New Camera / Gimbal - How to match FW

[Oso]

A friend asked me to make a video of his house showing an approach with the horizon, and then a POI circle around his house. Very easy to do of course, but it reminded me again about my drifting horizon and how that makes it so hard to edit video in post. [Note - this is not fixable for me with any type of calibration or with the gimbal roll adjustment]

I am considering buying a new camera/gimbal combo, hoping that it will give me a level horizon. If I do, I would probably get a P3P camera instead of my current P3A.

This led to a couple of thoughts I'd like to run by you guys.

1. I know that I have done dozens of very level IMU and gimbal calibrations since May. I'm reasonably sure based on flight behavior that my IMU knows what level means. Does anyone know enough to know for sure if a gimbal / camera replacement would be likely to correct a drifting horizon?

2. I've seen reports of update failures when assorted modules were not detected during a new FW install. It got me to thinking about how a new camera install is handled. I know using P3P camera hardware on a P3A is not a problem. Just use P3P FW. What I don't know is what will happen if the new camera comes with a different FW version than 1.5.3 which is currently installed on my AC, especially P3A versus P3P. Has anyone done a camera swap already or is anyone able to make an educated guess about what would happen with mismatched FW versions between the camera and the AC itself?

3. Any other option that I may be missing with regards to parts?

Thanks for any feedback.

 

[bbfpv]

2) I do not have first hand experience, but I would think that simply updating the FW to P3 bird side would be all that is required. There would be no missing components since the only difference btwn the A and P is the camera, everything under the shell is identical. And the controller doesn't care once the bird's been updated anyway.

3) Have you tried manually aligning the gimbal arm? No idea if that would be a permanent fix, but I've seen several posts on guys hand twisting the screw in the arm to straighten it. Maybe give @hunch a shout, he'd do it for a fraction of the cost of a new setup.

 

[Oso]

2) I do not have first hand experience, but I would think that simply updating the FW to P3 bird side would be all that is required. There would be no missing components since the only difference btwn the A and P is the camera, everything under the shell is identical. And the controller doesn't care once the bird's been updated anyway.

3) Have you tried manually aligning the gimbal arm? No idea if that would be a permanent fix, but I've seen several posts on guys hand twisting the screw in the arm to straighten it. Maybe give @hunch a shout, he'd do it for a fraction of the cost of a new setup.

Thanks for the reply.

I haven't tried manually aligning the gimbal, though I have seen several videos. If I had a constant (static) tilt, I would have done it already. In my case, the horizon drifts and the tilt changes which is which is why editing video is so difficult. My horizon moves from level to tilted to level to tilted the other way as I yaw. Sometimes I can even watch the horizon change as I switch between menu screens on the app. Very frustrating.

I did reach out to @hunch several days ago via the Contact Us / Get in Touch on his company web site.

 

[bbfpv]

Thanks for the reply.

I haven't tried manually aligning the gimbal, though I have seen several videos. If I had a constant (static) tilt, I would have done it already. In my case, the horizon drifts and the tilt changes which is which is why editing video is so difficult. My horizon moves from level to tilted to level to tilted the other way as I yaw. Sometimes I can even watch the horizon change as I switch between menu screens on the app. Very frustrating.

I did reach out to @hunch several days ago via the Contact Us / Get in Touch on his company web site.

Oh, you've got that kind of drift. I had that kind too, but for some reason gimbal cal while hovering fixed mine. That was a long time ago though. Perhaps buy one locally and install it, if no-go, send it back?

 

[hunch]

Oso,
i've seen couple of them doing this, instead of horizontally moving left and right when you move the yaw stick left and right they actually pan left and right.
very rare but when IMU is replaced all is good again.
it's a cheap fix and possibly you can DIY but bird will have to be opened and IMU black box opened very carefully and replaced with a working one.

Sorry for not noticing your email, it went to spam folder for some reason. i just checked now that i read your reply.