I got a SPINNER... No more, problem solved WaHoo

[IflyinWY]

I made an out of focus video "Hover Test" of my FC40 trying to hover on a windy day. It was acting a little whacky so I fired up the camera just in time to catch it doing a 540 to the left. It proceeded to wander around going up and down throughout the video. The only input I made was one 180 to make the red light visible to the camera. I may have also throttled up when it was about to hit the ground. This video has sound.
Hover Test: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4uQMvodzIcM

Yesterday I was flying around the house taking video of the exterior. It was pretty windy then too. At one point I let it hover at about 20 feet waiting for the gusts to stop and to my surprise it did a left 400. This time the camera was running and that's the "400" video. This video has NO sound.
400: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xQSNfWU ... e=youtu.be

Have I run it into too much stuff and made the brain go bonkers?
Is this why DJI says not to fly on really windy days?
Am I loosing gps satellites and it decides it needs to look around?
Is it because one of the prop guards is mostly broken off?

So many questions, so little brain power.

Have at it folks, I'm at a loss. :?

 

[houldsworth1]

Re: I got a SPINNER... my bird likes to do 400s and 540s

Have you performed a compass calibration and an advanced IMU calibration?

When doing either of those, were you near anything that might affect the results? Large metal structures, cell phones, power lines/wires?

 

[IflyinWY]

Re: I got a SPINNER... my bird likes to do 400s and 540s

My favorite place to do the compass dance is the middle of the front yard. On one side is the house, always sucking tons of electricity. On the other side of me is the power pole, with transformer, that sends the power directly under my dance floor. Duble Duuh, I did read about that.

So, tomorrow I walk into the field, with laptop, calibrate the IMU and do a compass dance.

Hope it's that simple.

This evening I shot about 15 minutes of "hands-off" hovering. I posted the last 34 seconds of wandering and spinning on YouTube. The controller is sitting on the ground in front of the camera. My favorite power pole is about 50 feet from the camera. Wind was virtually calm.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GJvyHjc ... e=youtu.be

Thanks.

 

[houldsworth1]

Re: I got a SPINNER... my bird likes to do 400s and 540s

I was watching that thinking "That's not bad"...then we got to 0:20... Hope the calibration helps.

BTW, I had mine doing some drifting. I tried the advanced calibration twice without luck. Then I realized that each time I did that the bird was sitting next to a power brick for a video camera. I moved those and did it again and things are much better now. Obvious when you know... Good luck!

 

[IflyinWY]

Re: I got a SPINNER... my bird likes to do 400s and 540s

I was watching that thinking "That's not bad"...then we got to 0:20... Hope the calibration helps.

BTW, I had mine doing some drifting. I tried the advanced calibration twice without luck. Then I realized that each time I did that the bird was sitting next to a power brick for a video camera. I moved those and did it again and things are much better now. Obvious when you know... Good luck!

Well, houldsworth1, you've made my hero's list.

Great advice. Took my bird and the laptop for a walk, plugged em in, did an Advanced IMU Calibration, then the Compass Dance and straightened out it's brain. Simple as that.

My first attempt at advanced IMU calibration resulted in failure do to "Overheated MC". Yea, right. It was about 55 degrees and the sun had already gone behind the mountain. Goofie electronic stuff. I backed out, started over and zipped right through the calibration.

Fired it up and climbed to 15 feet and watched it do nothing but sit there for 6 minutes. Life is good.

Flew it around for a bit and it did great. Put new 9450 props & guards on and flew some more. The only time it gave me any problems was when I flew into the Bermuda Triangle where I used to do the Compass Dance. I guess the electrician had extra wire and decided to make an electromagnet in the front yard.

Thanks again,
Problem solved...

 

[houldsworth1]

Wow! I actually helped someone! Hold on...need to go and write that in the diary

Glad that sorted it out. As I said, obvious when you know.

 

[IflyinWY]

A bit of (diary) philosophy, by me...

Just try to imagine what those folks you wrote about wrote about you. It'll boggle your mind if you let it.

And with that I say, do an advanced IMU calibration and celebrate the dance of the compass.

What is IMU, anyway?

 

[houldsworth1]

IMU = Inertial Measuring Unit

I'm still learning the lingo around here but this helps:

viewtopic.php?f=32&t=23402

 

[IflyinWY]

So, it's like a computerized "G-Meter"?