How far should I fly away to still feel confident?

[Joe Glenn]

Know your flying environment and risks or injury to animal/person or property. Ensure your RTH settimgs are appropriate. Fly against any wind on the way out. Watch your battery and go for it. Comfort level depends on where you are and conditions.

Great advice about flying against the wind on the way out! Let it help push you back! So many times, people have run out of power due to wind.

 

[David Cooke]

Totally agree with most above . . except flying where planes with people in them fly . . without any flight advisory or control tower able to advise me where and what altitude drones are it's becoming a game of Russian roulette just to go from A to B . . . while someone goes for a joyride in a 3 lb projectile that could take me down without much of a chance to avoid being hit. . . IT WILL HAPPEN.

I'm all for opening the skies . . I fly an aerial camera (P4) almost every day . . and I know how valuable they can be. . . .and fun. . . but let's keep the rest of humanity in mind when we plan record breaking ( law breaking) trips and do your BEST planning to avoid the possibility of a collision. We still lack the drone sensor technology that can mesh with the rest of aviation safety . . . and it will be a few years yet before airspace control fully on board with personal drones . . we are not there yet . . until then, it's up to US.

 

[richardseguro]

I agree with comments from With the Birds. I always fly headwind first leg...I fly anywhere between 1k to 5k feet away. Have flown P4 to 18.5k feet with 0 to light wind. No problem whatsoever. Have fun...blue skies!

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[davoud]

I've read lots of threads on here about the range and I understand that it can go further than I would ever need to go. However, I'm interested in hearing from some experienced pilots how far you would feel comfortable taking the P4 on a normal everydayou flight. Only gotten mine out 1300 feet and was nervous about pushing it too far -- still a novice.
Basically wanting to know where I should feel confident? 3000 ft? 5000?
Thanks in advance!
I apologize in advance if this post is redundant.

Novice or expert, you should fly in accordance with the regulations, which means that you should be able to see your UAV at all times. This protects people and property, including your UAV.

 

[Mark J Colbert]

It's all about your comfort level - and that comes from experience. Create a pre-flight routine (an old habit I've picked up from being a pilot for over 30 years) and don't deviate from it. Know your environment and the limitations of your aircraft - something else which comes from experience. When my drone was new, I wouldn't fly it across the street. Nearly a year later, and after having accumulated a bunch of really cool gadgets, I have the ability to fly further than my battery will allow. In fact, one time I didn't leave myself enough power to get back and was forced to land my drone on a rock outcropping that I had to hike up to in order to recover it. Keep flying it every time you get a chance. Pretty soon, it'll all be second nature. Good luck

 

[longdog]

This far.

Relax and enjoy. I even fly my distance missions at night. I can usually track the blinking lights for about 2 kilometers and then it's lights out, so no worries. Sometimes I turn around or l let the system tell me the battery status and it does a RTH automatically. If it goes in the drink it goes in the drink. Life is about inconveniences and problems. Losing a drone is not a problem. Losing a child to cancer, well that's a problem.


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Losing a child, period; is not really a problem. It's more of an emotional void that tears your heart out and apart, permanently. EBC

Does put things in perspective though. I could care less if my drone crashes into the ocean.
I'll buy another...

 

[BenDronePilot]

As stated above, make sure your RTH altitude is set for a lot more than you think you might ever need. And watch your battery level. The final precaution is just to make sure the home point is updated when you take off. With those precautions, fly as far as you want. Fly until you lose contact completely. Your P4 will come back to you as long as you set the right parameters before flight. It's a bit worrisome at first, but soon you get comfortable with it. You will have contact reestablished well before your drone gets home, at which time you can cancel the automatic return to home. One more thing to watch out for is when you do a firmware update, you will lose all of your settings so it is important to reset them before your next flight.

This is not the best advise, at least the part about flying as far as you can irregardless of other important factors. You can't count on it just coming back to you. External factors such as aggressive or unexpected wind gusts not to mention battery level are the top two reasons you don't and should not do that.

A little common sense needs to be used when flying far out. In case you don't have said common sense here are some bullet points to be mindful of regarding your max range in a given environment.

1) Don't take off before having a good GPS Satelite lock and home point recorded.

2) fly on a calm day with winds sub 10mph or ideally sub 6mph if you're going for max range flights.

3) of flying on a windy day when you fly out make sure you're flying against the wind so you can have some assurance that the return trip will be faster. Always give yourself a buffer in case winds change direction during your flight.

4) it's usually safe to fly as far out or usually further out than the DJI Go app return to home warning. But if you want to err on the safe side fly as far as you can and start heading back when or shortly after the return to home power level warning.

5) I most always find I get home with plenty of battery to spare when returning when the app warns me. So if you want to push the envelope a bit you can fly out till you are between 55 and 60% battery life remaining. Extreme distance flyers will push that even further if they believe they will be flying back with a tail wind reducing the time to return. Problem with that is you will be landing with just a few if any percentage to spare in battery so it's not worth the risk to me.

6) For max range use ATTI mode, GPS will still be working but it no longer will use position hold. This is not a big deal since you're not trying to hold station you're flying back and I consistently get increased speeds flying in ATTI mode. If you want to add some battery buffer let's say you fly out no further than 50 -55% remaining battery and fly back in ATTI mode with a tail wind behind you pushing you even faster in the return.

That's mainly it. I've flown over 6k feet away on my Phantom 3 returning with plenty of battery to spare (on relatively calm days) so you can get pretty far with the Phantom especially if you're using the Phantom 4.

 

[Tobs]

Don't want to put a downer on your trip mate but New Zealand have very strict drone rules. In short, you can not fly anywhere without permission from who ever owns the land you want to fly over. For the record, I think the rules are ridiculous. Just want to give you the heads up.

Quick question about your trip. Do you pack the batteries with the drone in the backpack, discharged down to 10%. Or do you put them in your luggage.?
Tobs

 

[NPH#3]

I am very new to this hobby. I have a dumb question. I flew out to about 2000 feet and had warnings of camera loss coming up. Does it keep recording? If I keep going will I lose my quad? And how far up can you feel comfortable with? And when I was out 2000 feet I was in a clear rural area . I am soon nervous of losing my quad.

 

[LundyD43]

I'm a total noob myself, but I thought you were ALWAYS supposed to keep the aircraft in direct visual sight - not via binoculars, telescope, some other person observing, or wirelessly via the drone's camera. Am I wrong?

 

[David Cooke]

You are absolutely right LundyD43 . . . at least in North America and Europe . . . Legally VLOS (Visual Line Of Sight) is the only SAFE way to fly . . I don't mean safe for you . . I mean safe for the rest of the humans who are up there counting on another human to get them back on the ground alive. If you can't see your drone ( and more importantly what is around it . . or behind it) you risk other lives . . seriously. Stay below 500ft and away from airports and I think the risk is relatively small. . . keep it in sight and at least you have a chance to avoid being the reason people died. Believe me, crash investigators WILL find out the cause of the crash and they will trace it back to you.

Some day drones will have a proximity sensor that can get out of the way of a pending collision with another airborne object but not any time soon I think. Some of the video on line is amazing, beautiful and breathtaking but please do some serious planning before you fly. Don't just take off at midnight with "let's see how far she'll go" . . . evaluate the risk you pose to others first and do a little planning.

 

[Primevil]

I have had my P4 for about two months and I push mine based on comfort level. I am up to 2 km out and 400' feet up. I live in the radius of an airport so I don't go higher than 400' but I am comfortable with no line of sight. First time I went out of line of sight I was sweating because I did not yet know the capabilities of the bird in actual practice regardless of what it says on paper. I was pleasantly surprised that the P4 is a very capable machine and the RTH function is excellent just double check your RTH Altitude setting every time and make sure its high enough to clear stuff you can't see when out of VLOS.

Enjoy.

P.S- To everyone great feedback from all of you experienced flyers, it helps for people like me with very little experience. I am working on my SFOC at Clarion Drone Academy in Kitchener Ontario.

 

[Erised]

If GO freezes that doesn't automatically trigger RTH. The controller can still control the craft, you just can't see the video feed. If you have VLOS you can still fly back and land without GO working. So if GO freezes just take your hands off the sticks and it will hover until you get GO rebooted and connected again. Optionally, you can press and hold RTH button to enable RTH until you can see the craft with VLOS. Then short press RTH to retake control.

Your right John, but that day as I started to lose connection the app froze at the same time, I was way out and over water and I was a newbe and my first reaction was WTF do I do now! I since then really cleaned up my tablet and I only use it to fly now, took out all that was not needed and disabled all notifications and I fly with wifi off after my maps are cached,my tab as not frozen since. (Samsung tab 4) About 2,000,000 feet later I fly with a whole lot better, reading these post helps big mutch.

 

[CamC]

I just flew mine a little over 6000ft tonight then turned around. You will get comfortable as you keep flying it.

 

[Kaitlyn]

Curious - WHY do you guys push the range of your drones? I think the furthest I flew so far was ABOUT 1,200ft but that was flying over water to an island. Most of the time I am hiking or driving to a destination to fly, and never need to go too far.

I use it mostly as a photo+video device, less of a "hobby toy" though

 

[Neon Euc]

Curious - WHY do you guys push the range of your drones? I think the furthest I flew so far was ABOUT 1,200ft but that was flying over water to an island. Most of the time I am hiking or driving to a destination to fly, and never need to go too far.

I use it mostly as a photo+video device, less of a "hobby toy" though

I push mine to the limit of no signal as I'm at ease knowing I have RTH which will kick in and never failed me. Plus I get some nice height footage too

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[Neon Euc]

This was at 1600+ feet high... You can see the city of london in the middle, then on the right hand side is a puddle which is the Thames...and next to that.. The millennium dome

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[Neon Euc]

You have to zoom in to see it

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[JigSaw294]

I've read lots of threads on here about the range and I understand that it can go further than I would ever need to go. However, I'm interested in hearing from some experienced pilots how far you would feel comfortable taking the P4 on a normal everydayou flight. Only gotten mine out 1300 feet and was nervous about pushing it too far -- still a novice.

Basically wanting to know where I should feel confident? 3000 ft? 5000?

Thanks in advance!

I apologize in advance if this post is redundant.

I have been to my extents. It is un-nerving not seeing that little bird in the air. I love that buzz when I hear it again. I have not lost mine anywhere I did not intend to land but I spend the first minutes of my flights far off and than come home with lots of juice and flay around near by. I almost always get the first warning and land very shortly after. Also I can not get any where near the range they claim. Lucky to get 1.5 km

 

[DroningAround]

Make sure (at least as a novice) that you return home when the battery is no less than 50%.

Personally, I would not go out to the 50% mark on your battery. I've had my P4 auto land with 10% battery power left without the ability to cancel it. Fortunately at 25% I was close and brought it in and was doing very close work within 30' of me with a safe landing spot I guided it to. It caught me off guard the first time it happened.


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