Flying 2 phantoms together, strong interference.

dtokez · Feb 25, 2016

I went out with my pal last night for a flight (my P3A and his P3P) we set up and started waiting for the crafts to warm up, by my friend noticed that he was getting a warning that there was strong interference and be careful on long range flights? This spooked us a little so we didn't fly at the same time in the end.

If I walked away with my craft the poor signal would change to good? It seemed to be my craft interfering with his rc and visa versa. What do you guys think, was it perfectly safe to fly?

dixter · Feb 25, 2016

some have used the 32 channel hack for when they are flying together then they choose the different channels manually so they don't interfere ...

Lonewolf · Feb 25, 2016

dixter said:
some have used the 32 channel hack for when they are flying together then they choose the different channels manually so they don't interfere ...

You can do the same thing using the original frequencies that came with your Phantom by simply changing the setting from auto to custom. Then picking 2 different channels.

dtokez · Feb 25, 2016

What is the 32 channel hack? We were looking for an option to change from auto but couldn't find an option?

dtokez · Feb 25, 2016

What do you guys think then, is it simply a warning or would it have been a risk to fly?

vcinfio · Feb 25, 2016

I've flown 3 at the same time and I've noticed that the phantoms will often change channels and 1 phantom can override the next causing a total loss of signal. The way to avoid this is having all the phantoms in the same vicinity on their own channel by manually selecting. I would strongly avoid using auto setting when flying more than 1 phantom in close quarters.

Wolfiesden · Feb 25, 2016

I flew 2 the other day and the only issue is when the controllers were right next to each other. When separated by a couple feet, all was good.

I presume by having two next to each other the RF of one was overloading the front end of the other's receiver. A reasonable distance separation solved the issue.

jamesb72 · Feb 25, 2016

I flew with another p3p at the weekend and we had no issues at all.

dtokez · Feb 25, 2016

vcinfio said:
I've flown 3 at the same time and I've noticed that the phantoms will often change channels and 1 phantom can override the next causing a total loss of signal. The way to avoid this is having all the phantoms in the same vicinity on their own channel by manually selecting. I would strongly avoid using auto setting when flying more than 1 phantom in close quarters.

We can't see the option to select channel manually in either of our apps? I guess dji have taken the option away?

dtokez · Feb 25, 2016

jamesb72 said:
I flew with another p3p at the weekend and we had no issues at all.

lol cool video

did you notice if you had a warning when checking your signal quality?

jack1144 · Feb 26, 2016

dtokez said:
We can't see the option to select channel manually in either of our apps? I guess dji have taken the option away?

The channels you can change are for video link.Channel 13 to 20.
Go to settings ( top right corner) of Go app.
Go tp the " HD " , select " custom" instead of " auto"
Pick a channel. Other P3 do same only pick a different channel

dtokez · Feb 26, 2016

There there is no option to manual select on either of our apps?

dtokez · Feb 26, 2016

Firmware version info attached

Hemar174 · Feb 26, 2016

dtokez said:
There there is no option to manual select on either of our apps?

did you have it in beginner mode ?....

dtokez · Feb 27, 2016

Hemar174 said:
did you have it in beginner mode ?....

No mate, definitely not in beginner mode?

nhoover · Feb 27, 2016

We've flown 3-6 at a time a number of times and while there is some interference and you're certainly not going to do any super long distance flights, it's always worked pretty well for me. I'm on channel 32 and I think most of the guys don't have the hack and so are not interfering so much with me.

Suntana · Feb 27, 2016

Sent from my iPad using PhantomPilots mobile app

jamesb72 · Feb 27, 2016

dtokez said:
lol cool video

did you notice if you had a warning when checking your signal quality?

Thanks.

I kept an eye on signal quality bars in case we needed to not stand too close together and they never dropped, and we had no warnings.

We were not going for any long distance, prob 300m max, and we were in the middle of a field so maybe in a busier rf environment ie near houses/wifi etc it may be more of an issue..