It happened today. My nightmare came true, a $1200 yard sale in a (thank God) unoccupied field. I will try and describe the sequence of events as best as I can with hopes that someone can explain this catastrophe to me:
This flight was done in a baseball field/park with houses to the east and south, telephone wires approximately 200 yards away to the northeast. No other wires, towers, or interferance present or evident. Firmware was as is, straight out of the box. I have about 12 flights with this thing under my belt, all without incident.
1) Preflight inspection: PV out of case, props checked-tight. Turn on TX, turn on wifi repeater. Insert battery into PV, Turn on battery. Wait for green LEDs, conduct calibration at ground level. Turn on DJI App, wait for camera connection. Ensure that GPS is tracking sattelites (10 satellites). Fully charged battery at 99%.
2) Flight: Fired it up and sat for a couple seconds. Took off and hovered in front of me to check GPS stabilization. Hover was good and stable. Forward input and check hover again, all good. Rotate so that the front is facing me, approximately 20 feet off the ground...... This is where the fun starts!!
After about 5 seconds, hard left bank with absolutely no input. I was able to correct slightly with right bank (still facing me). Hard left bank again with no input from me...... Let me pause by saying that I am experienced in RC flights, mainly with fixed wings, and I am very well versed in controlling an aircraft in any position (away, facing, inverted).
At the point of the second hard left bank with no input, I decided to gain some altitude (I was always taught that with RC aircraft, altitude is your friend so that there is more room for corrections). The PV responded to my altitude input and began to climb to approximately 45 feet. Once it reached this height, it began backwards pitch with no input from me. As it got further away from me, and now out of sight, I activated the distance and positional feature on the app. My hope was to get a good bearing using the FPV and get it closer to me. I was able to sucessfully get the feature up and running. As I gave it forward input, it would respond briefly, then pitch away and to the left and right. It began getting further and further away and over houses at this point. As I tried to regain control using the FPV, it fought me continually, seeminly correcting every one of my inputs with an exact oppossite reaction. My PV flew itself over a clear field across the street, southwest of where I was. At this point I pushed the record feature and continued to fight it. The PV was still completely out of view and I was relying on the FPV to get it back to me. It seemed that as I yawed left or right to get it back to me, it would rotate away without input.
Beings that I was thusfar unsucessful at returning my PV on my own, i made the move that I have hoped that I would not have to make against my will....I shut off the transmitter to initiate the return to home. I watched the screen as it it read: "connection lost", then "returning home". I still had broken FPV. I watched as it rotated left, then rotated right, then left again. It began flying back in my direction, then stopped, rotated right and began forward pitch....forty five degrees away from where "Home" was. Unfortunately at this point it was flying straight for a busy "Raleys" parking lot. It was not returning "Home" and rather, it was flying further away from me.
Many thoughts went through my head at this point: What or who am I going to crash into? How much is this going to cost me? What is this going to do for the public's already poor perception of these things? Why is this happening? Why didn't the "failsafe" "return to home" work?
I watched the screen as the PV gradually plummeted down to earth and landed in the field, just south of the supermarket. The screen then showed "connection lost" again and a view of the field, at a 45 degree, canted angle. The locater app was still functioning. I switched on the "Find my Phantom" setting as I packed my case and set out to discover the impending giant crater that my PV had created.
As I got to the crash, I saw what I had expected (Minus the giant crater). The PV upside down, battery 10 feet away, camera 10 feet away.
There was no apparent damage to the Phantom or the camera, other than the back of the camera case separating slightly. The props were mostly still in tact, with a corner broken off of one of them. I brought it home, cleaned it off, put it back together, replaced the props and gave it a test flight. The test flight was seemingly successful. One thing I did notice was that the servos in the camera seemed to have a "lag" when I tilted the PV forward and backward. It just sounds different, like it is struggling to work.
Now I'm not as confident in this thing. I can't have it flying away on it's own like this, certainly if the "return to home" feature does not work. Should I contact Dronefly and DJI?
This flight was done in a baseball field/park with houses to the east and south, telephone wires approximately 200 yards away to the northeast. No other wires, towers, or interferance present or evident. Firmware was as is, straight out of the box. I have about 12 flights with this thing under my belt, all without incident.
1) Preflight inspection: PV out of case, props checked-tight. Turn on TX, turn on wifi repeater. Insert battery into PV, Turn on battery. Wait for green LEDs, conduct calibration at ground level. Turn on DJI App, wait for camera connection. Ensure that GPS is tracking sattelites (10 satellites). Fully charged battery at 99%.
2) Flight: Fired it up and sat for a couple seconds. Took off and hovered in front of me to check GPS stabilization. Hover was good and stable. Forward input and check hover again, all good. Rotate so that the front is facing me, approximately 20 feet off the ground...... This is where the fun starts!!
After about 5 seconds, hard left bank with absolutely no input. I was able to correct slightly with right bank (still facing me). Hard left bank again with no input from me...... Let me pause by saying that I am experienced in RC flights, mainly with fixed wings, and I am very well versed in controlling an aircraft in any position (away, facing, inverted).
At the point of the second hard left bank with no input, I decided to gain some altitude (I was always taught that with RC aircraft, altitude is your friend so that there is more room for corrections). The PV responded to my altitude input and began to climb to approximately 45 feet. Once it reached this height, it began backwards pitch with no input from me. As it got further away from me, and now out of sight, I activated the distance and positional feature on the app. My hope was to get a good bearing using the FPV and get it closer to me. I was able to sucessfully get the feature up and running. As I gave it forward input, it would respond briefly, then pitch away and to the left and right. It began getting further and further away and over houses at this point. As I tried to regain control using the FPV, it fought me continually, seeminly correcting every one of my inputs with an exact oppossite reaction. My PV flew itself over a clear field across the street, southwest of where I was. At this point I pushed the record feature and continued to fight it. The PV was still completely out of view and I was relying on the FPV to get it back to me. It seemed that as I yawed left or right to get it back to me, it would rotate away without input.
Beings that I was thusfar unsucessful at returning my PV on my own, i made the move that I have hoped that I would not have to make against my will....I shut off the transmitter to initiate the return to home. I watched the screen as it it read: "connection lost", then "returning home". I still had broken FPV. I watched as it rotated left, then rotated right, then left again. It began flying back in my direction, then stopped, rotated right and began forward pitch....forty five degrees away from where "Home" was. Unfortunately at this point it was flying straight for a busy "Raleys" parking lot. It was not returning "Home" and rather, it was flying further away from me.
Many thoughts went through my head at this point: What or who am I going to crash into? How much is this going to cost me? What is this going to do for the public's already poor perception of these things? Why is this happening? Why didn't the "failsafe" "return to home" work?
I watched the screen as the PV gradually plummeted down to earth and landed in the field, just south of the supermarket. The screen then showed "connection lost" again and a view of the field, at a 45 degree, canted angle. The locater app was still functioning. I switched on the "Find my Phantom" setting as I packed my case and set out to discover the impending giant crater that my PV had created.
As I got to the crash, I saw what I had expected (Minus the giant crater). The PV upside down, battery 10 feet away, camera 10 feet away.
There was no apparent damage to the Phantom or the camera, other than the back of the camera case separating slightly. The props were mostly still in tact, with a corner broken off of one of them. I brought it home, cleaned it off, put it back together, replaced the props and gave it a test flight. The test flight was seemingly successful. One thing I did notice was that the servos in the camera seemed to have a "lag" when I tilted the PV forward and backward. It just sounds different, like it is struggling to work.
Now I'm not as confident in this thing. I can't have it flying away on it's own like this, certainly if the "return to home" feature does not work. Should I contact Dronefly and DJI?