Compass Calibration

[fin032]

After reading and watching videos on the compass I see that some of you do the compass dance every new flight.

Say that 24 hours ago you done the dance in a wide open field with nothing near and had a good flight. The next day you are going to take off from a spot near by but much closer to building concrete etc. Would you still go ahead and do the dance again or would you just keep the good calibration you got from the field the day before?

If you did go ahead and recalibrate is there not a chance this could cause problems?

 

[Meta4]

Some people go 6 months and travel more than 100 kilometres between flying sites without recalibrating and have no problems.
Some people wouldn't dream of flying without recalibrating even if they just landed to change batteries.

 

[Mako79]

It's really hard to argue and I don't think DJI even knows the answer. The best way is to use a laptop with a long extension cable and make sure the compass MOD values are within range of 1500-1800...

The most important compass calibration is before you first launch it. This is critical as the phantom shipped from another country may register an incorrect north or interfered during shipping by other metal objects.

From then on, I only do it when the app warns me. Overdoing it can also lead to anomalies. Ie, you may have a perfect calibration that was done in an open wide field. Then one day, you may do it another open field near by, but you don't realise that there is rebar below you.

The compass dance should only be done when "needed".
Eg:
if you leave near a magnet (subwoofer in the boot)
if you have used a magnetic screw driver to change components or maintained the phantom.
travelled an excess distance where there is a massive difference in magnetic declination.

Another thing you can do is hover 10ft near you and inspect the movement of the phantom before the mission. If she spirals, then she most likely needs a calibration..

 

[fin032]

Thanks for the replies. I think I will go with getting it calibrated in a open field and again if.

I get to much movement when hovering .
move to a location more than say 50 miles away
after a crash or repair
after a update
App warning

let me know what you think and if you can think of anything to add or change.