Cleanflight - What's your favorite PID controller?

[zenguerilla]

I realize it is nominally the same, but seems like for all intents and purposes the dynamic handling of the primary tuning variables is as different as different firmwares are.

And I'm not trying to contend what is correct but just increase understanding, and could be mistaken or just looking at things differently.

 

[narcolepticltd]

I realize it is nominally the same, but seems like for all intents and purposes the dynamic handling of the primary tuning variables is as different as different firmwares are.

And I'm not trying to contend what is correct but just increase understanding, and could be mistaken or just looking at things differently.

Nope you're making perfect sense... and in a way it's as if the PID controllers are little devices with their own firmware installed on cleanflight =)

Depending on which controller you use, it may have to be completely retuned to be flyable... the gain values in PID 2 for instance are read completely differently (floating point integers... math... ugh...) and you'll have to start with radically lower gains.

Now that PID 2 has had some tweeks (thanks to FGA's testing) it flies a lot better now, and I'm really enjoying it on my mini-tricopter. The oscillations I couldn't get rid of causing tail waggle were mostly stamped out by PID 2, and that's limping it on a stripped servo (just confirmed today the servo I have isn't up to snuff).

tail surgery in progress with a stronger servo, and I think PID 2 may stick with the tri for a while.

 

[cranialrectosis]

I have rebuilt my 230mm Warpquad String Theory using the 18a ZTW Spider ESCs and flashed to Cleanflight. I am still tuning and playing with the different PIDs (love the profiles in CF btw). PID 2 was wild.

I also flashed CF on the mini-tricopter and found PID 2 to be pretty hard to manage.

The defaults are crazy high.

Is there a secret to tuning PID 2?

 

[narcolepticltd]

I have rebuilt my 230mm Warpquad String Theory using the 18a ZTW Spider ESCs and flashed to Cleanflight. I am still tuning and playing with the different PIDs (love the profiles in CF btw). PID 2 was wild.

I also flashed CF on the mini-tricopter and found PID 2 to be pretty hard to manage.

The defaults are crazy high.

Is there a secret to tuning PID 2?

gotta start really low... the majority of my issues was with the servo being slowly stripped to death, but I'll shoot you my values later after a bit more tuning this afternoon (with a good servo).

However, if you start with 15/45/20 on pitch/roll that should get you in the ball park. Yaw I ended up with 20/28/20, but I believe that can come up a whole lot with the new tgy-210 installed. The rates are a lot more linear as FGA has mentioned, so right now I'm running 1.25 rc rates and 25/25/25 r/p/y with 65% expo. running a looptime of 1500 with those numbers as well.

again, I'll PM you my rates if it changes drastically today with the new servo.

 

[cranialrectosis]

You aren't kidding, really low. PID 2 with low gains really worked on the Twitchity mini-tricopter though.

Thanks for the rates. I am flying again.

It will take more tuning as my build is pretty different from yours but the wind is just howling outside today so no tune for me.

Guess I will have to fly the Twitchty mini-hex today.

 

[narcolepticltd]

You aren't kidding, really low. PID 2 with low gains really worked on the Twitchity mini-tricopter though.

Thanks for the rates. I am flying again.

It will take more tuning as my build is pretty different from yours but the wind is just howling outside today so no tune for me.

Guess I will have to fly the Twitchty mini-hex today.

Thank FGA, he's the one that gave me the starting values

I dunno why, but that tricopter LOVES PID 2. I just wish I could see the standard mixer layout for a tricopter in cleanflight so I'd know how to set up a custom mix (if cmix is even supported by tricopters).

 

[cranialrectosis]

I got to fly the tricopter this morning before the wind gets to howling.

The copter is pretty stable and very reactive (probably going to tone down the roll/pitch/yaw settings a bit) in acro mode with just a tad of warble in horizon mode. The copter flies well enough for me to flip and roll it in my backyard.

Thanks FGA and narco. I had no troubles finding a tune in Baseflight but Cleanflight gave me some real challenges on PID controller 0 and 3. PID 2 seems to be the answer to the wild yaw issues although I haven't flown in a place large enough to go WOT and see if the yaw warbles at high speeds.

What got me most about PID 2 is that the defaults are double the defaults for PID 3 yet the final, flyable values for PID 2 are lower than I can run in PID 3.

 

[narcolepticltd]

I got to fly the tricopter this morning before the wind gets to howling.

The copter is pretty stable and very reactive (probably going to tone down the roll/pitch/yaw settings a bit) in acro mode with just a tad of warble in horizon mode. The copter flies well enough for me to flip and roll it in my backyard.

Thanks FGA and narco. I had no troubles finding a tune in Baseflight but Cleanflight gave me some real challenges on PID controller 0 and 3. PID 2 seems to be the answer to the wild yaw issues although I haven't flown in a place large enough to go WOT and see if the yaw warbles at high speeds.

What got me most about PID 2 is that the defaults are double the defaults for PID 3 yet the final, flyable values for PID 2 are lower than I can run in PID 3.

For the most part, with the new servo I'm running the tail wagging is gone even WOT. I'm sure it can be tuned better, but for LoS it's as good as my newb piloting skills can muster at the moment You could even take the gains down a touch if you're at where I left it. I have a feeling once I find the time to load up a board camera and VTX, those gains are going to make things really jolty, and they'll need to come down a touch, especially the roll values.

 

[joshuabardwell]

All this time, and not one single vote for Luxfloat. Maybe floating point's not all it's cracked up to be?

 

[narcolepticltd]

All this time, and not one single vote for Luxfloat. Maybe floating point's not all it's cracked up to be?

At the time this poll was created weeks ago, PID 2 was bugged and broken. Since then it has been fixed and is awesomesauce... however, most of us have already voted. Not to mention unless this thread is bumped and at the top of the page, a lot of people will miss it (or just not bother voting).


I also wouldn't call 10 votes across the board a very telling story

 

[C0d3M0nk3y]

All this time, and not one single vote for Luxfloat.

I'll fix that since I haven't voted yet.

 

[C0d3M0nk3y]

I updated to 1.8.1 yesterday and decided to give LuxFloat a try. I went out and did a quick LOS test. It only took 40 seconds or so to convince me it was my new favorite. Here's what it looked like:

 

[joshuabardwell]

At the time this poll was created weeks ago, PID 2 was bugged and broken. Since then it has been fixed and is awesomesauce...

I haven't finished building and started tuning yet. I assumed I would default to PID 3, since that is what I was using with my Electrohub with my Flip running MW 2.3. Is Luxfloat a compelling improvement over PID 3?

 

[narcolepticltd]

I updated to 1.8.1 yesterday and decided to give LuxFloat a try. I went out and did a quick LOS test. It only took 40 seconds or so to convince me it was my new favorite. Here's what it looked like:

I love how PID 2 makes you dizzy as hell but still has great control and makes for good smooth video.

 

[narcolepticltd]

I haven't finished building and started tuning yet. I assumed I would default to PID 3, since that is what I was using with my Electrohub with my Flip running MW 2.3. Is Luxfloat a compelling improvement over PID 3?

Give both a try and see which you like best. It tunes a lot differently than PID 3

 

[jipp]

I updated to 1.8.1 yesterday and decided to give LuxFloat a try. I went out and did a quick LOS test. It only took 40 seconds or so to convince me it was my new favorite. Here's what it looked like:

that looks locked in like crazy. i wonder if GCS has these pid settings or if its just clean flight.
i may have to buy a naz board. so i can like learn with all you.. since it seems not many use CC3d or tau.
as id get the naz board with the sensors on board.
chris.

 

[C0d3M0nk3y]

i may have to buy a naz board. so i can like learn with all you..

Or you could try running Cleanflight on your CC3D. I'm not very familiar with CC3D, so I don't know if there are different variations or anything, but it looks like it's supported by Cleanflight.

https://github.com/cleanflight/cleanflight/blob/v1.8.1/docs/Board - CC3D.md

 

[notreallyme]

I'm having a hard time finding enough rudder control so far, not sure if i just need to add a higher yaw rate or change pid, new at tuning these things so don't really know which ones to change or by how much. i don't like moving my rudder stick much and i am having to move it A LOT to get a slow spin. Sorry guess i should have started with it is a 250 size quad running 2204 2300kv motors and 5x3 props.

 

[narcolepticltd]

I'm having a hard time finding enough rudder control so far, not sure if i just need to add a higher yaw rate or change pid, new at tuning these things so don't really know which ones to change or by how much. i don't like moving my rudder stick much and i am having to move it A LOT to get a slow spin. Sorry guess i should have started with it is a 250 size quad running 2204 2300kv motors and 5x3 props.

The PID controller we're currently talking about has crazy yaw (and everything else). However, if you'll read through this entire thread, there is quite a good bit of information from those that know better, as well as links to several different documents that can give you a much better idea of what does what... at least enough to get you started.

If you have a decent tune currently, the first place I'd look would be your roll/pitch/yaw rates.

 

[notreallyme]

i have been reading this thread, i can't seem to get the yaw i want without the pitch and roll being crazy as well. maybe i just need to learn to fly the pid 2 that i had in a 1 time. LOL

The computer is going with me to the field next time so i can change stuff and check it right then.