Ingredient
IMU (MPU6050 / BNO085)
Also known as: inertial measurement unit, MPU6050, MPU9250, BNO085, BNO055
Inertial measurement unit — combines a 3-axis accelerometer (linear acceleration) and a 3-axis gyroscope (angular rate) on a single IC; 9-DoF variants add a 3-axis magnetometer for absolute heading. The right ingredient when a robot needs to know its orientation, tilt, or motion: leveling a rover, stabilizing a drone, detecting that a robot has tipped or stalled, computing dead-reckoning position. MPU6050 (~$3, 6-DoF, popular but old) for hobbyist work; BNO085 (~$25, 9-DoF, runs on-chip sensor-fusion to output stable quaternions directly) for serious applications.
Inputs / outputs
- Power: 3.3V or 5V, ~5–10 mA
- Interface: I²C typical; some SPI variants
- Output rate: up to 1 kHz raw; on-chip-fused quaternion at 100–400 Hz
- Range: accelerometer ±2g–±16g; gyroscope ±125°/s–±2000°/s
- 6-DoF vs 9-DoF: 6-DoF gyro drift over time; 9-DoF magnetometer corrects yaw drift but is sensitive to nearby ferrous metal
Solves / unlocks
- Rover tilt and rollover detection (safety stop on excessive tilt)
- Drone attitude stabilization (the foundational drone-flight-controller sensor)
- Vibration monitoring on motors / pumps (accelerometer FFT detects bearing wear)
- Dead-reckoning fill-in between GPS updates (orientation + wheel odometry)
- Equipment-tipping alerts (livestock waterer, hive)
- Activity detection on livestock collars
Constraints
- Drift — gyroscopes drift over seconds; accelerometers tilt-couple with gravity; magnetometers distort near steel. Sensor fusion is required for stable orientation.
- Calibration matters — gyro bias, magnetometer hard-iron and soft-iron calibration are necessary for accuracy.
- Vibration sensitivity — high-vibration platforms (running engines) produce noisy IMU data; isolate mechanically.
- Cheap MPU6050 modules vary in quality; prefer SparkFun or Adafruit breakouts over generic AliExpress.
Source
- BNO085 (recommended — on-chip fusion): https://www.adafruit.com/product/4754
- MPU6050 (cheap, basic): https://www.sparkfun.com/products/11028
- Library: https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_BNO08x
See also
Auto-generated from this entry’s typed relations: frontmatter, grouped by relation type so the editorial signal isn’t flattened.
- Member of: [[ingredient]]
- Combines with: [[arduino-uno]] · [[esp32]] · [[ros2]] · [[gps-rtk]] · [[acorn-rover]]
What links here, and how
Inbound connections from across the wiki, grouped by lens and by relationship. These appear automatically — every entity page declares what it links to, and that data populates here on the targets.
Practical
contains
- Farm-tech toolkit sensor / orientation, tilt, motion
combines with
- GPS-RTK RTK-GPS gives position; IMU gives orientation; fused they give pose
- PX4 / ArduPilot autopilot Pixhawk includes industrial-grade IMUs internally; the same sensor class as the IMU pantry entry
combines
- Recipe: autonomous row-crop weeder tilt sensing for safety stop on rough terrain
- Recipe: livestock & equipment tracking mesh activity sensing — cattle behavior (lying / standing / walking) and equipment-tampering detection
- Recipe: NDVI crop-scouting drone internal to Pixhawk; provides flight stabilization
6 inbound links · 6 outbound