Rabbit Baro Upgrade

[Gaza07]

If you have one of the original Rabbit flight controllers with the original BMP085 Baro there is an upgrade board available with the new MS5611 baro but you need to add a resistor to the old board for it to work with the new baro, the picture shows the alteration using a very small surface mount 10k resistor, it would be far easier and safer to use a small axial resistor like shown in the pictures below

[panguitou]

Nice Gazza !
I just ordered yesterday a full new rabbit and also an additional extension card with the new baro !
I will keep you posted !

[Gaza07]

I was going to order the new baro board for mine from love flight but the shipping cost was very high and it put me off for now 
It just seemed like a lot of money when compared to the price of a new Rabbit, Have you installed the new firmware v1.212, every thing seems to work for me except the carefree sees a little off compared to the previous release

[panguitou]

I was going to order the new baro board for mine from love flight but the shipping cost was very high and it put me off for now 
It just seemed like a lot of money when compared to the price of a new Rabbit, Have you installed the new firmware v1.212, every thing seems to work for me except the carefree sees a little off compared to the previous release

that's why I took also another rabbit card, I intend to build a micro quad !
Yes I have tested the 1.212 : PH and AL no problem for the moment but the weather is very windy and rainy for the season :-(

[Gaza07]

The weather has been very bad here to mostly rain, will test carefree again just to make sure it wasn't just a one off, and also report it on RCG if there is a problem

[MadMax]

The surface mount resistor in the picture above looks a bit dodgy  couldnt it cause a short 

[Gaza07]

It looks like he's applied a little super glue or some thing to the wire to hold it in place, I suppose the varnish on the board will keep it insulated, not the way I would choose to do it 

[panguitou]

Hi everybody !
I finally install the new card with the MS5611 Baro and of course added also the 10k resistor but yet another question :
does it need to be covered with a piece of foam like the former one ?

I'm not proud of my solders, but the difficult task was to unsold the old card I'm not sure it will work anymore :

[Gaza07]

Nice job thanks for posting, I have still used a piece of foam on my rabbit with the ms5611 as I would think the prop wash could affect it the same way as it did the older bmp85, you could give it a try with and with out and let us know how you get on and if it makes a difference with out it 

[MadMax]

Your soldering looks ok to me better than mine, when I solder something it looks like ive used a flame thrower  ::)
did you use a de-solder pump to remove the old one ? and have you tested it yet does it make a big deffrence compared to the older version 

[panguitou]

Your soldering looks ok to me better than mine, when I solder something it looks like ive used a flame thrower  ::)
did you use a de-solder pump to remove the old one ? and have you tested it yet does it make a big deffrence compared to the older version 

No, unfortunatly I was unable to find out that #@ù$& pump ! I used instead a desoldering braid but it's not helping a lot ...
The old card is now in a pretty bad state as the small holes seem to have lost their copper tubing ... anyway I will not use it anymore ...
I have not yet tested the new baro  as it is part of a new mini quad and I'm still missing the controllers they are lost in the mail from an Ebayer :-(

Though, I'll keep you posted !

[Gaza07]

I received my new baro upgrade today I bought it from a guy of RCG that was selling it new un opened,

The first thing I tried was removing the old baro board from the rabbit this is not as easy as it looks and not a job for the faint hearted,
I tried to delsolder all 4 pins using a desolder pump which it did but the board was still not loose as the solder travels down the holes and still holds the board tightly,

I then thought a bit of flat copper heated up to heat all 4 pins together might work but this methos wasnt very good as the metal would cool quickly and you didnt get long enough to move the board,

I gave it some more thought on how to approach the problem and came up with the idea of using some 100mm copper tube with a section cut away and then flattened the cut end with a hammer, cleaned it up and stuck it on the end of my gas soldering iron, a quick pinch with pliers held it in place,

This worked very well and heated all 4 pins and I was able to wiggle the board from the Rabbit, with no damage to either
I soldered the new board in place while holding it from tipping up using a chunk of blu tak the stuff you use to stick posters or pictures up,
I then fitted the required 10k resistor and tested the board all is working fine,

you can see the tools and soldering iron addon that I used in the pictures below 

[attach=1][attach=2][attach=3]
[attach=4][attach=5][attach=6]
[attach=7]

[sakiskoz]

nice work Gary clean and pro. Good flights

[MadMax]

+1 nice job well done not sure I would tackle something like that though 
Im just wondering though why are the numbers files of your chips  one of them is clearly an ftdi chip the other the mcu 

[teslahed]

They are also filed on my rabbits chips and others i have seen.

Conspiracy theorists have suggested it has something to do with the fact the rabbit programmers appear to have 'borrowed' code from the open source multiwii program and then close sourced it, which (if true) is a bit mean and against the GPL, and so might have something to hide;

http://www.multi-rotor.co.uk/index.php/topic,188.0.html

but I have no idea if that's really the explanation or not.

Impressive soLdering anyway

[Gaza07]

The numbers being filed off came up in the RCG Rabbit thread and it was said they didn't want people to copy the hardware, as if the Chinese would copy any thing  They filed the numbers of the mcu because there is quite a wide choice of the 32 bit mcu's about and they haven't used the same one as every one else, but it was soon published which they had used, so they achieved nothing by their actions, I notice in the post above that the FTDI chip hasn't been filed but the mcu has  ::)

[antonkad]

Hi all,

i recently bought this one : http://www.csgshop.com/product.php?id_product=111
i find your post because the barometer did not work. The thing is that it it actualiy working there';s a green led and the compas led on the rabbit work with also data on the computer, but nothing for the barometer. So i installed a 10k resistor but not working... Any idea ? why exactly do we have to put this 10k resistor ?

[Gaza07]

Hi antonkad and welcome to the forum, you need to have 2 of the pads soldered together on that baro board you show in your link, the picture below show the board with bare solder pads and the after has a red line to show which 2 pads should be joined 

[attachimg=1]

[attachimg=2]

Hi all,

i recently bought this one : http://www.csgshop.com/product.php?id_product=111
i find your post because the barometer did not work. The thing is that it it actualiy working there';s a green led and the compas led on the rabbit work with also data on the computer, but nothing for the barometer. So i installed a 10k resistor but not working... Any idea ? why exactly do we have to put this 10k resistor ?

[antonkad]

Thanks for your reply ! 

i just solder the 2 pads like on the photo but nothing ... the led still black and no data on the software i tried everything reinstall the soft on the board, solder a second time. still not working. The compas does but not the barometer.

[Gaza07]

The info above is the only info I could find but maybe it is worth trying the other 2 pads instead but Im not sure this would work, have you tried to email the guy from the shop about it

[antonkad]

Yeah i did it, the guys says that i have an old bootloader ... i don';t know he mean by that. He';s always replying by yes or no 

[antonkad]

Anyway thank for you replies i realy apprciate ! 

[Gaza07]

I';m sorry I cant help you further maybe the baro is a duffer   

Anyway thank for you replies i realy apprciate ! 

[dominic12]

Hi All,
Old thread I know but is it worth buying a Rabbit or Rabbit II if the price is right?
Not too techy but I don';t understand the MCU marking thing? Does that mean they can';t be used now?

Regards to all

Luke2000

[Gaza07]

The rabbit was a very good flight controller but they stopped developing for it a long time ago and you cant load other firmwares on it, as for the rabbit 2 it never seemed to do very well but either board would probably be worth playing with if you found one cheap enough, even though there isnt any new firmware they did fly very well on the last firmware they released 

[teslahed]

I wouldn';t recommend you waste your time learning to use the rabbit system when it';s no longer being developed for and there are better systems out there.

Unless you have loads of time and are on a budget and someone is giving you one - in which case knock yourself out. As Gary says it';ll fly well with the right firmware. But you';ll be spending time learning skills that wont be all that much help in the future when you upgrade to a currently supported flight controller.

APM, DJI Naza, Naze32, CC3Dare all better flight controllers now depending on what you want to do. You';d be better off learning to use any of those instead.

[dominic12]

Hey, thanks for the uber quick replies fellas.

I';ll see how much it really is and decide then.

Many Thanks

Luke2000