2025-07-06, 05:17 AM
Here's my setup. Nothing too out of the ordinary I think. I ran it today for the first time and the default steering algorithm ran great. Pi5, MacArthur hat, IMU and DCDC on the hat, NVMe storage, USB GPS antenna, nano arduino via USB, L298N motor controller, linear actuator. Wind sensing isn't hooked up yet. The Pypilot did great with just the compass in the IMU. On first try the motor controller wires were backwards. I didn't even try to keep track of left and right during the build because I had a 50/50 chance and would be easy to fix. Tacking worked. Sailing close hauled didn't work great because I didn't have wind direction, so I fell off 20deg. I have the Davis 6410 anemometer on top of the mast. The telephone style cord will go through a ADS1115, run on 3.3V, and speed will go straight to the pi. I used Gemini a lot. It sent me down one rabbit hole of trying everything possible to get an old package to work before I found out on the forum it was old and would never work on the Pi 5. Other than that Gemini was great. The project would have been impossible for me without Gemini's help and the forum. I hooked up everything at home on my pool table first. It took a lot of fiddling around, probably 40+ hours of learning new things. I'm a mechanical engineer and this was all new to me in the electrical engineering and computer programming realms. Seeing it work today was so much fun. I sailed 3 hours towards Canada and turned around to Detroit, without hardly ever touching the tiller. I avoided two faraway collisions just by clicking the mouse.
Next up is hooking up the anemometer, a proper enclosure, touchscreen, remote, and welding up a slicker tiller bracket. Current bracket is made from 4 different fence gate parts and bolts. It works. It attaches to pre-existing holes in the tiller, same holes that hold the tiller to the rudder.