ros2_imu_serial

A ROS 2 package for reading 6-axis IMU (Inertial Measurement Unit) (MPU6050) data over a serial interface and publishing it as standard ROS 2 messages. This project is designed to make it easy to integrate low-cost or custom IMU hardware into a ROS 2-based robotics system.

Features

• Reads IMU data from a serial port
• Publishes data as standard sensor_msgs/msg/Imu
• Configurable serial port and baud rate
• Lightweight and easy to integrate into existing ROS 2 systems
• Suitable for embedded IMUs, microcontroller-based sensors, and prototyping

📦 Package Overview

v This package provides:

• A ROS 2 node that:
  • Opens a serial connection to an IMU device
  • Parses incoming sensor data
  • Publishes orientation, angular velocity, linear acceleration, and Euler angles

🔧 Requirements

• ROS 2 (tested with common distributions such as Humble / Iron)
• Linux (recommended for serial device support)
• IMU device that outputs serial data in a supported format
• Access permissions to the serial device (e.g. /dev/ttyUSB0)

📥 Installation

Clone the repository into your ROS 2 workspace:

mkdir -p ~/ros2_ws/src
cd ~/ros2_ws/src
git clone https://github.com/SlyPredator/ros2_imu_serial.git

Build the workspace:

cd ~/ros2_ws
colcon build --symlink-install
source install/setup.bash

Usage

Run the IMU serial node:

ros2 launch ros2_imu_serial imu_publisher.launch.py

📡 Published Topics

Topics published by this package include:

• /imu/data_raw (sensor_msgs/msg/Imu)
• /imu/euler (sensor_msgs/msg/Imu)

You can inspect the data using:

ros2 topic echo /imu/data_raw
ros2 topic echo /imu/euler

Parameters

Parameter	Type	Description	Default
serial_port	string	Serial device path	/dev/ttyUSB0
baudrate	int	Serial communication baud rate	115200
frame_id	string	TF frame for the IMU data	imu_link
publish_rate	float	Rate of topic publishing in ROS2	50
use_madgwick	bool	Whether or not to apply Madgwick Filtering	true
madgwick_beta	float	Madgwick Filtering beta value	0.1
publish_euler	bool	Whether or not to publish Euler angles	true

Permissions

If you encounter permission errors accessing the serial port:

sudo usermod -a -G dialout $USER
newgrp dialout

Notes

• IMU data format and parsing depend on your specific hardware
• Sensor calibration may be required for accurate results
• Orientation covariance and filtering are left to downstream nodes (e.g. robot_localization)

License

This project is open-source. Please check the repository for license details.

Contributing

Contributions, bug reports, and feature requests are welcome! Feel free to open an issue or submit a pull request.

Acknowledgements

Built for ROS 2 users who want a simple and flexible way to bring serial IMU data into their robotic systems.

Happy hacking! 🚀