Hacking the Phantom

ianwood

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Was wondering if anyone has come across any threads here or elsewhere on hacking the CAN bus or S.Bus on the P2. There is a lot of data on those channels that we could do lots of cool stuff with. I was thinking something like the video below but waaaaay better using fully addressable LEDs connected to an Arduino Teensy so you could have really smooth light patterns based on what the Phantom is doing. The new Teensy has a CAN interface built-in. Overall weight and power impact should be pretty small.

Not only would it look amazing, it could tell you a lot more about what the Phantom is doing. For example, colors can flow from whichever direction you are traveling in. They can speed up the faster you go. If you're descending at the same time, the pattern can pulse with a specific color. If your signal strength is getting poor, it can animate a predefined pattern to tell you. Don't like the patterns, update the Arduino code with your own.

So not only can you impress your neighbors with your flying machine by day and scare the stink out of them with a UFO by night!

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uAmRNXXeYkU[/youtube]

I built this last year using Arduino and WS2801 LEDs so I've got that part covered:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lyug5C1EFf4[/youtube]

This board is nice and small:
http://hackaday.com/2013/12/09/meet-the-teensy-3-1/

My problem is I only know a little bit about CAN bus and even less about S.Bus and nothing about DJI's implementation of either of them.

And that's just one idea. We need to hack OSD to get it to display RSSI (if the parameter is on the CAN bus). You could modulate a bunch of CAN bus parameters into your FPV audio channels and decode on the other end. Also, and this may be a little controversial, we could unlock some of the Naza features that we don't get access to in the P2 version. If it's in the firmware but simply disabled, we have every right to enable it.
 
I’ve used Teensy boards (v2) in the past for various projects and have also been thinking of ideas on how they can be used on the P2.

I have been investigating using one to trigger the GoPro shutter through a ‘spare’ channel on an updated Futaba receiver. That way you could use a momentary switch on the transmitter (in my case the Futaba 8J has switch H as a momentary) to take the shots rather than rely on Time-Lapse etc.

I’ve got a pin-out for the GoPro’s HD Bus and am now looking into whether the P2 uses the trigger channel or whether this can be ‘disconnected’ from the P2 and used by the Teensy.

It’s a work in progress!
 

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