions

I’m looking at a possible purchase of a PixHawk and various accessories and have the following questions:

  1. Does your Ublox LEA-6H GPS with compass kit have the correct plug to fit directly to PixHawk.
  2. Am I correct in thinking that If I purchase (when available) a Taranis with X8r RX then I do not require a PPM Encoder
  3. Do I need the Telemetry kit or should I be able to get the telemetry through the Taranis
    4.If the Telemetry kit is required does it have the correct plug for PixHawk
  4. I am looking at adding a Air Speed sensor and Voltage current sensor again do these have the correct plug for the PixHawk
  5. I take it that I may need a power module/UBEC depending on what ESCs I use. Am I correct in my thinking here
  6. Are there any other cables I would need to purchase to connect everything up

I’m sorry for the basic questions. I’m fairly new to this and am reading myself in slowly. I’m currently putting together bits to build a Y6. Many thanks for your time.

2

1.Yes the pixhawk kit comes with the correct cable to connect the GPS/Compass module

2.Correct you will not need a PPM encoder with teh X8R - There are two “S” ports on the X8R. The one on the top of the receiver is the proprietary bus and the one on the end under the channel outputs is the SBus which is compatible with pixhawk. The three wire connector goes from the X8R to the RC input on the pixhawk. You can also find some info on setting up the tarranis with APM here -

3.You could use telemetry through the RC radio but it requires some modification and hacking (someone has done it here), I would suggest that you use the official telemetry kit as it gives you full control of all the options, like changing way-points in flight etc…

4.Yes again the correct cables are included with Pixhawk/ telemetry kit

5.The included power module includes voltage/current sensing. An airspeed sensor will be released for the pixhawk soon, but you can still fly just fine without it.

6.The APM power module provides power to the pixhawk so unless you are using very power hungry servos you might need to use a UBEC to power them.

7.I would only suggest a female to female servo cable to connect your PPM receiver to the pixhawk - http://www.unmannedtechshop.co.uk/servo-cable-female-to-female-15cm.html

Hope that helps.

3

Also if the above does not help I found this great article talking you though the setup process of the Taranis X9R radio for pixhawk - HugeDomains.com

4

I cam across this post and I recently bought a pixhawk from unmannedtech and I am in the process of building the same setup with a DJI F450 frame and E300 motors and esc’s. My questions are:

  1. How do I connect the E300 esc to the pixhawk, is it directly from the servo cable to the pixhawk?
  2. How do I connect the battery cable? Can I connect it direclty to the intergrated circiuit board of the F450?

Thanks

5

1 - To Connect your ESC’s to pixhawk they will simply connect to the pixhawk outputs corresponding to the motors they are connected to as per the image below. Just make sure the signal cable is on the bottom row.

2 - When you say battery cable is this the actual battery? Usualy it will be connected to your pixhawk power module and then to your power distribution board, in which case it can be the one integrated onto your F450 frame.