Kubo: Startup - olinrobotics/gravl GitHub Wiki

0. Table of Contents

1. Overview

2. Startup: Vehicle Mode

The following instructions detail how to

3. Startup: Robotic Mode

3.0 In the Field

The following instructions detail how to fully start the tractor in the field and run teleoperation. 0. Before starting, vehicle state should be as follows:

  • Sitting on level ground with engine off
  • Parking brake set, shifted into Neutral
  • All electronics off

  1. Turn rear switch to power autonomy electronics.
    This powers all upper-level electronics, but the motors also need tractor power. Note that this is when the router turns on, and it often takes time to boot up before you can connect to the Wifi.

  2. Open rear electronics box; press power button on NUC
    This begins the NUC boot-up. Note that after this point, the NUC will take some time before you can SSH into it over the router.

  3. On remote laptop, connect to AGCO-SCOPE wireless network when available
    The password for access can be found in the admin documentation on Google Drive.

  4. SSH into NUC with command ssh -X [email protected] SSHing into the NUC provides you with terminal access to the onboard computer. The -X argument additionally allows external windows to pop up on your computer, which is used for Teensy code uploads and running the state controller.

  5. On nuc, run command roslaunch gravl bringup_min.launch
    This command will print a large amoung of text, culminating in an instruction for the initial tractor calibration. It will also open a new window for display of the current tractor state and transitions.

  6. Open a new terminal on remote laptop. Plug in controller and run commands:

setup_kubo
roslaunch gravl teleop.launch

The first command sets up the local ROS environment to connect remotely to the NUC. This setup allows your teleop node to send commands to the tractor. The second command runs the node to translate joystick commands on your computer to the state controller on the tractor.

  1. Follow the instructions printed to the NUC SSH Terminal to home the tractor motors. This startup procedure is necessary because both tractor motors (steering and velocity) are controlled by potentiometers. In order to make sure that they are in the correct positions relative to the tractor implements, they need to be homed before the pins are put in.

  2. Start the tractor, release the parking break, keep the RPM low, and put it in low gear.

  3. Jump off and drive it!

3.1 In the Garage

Frequently, it is necessary to start up the tractor full autonomous system in the LPB in order to test various firmware-hardware code. In this case, the steps are similar. However, there are some key differences:

  1. Hook up the following:
  • Battery charger to tractor battery
    The tractor electronics need to be on for the motors to function - this drains the tractor battery, because the alternator is not running to recharge it. Use the battery charger because the system draw is not negligible.
  • Battery tender to autonomy battery
  • AC shore power
    The tractor actuators draw power from the autonomy battery. In addition to trickle charging it, keeping shore power plugged in allows the system to draw from shore to power the motors, rather than the battery.
  1. Do not start the engine
  • If for some reason you need to start the engine, make sure the tractor is in Neutral

4. EStop Recovery

5. Shutdown