Hardware installation

Link to the documentation

The pixhawk 4 system is comprised of

• A: The pixhawk unit
• B: The power module

Pixhawk periferals

Link to the documentation

• The receiver (3) is connected to the DSM/SBUS RC port
• The pressure sensor is connected to the I2C A port
• The GPS is connected to the GPS MODULE port
• The telemetry module is connected to the TELEM 1 port

Power module

Link to the documentation

The power module provides power to the pixhawk and the servos. It's connected to the pixhawk with a 6-pin power cable as well as a 10-pin PWM cable from the pixawk output I/O-PWM-OUT to the power module input FMU-PWM-IN
Power comes to the power module from a 7 to 51v (2 to 12s LiPo) DC port (1)
ESCs & servos are connected to the power module at the FMU-PWM-OUT 3-pin rail (2). At least one ESC must provide 5V UBEC power to the power rail

Software installation

Cloning the code and setting up the environment

Make sure brew and python are installed. If not, execute the following

/usr/bin/ruby -e "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/install)"

brew install python

Clone and compile ardupilot

git clone https://github.com/zenithaero/ardupilot.git
cd ardupilot
git submodule update --init --recursive

Don’t forget to regularly pull the latest changes

git pull origin master

Clone MAVProxy and add it to the PATH (assuming the shell is ZSH)

git clone https://github.com/zenithaero/MAVProxy.git
export MAV_PATH=/path/to/zenith/MAVProxy
echo "export PATH=$MAV_PATH/MAVProxy:$PATH" >> ~/.zshrc

And install the required dependencies

# dateutil is unsupported by some dependencies
pip uninstall python-dateutil
pip install wxPython gnureadline billiard numpy pyparsing

Follow the ardupilot build setup manual here. Here’s a summary of the steps to take

xcode-select --install
brew tap ardupilot/homebrew-px4
brew update
brew install genromfs gcc-arm-none-eabi gawk
pip install pyserial future empy pymavlink scipy

Install the OSX SDK headers (for version < Mojave)

open /Library/Developer/CommandLineTools/Packages/macOS_SDK_headers_for_macOS_10.14.pkg

Building the sim

From ardupilot directory, enable the sitl. That step should only be executed once

cd ardupilot
./waf configure --board sitl

Compile the sitl

./waf build --target bin/arduplane

Running the sim

Make the sim script executable

cd Zenith/Sim
chmod +x ./sim.py

Run the sitl on the default flight plan

./sim.py --f --speedup