Drift on ADXRS453 Gyro

[alopex_rex]

Our team has been trying to use the ADXRS453 gyro (datasheet), with this board (http://www.digikey.com/product-detai...53Z-ND/2700448.

We got SPI communication working pretty well, we think. We're getting data from the gyro, in the format we expect. But while at rest, the sensor returns apparently random values between ~0.3 and ~0.8, averaging around 0.6. We tried using a calibration routine, which samples the rate while at rest to find an average drift, but the amount of the drift seems to vary depending on how fast the gyro is rotating, with the result that even with the calibration the gyro results are not usable.

We're displaying the raw 1's and 0's from the gyro on the SmartDashboard, and they show the drift, so we can be pretty certain the issue doesn't have to do with how we process the data. The status bits always indicate "valid sensor data." Our code on github (relevant files ADXRS450Gyro.h and ADXRS450Gyro.cpp) if you want to look at that.

Does anyone have any idea how either to fix this, or to compensate for it? As it is we can't really use the gyro for anything. The ADXRS453 is supposed to be a fairly precise gyro, so I assume that there's a way to get useful data from it. Any ideas?