Crash... My P2V is in the bottom of the Amazon river....

[BogotaMatt]

I'd like to share my experience with you guys. We've lost a P2V due to a very strange failure. I'm pretty experienced in flying drones. We were doing tracking shots of our boat on the amazon river, with the copter at about 50m high and reasonable forward speed. Copter was in GPS mode, I let it go away a little bit up to lost connection, no biggie, we turned back and it was promptly back.
As I was bringing it back towards the boat, at about 10ft, it swerved violently and sunk immediately. Copter was calibrated, flying fantastic, no ESC false movement or anything like that, it just went straight in the water. Due to the presence of electric eels, I didn't jump in the water. Any idea ?

 

[msinger]

VRS perhaps?

If you get another Phantom and plan on flying over water, make sure you attach a Getterback to the landing gear.

 

[Fplvert]

Sorry about your crash, and welcome to the forum. I hope you can get some help here!

First, some more details would help. I understand you were flying a P2V and it crashed in the river. Did it drop suddenly to one side and go down?

Was it flying in NAZA mode? How many satelites if you were in GPS? The boat, is it metal? Did you do any firmware updates or something different for this flight?

 

[Vas Deferens]

The electricity from the eels.

 

[Green_Phantom]

I keep seeing more and more of the P2V acting weird/crashing threads. I don't think I'm ever going to upgrade from my old school P1. This thing is rock solid.

 

[packetlos]

BogotaMatt,

This is due to high quality Chinese engineering, needless to say they have some way to go yet.

See mine attempt to fly away: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zmAqnXsB2PY

 

[jonstatt]

What a shame...would have loved to see the footage from the Amazon!

If you get an ESC/motor failure then this could happen....it's even more of a disaster as it happened over water. Unfortunately only hex flyers seem to have the ability to keep under control in the event of a single "engine" failure.

VRS typically causes a wobbly plummet, but not usually a sharp descent angle (which actually would pull it out of VRS) although you can get VRS on just one prop which can cause it to tip.

 

[Mori55]

Sorry about your crash, and welcome to the forum. I hope you can get some help here!

First, some more details would help. I understand you were flying a P2V and it crashed in the river. Did it drop suddenly to one side and go down?

Was it flying in NAZA mode? How many satelites if you were in GPS? The boat, is it metal? Did you do any firmware updates or something different for this flight?

Please tell me what would naza mode have to do with this ?

 

[BogotaMatt]

It did drop to one side and go down, yes. Copter was in NAZA mode, I have the last frame sent to the phone, and it shows something interesting, now that I see it...

It was however responding perfectly and was right over me when it went...
Not a VRS, descending at a slow rate, in GPS mode, not in ATTI. The shots were incredible, absolutely breathtaking, they are part of a feature-length documentary about climate change in South America. I've had the copter fly at over 1800m without much concern, as its performances had been rock-solid. It didn't trip, crash or anything.
We bought the first one from UAV, and when we contacted them they immediately knocked $300 on a new one and offered overnight shipping, and the insurance will pick up the tab on the first one.

 

[BlackTracer]

Yeah the speed is interesting to say the least. That's 6355 mph for all the people in the USA. That velocity is improbable and impossible I would say.

 

[BogotaMatt]

Note distance too. Telemetry was lost, not the video feed, but the copter was perfectly responsive...

 

[jonstatt]

I still say the most likely is an ESC/motor failure as it dropped to one side suddenly.

 

[BogotaMatt]

Luckily the insurance covers us. I'm still tempted to go for a Walkera, the hex safety factor very appealing...

 

[rbhamilton]

It could be an ESC failure but did you secure the GPS cable? The drone calculates it's speed by measuring the change in location over time. If it was getting bad GPS data the speed would be way off. It would think it was suddenly miles from home and maybe at some weird elevation. As it tries to get home and back to the right altitude it could head into the water.

The GPS cable isn't very solid. It's not a locking clip. I think it was Frank who found this out (but I'm too lazy to search) when he was using his Flytrex and got some wildly fluctuating data.

The solution is to pop the case and wedge a bit of cardboard into the connector and secure it so it doesn't wobble around or pop out.

 

[BogotaMatt]

I will definitely check it out when I receive the new one !

 

[jonstatt]

It could be an ESC failure but did you secure the GPS cable? The drone calculates it's speed by measuring the change in location over time. If it was getting bad GPS data the speed would be way off. It would think it was suddenly miles from home and maybe at some weird elevation. As it tries to get home and back to the right altitude it could head into the water.

The GPS cable isn't very solid. It's not a locking clip. I think it was Frank who found this out (but I'm too lazy to search) when he was using his Flytrex and got some wildly fluctuating data.

The solution is to pop the case and wedge a bit of cardboard into the connector and secure it so it doesn't wobble around or pop out.

Yes, it's an interesting point. I had assumed that if the GPS cable plays up that it just sporadically drops to ATTI, which wouldn't cause it to drop or change altitude...but if it causes it to get random or bad data, particularly around altitude, then anything could happen. I still can't believe how ridiculous it is to have a plug and socket that don't match!!

 

[Mori55]

I had a DJI f450 naza hover about 8' high when it flipped over and hit the ground. Only did this once never happened again.
I just think **** happens sometimes.

 

[Mako79]

It did drop to one side and go down, yes. Copter was in NAZA mode, I have the last frame sent to the phone, and it shows something interesting, now that I see it...

It was however responding perfectly and was right over me when it went...
Not a VRS, descending at a slow rate, in GPS mode, not in ATTI. The shots were incredible, absolutely breathtaking, they are part of a feature-length documentary about climate change in South America. I've had the copter fly at over 1800m without much concern, as its performances had been rock-solid. It didn't trip, crash or anything.
We bought the first one from UAV, and when we contacted them they immediately knocked $300 on a new one and offered overnight shipping, and the insurance will pick up the tab on the first one.

Looking at the bottom left hand radar of the last fpv capture, the centre of gravity shows that you are fully tilting backwards, however the last screen capture shows you diving fwd. Doesn't make sense. Its like the NAZA fell of the main board and the phantom tried to correct itself. It really sounds like the NAZA/IMU went skitz.

 

[capodrone81]

BogotaMatt,

This is due to high quality Chinese engineering, needless to say they have some way to go yet.

See mine attempt to fly away: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zmAqnXsB2PY

i just watched this WTF was that all about? good job thinking quick and enabling
RTH...

ever figure out what caused that much erratic behavior.... the angles it reached almost seemed like it was in manual mode.....