SLAM without odometry, hector_slam + sicktoolbox

edit

Hi. I've been working on SLAM without odometry in ROS hydro. I'm currently using a SICK Lidar LMS200 which I could succesfully connect to serial and I get communication and data in RVIZ.

I git cloned the files and I started to do some test running ~$ roslaunch hector_slam_launch tutorial.launch and it appears to be working properly so I assume the package was correctly installed.

Then I proceeded to review and modify the files tutorial.launch and ~/catkin_ws/src/hector_slam/hector_mapping/launch/mapping_default.launch and ~/catkin_ws/src/hector_slam/hector_slam_launch/launch/tutorial.launch

The current mapping_default.launch :

<?xml version="1.0"?>

<launch>
  <arg name="tf_map_scanmatch_transform_frame_name" default="scanmatcher_frame"/>
  <arg name="base_frame" default="base_footprint"/>
  <arg name="odom_frame" default="nav"/>
  <arg name="pub_map_odom_transform" default="true"/>
  <arg name="scan_subscriber_queue_size" default="5"/>
  <arg name="scan_topic" default="scan"/>
  <arg name="map_size" default="2048"/>


  <node pkg="hector_mapping" type="hector_mapping" name="hector_mapping" output="screen">

    <!-- Frame names -->
    <param name="map_frame" value="map" />
    <param name="base_frame" value="$(arg base_frame)" />
    <param name="odom_frame" value="$(arg odom_frame)" />

    <!-- Tf use -->
    <param name="use_tf_scan_transformation" value="true"/>
    <param name="use_tf_pose_start_estimate" value="false"/>
    <param name="pub_map_odom_transform" value="$(arg pub_map_odom_transform)"/>

    <!-- Map size / start point -->
    <param name="map_resolution" value="0.050"/>
    <param name="map_size" value="$(arg map_size)"/>
    <param name="map_start_x" value="0.5"/>
    <param name="map_start_y" value="0.5" />
    <param name="map_multi_res_levels" value="2" />

    <!-- Map update parameters -->
    <param name="update_factor_free" value="0.4"/>
    <param name="update_factor_occupied" value="0.9" />    
    <param name="map_update_distance_thresh" value="0.4"/>
    <param name="map_update_angle_thresh" value="0.06" />
    <param name="laser_z_min_value" value = "-1.0" />
    <param name="laser_z_max_value" value = "1.0" />

    <!-- Advertising config --> 
    <param name="advertise_map_service" value="true"/>

    <param name="scan_subscriber_queue_size" value="$(arg scan_subscriber_queue_size)"/>
    <param name="scan_topic" value="$(arg scan_topic)"/>

    <!-- Debug parameters -->
    <!--
      <param name="output_timing" value="false"/>
      <param name="pub_drawings" value="true"/>
      <param name="pub_debug_output" value="true"/>
    -->
    <param name="tf_map_scanmatch_transform_frame_name" value="$(arg tf_map_scanmatch_transform_frame_name)" />
  </node>

   <node pkg="tf" type="static_transform_publisher" name="base_to_laser_broadcaster" args="0.1 0.1 0.1 0 0 0 base_link laser 100" />    


  <!--<node pkg="tf" type="static_transform_publisher" name="map_nav_broadcaster" args="0 0 0 0 0 0 map nav 100"/>-->
</launch>

Now the tutorial.launch:

<?xml version="1.0"?>

<launch>

  <arg name="geotiff_map_file_path" default="$(find hector_geotiff)/maps"/>

  <param name="/use_sim_time" value="true"/>



  <node pkg="rviz" type="rviz" name="rviz"
    args="-d $(find hector_slam_launch)/rviz_cfg/mapping_demo.rviz"/>

  <include file="$(find hector_mapping)/launch/mapping_default.launch"/>

  <include file="$(find hector_geotiff)/launch/geotiff_mapper.launch">
    <arg name="trajectory_source_frame_name" value="scanmatcher_frame"/>
    <arg name="map_file_path" value="$(arg geotiff_map_file_path)"/>
  </include>

</launch>

as far as I understand, when I launch the tutorial.launch file mapping_default.launch should be running as well. However I notice that the tf transform are not published, so I have to publish them manually by

~$ rosrun tf static_transform_publisher ...

And still, having a tf tree, I see no map working on RVIZ

Anybody catching some errors here?

Thank you in advance

EDIT 1

Launching tutorial.launch, I get no tf tree. I do get the warn No transform between frames /map and scanmatcher_frame available. If I run the node manually I get a tree only if the values are not ... (more)