A quadcopter controlled with custom elements and JavaScript. This is a prototype project meant to show how web components (and more specifically custom elements) can be used to build a hardware application. The quadcopter is very rudimentary and a work in progress.
Web components let you build applications declaratively, which can make them easier to understand, grow, and maintain. Here is some of the main HTML source code of the quadcopter:
<jfive-motor on="[[motorOn1]]" speed="[[speed1]]" reverse="[[reverse1]]" pwm-pin="GPIO12" dir-pin="GPIO23" cdir-pin="GPIO24"></jfive-motor>
<jfive-motor on="[[motorOn2]]" speed="[[speed2]]" reverse="[[reverse2]]" pwm-pin="GPIO18" dir-pin="GPIO20" cdir-pin="GPIO21"></jfive-motor>
<jfive-motor on="[[motorOn3]]" speed="[[speed3]]" reverse="[[reverse3]]" pwm-pin="GPIO13" dir-pin="GPIO27" cdir-pin="GPIO22"></jfive-motor>
<jfive-motor on="[[motorOn4]]" speed="[[speed4]]" reverse="[[reverse4]]" pwm-pin="GPIO19" dir-pin="GPIO6" cdir-pin="GPIO5"></jfive-motor>Even if you have never built hardware before, I'll bet you already know the most important things going on in the code above. That's one of the powers of declarative programming.
Right now this project has only been tested on a Raspberry Pi Model 3 B. It will be portable to other boards in the future.
From your Raspberry Pi:
git clone https://github.com/scramjs/web-copter.git
cd web-copter
bower install
npm install
npm run rebuild
Don't worry, Bower will be going away soon. I'm just waiting on Polymer to officially support NPM.
From your Raspberry Pi, and from the web-copter directory:
sudo su
npm start
An HTTP server will now be running from your Raspberry Pi. Go to your Pi's IP address with port 5000 to access the web quadcopter controls.
This section is a major work in progress. First you need to understand how the Raspberry PI pins work. You need to use PWM pins to control the speed of the motors. Here is a good schematic for the Raspberry PI 3: http://blog.mcmelectronics.com/post/Raspberry-Pi-3-GPIO-Pin-Layout#.WbDN5HWGP0p
To get four motors working with direction/polarity, you'll need to use motor controllers. This project uses two LC239D integrated circuits. They are 3-pin h-bridges, two per circuit. Having two of them allows you to control four motors. Just hook up everything correctly, following the LC239D's pin layout here: http://www.rakeshmondal.info/L293D-Motor-Driver It isn't that difficult once you understand the basics.
See the first test here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z87Q9AO3OWg
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