Published October 10, 2021 © GPL3+

Arduino RC interface for helicopters

My friend is a model maker of RC helicopters but he has no experience in Arduino and asked my help for a specific project that he’s making.

BeginnerFull instructions provided1,114

Things used in this project

Hardware components

Arduino UNO

Story

My friend is a model maker of RC helicopters.

For about forty years he has been building helicopters that are big, and I find it amazing how he can make them fly. However, he has no experience in Arduino and asked my help for a specific project that he’s making.

He needs to have a stabilised camera and the rear black headlight mounted on the helicopter move with a specific rotation angle and loop when a command on the analog remote control is activated.

Specifically, we would need to connect one channel of a Futaba RC Receiver so that, by operating the channels in question from a switch on the Radio Transmitter and only then, the servo control connected to that channel starts to make a series of preset movements on Arduino, until it is always deactivated by the same switch.

More precisely:

channel 1 switch in position 1: servo stopped in initial position with light OFF
channel 1 switch in position 2: switch on the led light (search light)
channel 1 switch in position 3: servo starts the movement with light ON

So we managed to get both in a room and while my friend was explaining what the servo needed to do, I was coding on the Arduino IDE.

At the end the result was done and we are here to share it with whoever may be interested.

Arduino RC interface for helicopters

Code

Arduino RC interface for helicopters

/*  Carlo Stramaglia 10 October 2021
 *  Code for driving a servo motor using an analog model remote conrol
 *  
 *  look at my youtube channel https://www.youtube.com/c/CarloStramaglia
 */

#include<Servo.h> 

Servo servo1; 

int angle=15;

int ch1;

int val1;

void setup() {
  
pinMode(6, INPUT); // Receiver channel 1 PIN input connection to Arduino
pinMode(2, OUTPUT); // Arduino output for LED light
pinMode(13, OUTPUT); // Internal Arduino led for debug purpose
digitalWrite(2, LOW);
digitalWrite(13, LOW); 

servo1.attach(8); // Servo PIN connection on the Arduino
servo1.write(15); // Go to home position at 15 degrees

Serial.begin(9600);
}

void loop() {
  
  ch1 = pulseIn(6, HIGH, 25000); //Configuration of the plseIN on PIN 6 

  if (ch1 > 1400 and ch1 < 1500){
    digitalWrite(2, HIGH);
    digitalWrite(13, HIGH);
  }
    
  else if (ch1 > 1900) {
    digitalWrite(2, LOW);
    digitalWrite(13, LOW);
    //servo1.write(0);
     }
  else if (ch1 > 900 and ch1 < 1000) {
    digitalWrite(2, HIGH);
    digitalWrite(13, HIGH);
    for (angle=15 ; angle <= 130; angle +=1) {
      servo1.write(angle);
      delay (40);
    }
    for (angle=130 ; angle >= 40; angle -=1) {
      servo1.write(angle);
      delay (40);
    }
    for (angle=40 ; angle <= 179; angle +=1) {
      servo1.write(angle);
      delay (40);
    }
    for (angle=179 ; angle >= 15; angle -=1) {
      servo1.write(angle);
      delay (40);
    }
  }
  
 }

Credits

cstram

16 projects • 23 followers

Passionate about IT, Electronics and DIY. Strong believer in Raspberry and Arduino devices. Experience in digital television and security.

Arduino RC interface for helicopters

Things used in this project

Hardware components

Story

Schematics