Newbie needs advice

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Hi All

Proud owner of a second hand Phantom Vision 2 and i got a few questions if anyone can help me out....

I did have a bit of an accident 2 days in, I was heading through the part practicing low level control, the phantom was about 5-6 Feet of the ground and 3-4 feet in front of me, the path was clear at first but the trees covered the view of the sky later on and the copter decided to head vertical max power and into the trees above, dropped to the ground and then started back up again. I managed to get hold of it and powered down, the question is was it doing a return to home for some reason, could loss of GPS cause a return to home point ???

The camera was slightly damaged in the incident, one of the leads (brown orange and red) from the camera to the phantom was cut, the brown one if i remember correctly which stopped the copter working at all, i managed to solder it and now the copter is fine, my question is can i run the vision 2 without the camera or will the system fail to start. I was thinking of attaching the GoPro but no point if the camera nees to be attached and working.

Any help would be appreciated

Gavin
 
could loss of GPS cause a return to home point
No. It cannot find the home point without GPS. If RTH is initiated and the Phantom is connected to less than 6 satellites, it'll auto land at its current location.
 
Interesting i wonder what set it off then, i was right behind it the extender and batteries were all charged and new and the battery in the copter was on 2 bar ....
 
Here are the only things that will auto initiate RTH:

1) The battery reaches the low level and you have the "Low Battery Auto Go Home" setting enabled in the DJI Pilot app.
2) The remote controller becomes disconnected from the Phantom. This could easily happen if the antenna is not oriented correctly.

Perhaps the Phantom thought the battery was low too. Sometimes it gets a bad reading when the battery contacts are dirty or it's not fully inserted.
 
Something i did notice last night was the recording it was making before the crash, the video stopped just before it headed straight up, i forgot it was recording and downloaded the video last night to see the crash but the video at that point was not there. Would that suggest a break in the connection signal from the controller to the phantom even though i was walking 3 feet behind the phantom ???
 
On my first flight I had the same thing happen. Was a low battery. Hit a tree, dropped 20 feet and broke my new, removable, expensive prop guards. First flight, first crash. I changed apps to Litchi which gives me an audible low battery warning so I can make sure I am clear and land. It is very important to know where your bird is when the low battery signal hits. You need to be able to, at minimum, get it someplace recoverable, preferrably right where you took off from. That becomes doubly important flying over water. When you hit critical battery it will just land. If there is wate under it, it will get wet. I never push my batteries below 20%. Probably better for battery life too.
 
Would that suggest a break in the connection signal from the controller to the phantom
I don't think so. If the remote controller connection was lost, the video should have continued to record since no command was sent to stop recording.

How close was your Phantom to the home point? If you were standing at the home point, it's pretty odd that is started returning home -- if that's what really happened. It should not do that unless it's 20m or more from the home point.
 
No I was quite a distance from my last home point, can you clear the home point so the quad has no where to fly off too ... ???
 
Ah, well, that explains why it was trying to return to home then. Either the remote controller signal was lost or your battery reached the low battery level and RTH was initiated.
 

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Your other option is to use a dynamic home point. You need to have the GPS on on your FPV device (Android for me). It updates on a regular basis to whereever you are standing. If you like to follow your Phantom around, it will come back to you, not the original home point.

Not having a home point is a recipe for disaster. The "oh **** where is it" moment will hit, you'll kill the transmitter to trigger return to home, just to get it back. I did this today when it was 1000' away, behind some trees, FPV froze, I couldn't tell its orientation and I wanted it back.
 
KenW, I got my posts crossed :( The OP does have a P2V... and, not a P3.

jasperuk, the dynamic home point would be your best option if you're going to be moving around a lot.
 
Cheers Everyone much appreciated, its not happened again since and i am now a lot more aware of the home point compared to where i am standing.
 

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