The wifi disappointment

So it turned out the servos interfered with wifi when the cameras pointed far left or far right, then tilted up or down. Orienting the tilt servo the right way seemed to do it. There were negligible variations in Vdd, so it must have been electromagnetic from the motor arcing.

Unless the camera was restricted to just the motions which didn't cause interference, Wifi ended up not having the bulletproof, super tight consistency needed to fly indoors. It was originally selected because vision was going to be done on the aircraft & there wasn't any knowledge of how unreliable it would be.

Pan/tilt mechanisms have always created the impression of a living being. They're usually tasked with something hopeless & covered in wires, giving the impression of something PETA would attack you for.



There are some musings about whether a traditional downward optical flow sensor with sonar would have done a better job.