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Systems Level Simulator

A systems level simulator that we can test the Avionics team’s state estimator performance, navigational performance, and etc; and use SLS to loop into the test flight data to better prepare for the flight day where we attempt to break the record. The use case is not limited to just Avionics team. As the simulation achieves high nough fiedelity in transonic and supersonic conditions, we can use the simulator as part of the design iteration process.

Components

We will use Software-in-the-Loop (sitl) simulations extensively to develop, test, and validate our Px4-based flight controller.

Simulation flight physics will be handled using JSBSim as our Flight Dynmics Model (FDM). Initially, we will use the base version of JSBSim, but we may customize the physics for better modeling of critical regimes of flight.

Both in testing and in flight, we will use QGroundControl for reporting telemetry and changing flight modes.

During testing, we will use FlightGear to visualize ground-truth flight paths.

We will need to adapt an existing script from Px4's Hardware in the Loop (HIL) repository to compare simulator ground truth flight paths with Px4 sensor- and flight model-derived flight paths as part of testing and validation. It will need to capture telemetry from Px4 and JSBSim, and proxy data and report differents to QGroundControl, or an automated test bench.

Contribute

  • See Issues page, and Projects page of this repositroy for tasks to do
  • Discussions in #avionics_sls, and #simulation_egnine channel

Dependencies

First approximation

  • Docker on you OS:
    • Linux x64
    • macOS
    • Windows with WSL, git-bash, or cygwin
  • Hardware GPU (Integrated GPU is OK, VM does not work)
  • 8 GB RAM

Applications

  • Docker daemon, to run
    • theprojectboom/px4
  • QGroundControl
  • FlightGear (for visualization)

Getting Started

Downloads (hurry up & wait)

git clone --recurse-submodules https://github.com/theprojectboom/sls  # 1 GB. half .git & half px4, with 13+ submodules
docker pull theprojectboom/px4:latest  # 3 GB

Running

Px4

This component, the Flight Controller, is the main focus of our development work.

docker run --name boom-px4 --volume `pwd`/.:/opt/boom-sls -p 14570:18570/udp -p 14580:14580/udp -p 4560:4560/udp -p 4560:4560 theprojectboom/px4:latest
  • NOTE: docker run -v hostPath:containerPath [...] - the hostPath must be an absolute path, i.e. starting with /.
JSBSim

I've included a JSBSim executable in the container at /opt/JSBSim If we need to customize the FDM, mount-build-run instructions will be updated here.

QGroundControl

Download, install, and run QGroundControl.

FlightGear

Need to configure to run with external FDM (Flight Dynamics Model). Port 5500, default for communication.

About docker

Docker runs containers, a kind of lightweight virtual machine on your computer. The containers allow easy sharing or deployment of software without installing libraries or compiled binaries onto your system permanently. On macOS, and possibly other platforms, the containers do run inside a virutal machine. The easiest and best way to interact with the containers (execute commands, inspect contents, start and stop) is through the docker executable and the subcommands it accepts. More information can be found with man docker[-cmd], docker [cmd] --help, or online.

You can download (or create) docker images with:

  • docker pull [img[:version]]
  • docker build

You can start/restart a container, which is an instance of an image, with:

  • docker run -w /opt/boom-sls [options] [image[:version]] [command]
  • docker start [options] [existing-container]

You can list running (or --all) containers and images with:

  • docker ps [-a]
  • docker containers
  • docker images

You can run a command in a container with:

  • docker exec -w /opt/boom-sls [options] [container] [command]
  • docker logs [options] [container]

You can stop, remove a container with

  • docker stop [container]
  • docker kill [container]
  • docker rm [container] - removes container
  • docker rmi [image] - removes image

More notes for contributors