Sending commands to drone in the X-Plane simulator with inav SITL

[NikitaYeryomin]

Hello INAV community,

I'm currently in the process of developing an autopilot system, with the decision-making software running on a Jetson Nano. My primary objective is to have the drone react in a simulator based on commands sent from my script.
I'm using the following setup:

1. X-Plane 11 simulator from Steam on Windows 10 with NK_FPVSurfwing model from the INAV-X-Plane-HITL repo. I have configured Data output to the 49000 port. Settings can be viewed below:
   I've also enabled all datarefs I found in the xplane.c code of the inav SITL.

2. inav_SITL running on the same host in WSL (Ubuntu 20.04) with the following command line:
   inav_SITL --sim=xp --simip=192.168.0.162 --simport=49000 --chanmap=S01-01,S02-02,S03-03,M01-04
   It's able to successfully connect to X-Plane:

3. INAV Configurator 6.1.0 - successfully connects the inav_SITL on port 5760 and I can see it receives the data updates from the simulator:
   Here are also my ports and receiver configuration tabs:
   
   

To communicate with the inav_SITL with my script I've created this fork of pyMultiWii library. It uses TCP socket instead of serial to connect to inav_SITL and send MSP commands. I'm able to successfully connect to inav_SITL on port 5761 and retrieve any data like attitude or RC data, e.g.:

import time

def get_rc_data(board):
    rc_data = board.getData(MultiWii.RC)
    return rc_data

if __name__ == "__main__":
    host = '127.0.0.1'
    port = 5761
    board = MultiWii(host, port)
    
    while True:
        try:
            rc_data = get_rc_data(board)
            if rc_data is not None:
                print(rc_data)
            else:
                print("Could not retrieve RC data.")
        except Exception as e:
           print(f"Error: {e}")
        time.sleep(0.1)

However, I'm not able to send any commands to the drone, like arming or changing throttle. Here's the code I've tried to use for take off:

def take_off(drone, takeoff_throttle, duration):
    if not drone.arm():
        print("Failed to arm the drone!")
        return

    print("Taking off...")
    start_time = time.time()

    hover_throttle = 1500  
    elevon_neutral = 1500 

    start_time = time.time()
    while time.time() - start_time < duration:
        # Set throttle for takeoff and maintain elevon in neutral position
        data = [elevon_neutral, elevon_neutral, 1500, takeoff_throttle]
        drone.sendCMD(8, MultiWii.SET_RAW_RC, data, '4H')
        time.sleep(0.1)

    # Set throttle to hover after takeoff
    data = [elevon_neutral, elevon_neutral, 1500, hover_throttle]
    drone.sendCMD(8, MultiWii.SET_RAW_RC, data, '4H')
    print("Hovering...")

It does not respond with any error but looks like it just ignores them as I don't see any visual changes in the simulator as well as it does not affect any RC data values. 

Has anyone faced a similar issue or can provide guidance on what might be going wrong?

Any help or insight much appreciated!

[stronnag]

In principle, sending MSP to the SITL works fine, for example fl2stil provides RC commands via MSP_SET_RAW_RC in order to replay BBL.

There is also further information on automation in the wiki.

In particular for arming and sending RC commands there are specific status requirements and update rate requirements.

[pogopo789]

try to change from SIM (SITL) to MSP

[walkvanja]

@NikitaYeryomin have you resolved an issue? Have the same and looking for the solution. Approach from @pogopo789 change stick values in iNav configurator, but not affect simulation in RealFlight

Any help would be appreciated