Currently I am using a USB to TTL Serial cable to communicate between the computer and the microcontroller. This acts as a tether on the quadcopter and would be much better if it would be wireless to eliminate the leash on the quadcopter. To do this I designed a board that would stack onto to main board plugging into the UART port and would connect the UART port from the microcontroller to a Digi Xbee module like shown below:
These modules offer an easily configuralbe point to point wireless UART gateway. SnceI would need two modules; one on the quadcopter and one connected to the computer I also designed the board to e populated to connect up to a computer’s USB port. To do this I connected the UART port on the Digi module to an FTDI FT232RL USB to Serial chip and have that connect to a male USB A port which can then plug into the computer.
Schematic:
Wireless UART Gateway
Andrew