How to almost destroy a Phantom 2

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I took the Phantom 2 out for a flight before dinner tonight. I did a few lap around the property, harassed the cat, took a photo of the weather vane on the roof. Normal stuff, I guess. A neighbor kid came by and asked how high it could go. For no good reason, I showed him. Really. I took it to the point where my neck hurt from looking straight up for so long, and I almost could not see the poor thing. Again, I have no excuse for this other than I guess I was curious to see the video when it came down. Anyhow, after throttling back to bring it back down to a sane altitude, the Phantom 2 got really unstable, and before I realized what it was doing, it was upside down, then tumbling. This is not a good feeling, when you're looking at $1400 bucks falling out of the sky and about to be reduced to scrap plastic.

Helicopter Rule #1: Helicopters do not like to go straight down. There's a lot of good aerodynamic reasons for this, but let's just say that going straight down is pushing the envelope. They'll do it, for sure. But in doing so, you are pushing boundaries that you don't want to push. Google: "Helicopter: Settling with power" if you are interested.

It took some faith to let go of the controls and let the Phantom at least right itself. Then I eased in some serious forward stick to get the Phantom moving in a direction other than straight down, and once I had it stable did I begin to throttle back again and bring it down and home. I don't plan on repeating this trick.
The moral of the story, go easy when throttling back. Avoid long straight descents - slide a little one way then the other - to maintain directional control. Ease it down, baby.
 
Thanks for the post. Hope your heart rate has calmed down LOL

Just another thing NOT to try -- glad you found out before me.

It sure does seem to take the Phantom a LOOOOOONG time to descend from 300+ feet. Probably because of the panic you have when you realize you can hardly see it! I've been going VERY slow with everything (I'm still a rookie with < 10 flights)

Good luck!

TCG
 
I wonder how many people buy a P2 or P2V, skim the manual, then go flying and nearly kiss it all goodbye from VRS. The manual has nothing on it at all. Only way to find out is here on the forums or the expensive way.
 
Yup. Since reading about this happening to a number of people here, I'm always very careful about desending straight down. One of the many things I've learned (the easy way) by being on this forum. :)
 
Had about 9 flights on my P2V now and I found this out yesterday on a descent from about 300 feet that it wobbled a couple of times coming down so backed right off and came down slowly and at an angle and wont be doing that vertical descent again !

Lesson learned thankfully not the hard way
 
The "prop-wash" decent issue is inherent w/P2 props. The agressive pitch exagerates the "settling w/power". On original style props it's not quite as bad but does exist. Cold/thinner air also adds to the effect.
 
ianwood said:
I wonder how many people buy a P2 or P2V, skim the manual, then go flying and nearly kiss it all goodbye from VRS. The manual has nothing on it at all. Only way to find out is here on the forums or the expensive way.


i 'm no expert , but i think they sell them with all these safety features and people just think it will all work fine . RC, ground or ski will always malfunction , all you can hope is, you work through it and save it .
 
Its an interesting point and its a shame that the original colin gwynne videos did not do one about "do's" and "don't do's" of flying the aircraft, as some very common newbie skills can wreck your aircraft out of sheer inexperience, and things like the rotor wash and vertical decesnts etc, could easily be covered with a basic flying tutorial video by someone more experienced.
 
Interesting on the angle descent. I've just been doing a slow descent with a stop every few meters. Coming down on an angle makes sense for stability. I might even be able to get it down quicker that way.

Glad yours made it. I don't know if I would've been that calm in the moment.

Thanks for the story.
 

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