Copying John Doran's control panel style

After replacing the broken boom from yesterday's failure and learning that the barometer onboard the APM is sufficient for autonomous landing I set out to test autonomous takeoff and landing today. I set the sonar so I could enable and disable it with a switch. I disabled the sonar while in autonomous mode. I also moved the sonar inboard to the center underneath the copter. I added a power filter circuit to filter the power going into the sonar to reduce electrical noise. I also created a funky foam shield around the sonar to reduce prop wash and prop audio noise interfering with the sonar. After the successful auto takeoff and landing test. I fly it around a bit manually and enabled the sonar to see if it is now agreeing with the barometer. I will review the flight logs to make sure the sonar is working correctly before I try using it again. I ended up with two totally successful completely autonomous flights today same route twice, 8 waypoints, autonomous takeoff, and landing

First attempt at autonomous takeoff and landing. It was a failure turns out I did not even need the sonar for this to work the barometer built in to the APM was sufficient. The sonar caused issues as it was getting interference and was periodically reading incorrectly. The hexa is back up and running the next day and had two successful fully autonomous flights today.

You will also notice the autonomous takeoff was wonky in the video it just sort of went nuts for a minute. I had visions of shattered parts as it was headed for the neighborhood at a steep angle and rapid clip. That was not part of the flight plan.

Well you can't see much in the video because it was quite a ways away but it worked flawlessly. Next is auto takeoff and land.

Testing out the airworthiness of my entrant for Sparkfun's autonomous vehicle challenge.