P3 went spinning out of control and crashed!

[AgentOrange2015]

I have been ridiculed because I tell people that they should Calibrate their compass (the DJI Dance) before every flight if they have moved flight locations by more than a .5 miles or less. I have also stated that before every flight, they should be sure and do an IMU calibration if possible, if not at least every 5 flights. I also suggest that a pilot remove all metal, watches and jewelry and even big belt buckles and get at least 25 yards from a car or truck before starting the motors. To stay away from concrete as most of it has metal inside it it is a big pad of concrete, it is call rebar and concrete wire, to keep concrete from splitting over time. Stay away from barbed wired fences and chain link fences as they will mess up a Phantoms compass big time. Remember, Metal Anything is bad to fly around or fly near, it is that simple men and ladies.

Last but not least, do yourself a favor next time you go flying and right after you take off. Just let the Phantom hover
at around 25 or 30 feet in the air, for a minute or two and watch the battery numbers. The Phantom should stay perfectly still and not move in any direction whatsoever. If it begins to drift in a calm wind situation, you would be advised to land and do all the calibrations. Remember, you can pull up the battery info at any time and something I think should now become S.O.P. for pilots at takeoff.

 

[impilot51]

IMU calibrations are not needed before each flight. If your not experiencing drifting, leave it alone. Where are you getting info that this is necessary? In that your phantom needs to be on a perfectly level surface for the IMU cal, you don't want to do that in the field.


Sent from my iPhone using PhantomPilots mobile app

 

[With The Birds]

I have been ridiculed because I tell people that they should Calibrate their compass (the DJI Dance) before every flight if they have moved flight locations by more than a .5 miles or less. I have also stated that before every flight, they should be sure and do an IMU calibration if possible, if not at least every 5 flights. I also suggest that a pilot remove all metal, watches and jewelry and even big belt buckles and get at least 25 yards from a car or truck before starting the motors. To stay away from concrete as most of it has metal inside it it is a big pad of concrete, it is call rebar and concrete wire, to keep concrete from splitting over time. Stay away from barbed wired fences and chain link fences as they will mess up a Phantoms compass big time. Remember, Metal Anything is bad to fly around or fly near, it is that simple men and ladies.

Last but not least, do yourself a favor next time you go flying and right after you take off. Just let the Phantom hover
at around 25 or 30 feet in the air, for a minute or two and watch the battery numbers. The Phantom should stay perfectly still and not move in any direction whatsoever. If it begins to drift in a calm wind situation, you would be advised to land and do all the calibrations. Remember, you can pull up the battery info at any time and something I think should now become S.O.P. for pilots at takeoff.

Compass at each new location fair enough but I'm happy to leave the IMU cal until after flashing new firmware or if the mod values look off (which I include in pre flight check). If you cal the IMU before each flight you must have a long wait for initial warmup. I stick mine in the fridge for half an hour before I calibrate the IMU, rarely see an aircraft warming up message.

 

[AgentOrange2015]

IMU calibrations are not needed before each flight. If your not experiencing drifting, leave it alone. Where are you getting info that this is necessary? In that your phantom needs to be on a perfectly level surface for the IMU cal, you don't want to do that in the field.


Sent from my iPhone using PhantomPilots mobile app

I totally agree, you do not need to calibrate the IMU before every flight if you have done an IMU calibration on a flat level surface with no metal interference anywhere near the Phantom. But if your Phantom is drifting around on a calm day or no wind after you take off, and just wanting to hover in one spot, then you very well may need to calibrate your IMU. IMU and Compass Calibration work hand in hand, so if one is off, the it will effect both.

 

[ksavoie]

I lean towards the compass calibration. The only scary crash I had(No damage, luckily)was not calibrating in a new location. Took it off and it went out of control at about 25' Agl and crashed flat out into some tall grass.Learned a lesson from that one.

I calibrated the compass prior to taking off and made sure everything was in good status...It took around 3 minuets. I also hovered for around 20 seconds before going straight up. Sorry, I didn't include this in my original post, but you can look at the heathydrones.com file or the .dat file.

 

[ksavoie]

I have been ridiculed because I tell people that they should Calibrate their compass (the DJI Dance) before every flight if they have moved flight locations by more than a .5 miles or less. I have also stated that before every flight, they should be sure and do an IMU calibration if possible, if not at least every 5 flights. I also suggest that a pilot remove all metal, watches and jewelry and even big belt buckles and get at least 25 yards from a car or truck before starting the motors. To stay away from concrete as most of it has metal inside it it is a big pad of concrete, it is call rebar and concrete wire, to keep concrete from splitting over time. Stay away from barbed wired fences and chain link fences as they will mess up a Phantoms compass big time. Remember, Metal Anything is bad to fly around or fly near, it is that simple men and ladies.

Last but not least, do yourself a favor next time you go flying and right after you take off. Just let the Phantom hover
at around 25 or 30 feet in the air, for a minute or two and watch the battery numbers. The Phantom should stay perfectly still and not move in any direction whatsoever. If it begins to drift in a calm wind situation, you would be advised to land and do all the calibrations. Remember, you can pull up the battery info at any time and something I think should now become S.O.P. for pilots at takeoff.

I actually calibrated my compass twice in the middle of my yard. The first time I spun around the wrong way so I did it again. Then checked all my settings....that took around 3 minuets.

 

[ksavoie]

Well, Good news. I checked the status of my repair today and for Payment Status it shows "Free of Charge"!! Whoop Whoop!

 

[BudWalker]

This is good news. From what I've seen it seems that DJI is good at determining the cause of an incident and then is reasonable on repair or replacement. I'd be interested to know if DJI repaired or replaced the main board.

 

[ksavoie]

@BudWalker , I asked for a list of parts that they installed and long for an explanation of what the problem was.

 

[ksavoie]

This is good news. From what I've seen it seems that DJI is good at determining the cause of an incident and then is reasonable on repair or replacement. I'd be interested to know if DJI repaired or replaced the main board.

Here is the info. I received from DJI and the parts they replaced.



Greetings!

Thank you for your continued patience. Thank you for contacting DJI Customer Support.

Your unit will be shipped out via FedEx. Your FedEx tracking number is ##############. You can view tracking scans in the tracking details via www.fedex.com. Your scheduled delivery date is Monday 02/01/2016 by end of day.

This ticket ########will now be closed as the process is complete and the unit has shipped.

In regards to the information you are requesting, this is the information our Customer Support was able to access and provide:

Parts Replaced:

Phantom 3 – Part 6 HD Camera 1
Phantom 3 adv/pro bottom cover modules 1
Phantom3_top shell V3 1
Phantom 3 adv/pro right landing gear modules 1
Phantom 3 adv/pro main control board module 1
Phantom3 left landing gear V3 1
2312A motor（CW） 1
2312A motor（CCW） 1
Phantom 3 – Part 9 9450 Self-tightening Propeller (1CW+1CCW) 1


Procedures done following Repair:
IMU Calibration
Camera Calibrated
Test Flight
Quality Inspection

Best Regards,
DJI Customer Support

 

[ksavoie]

I received my rebuilt P3 from DJI a few weeks ago and yesterday I went out and thoroughly tested it out and I received this notification "Propulsions output is limited to ensure the safety of the battery" this is the same notification that I received prior to previous crash. Is this something common? or am I just a lil to anxious?

See my healthy drones log below.

HealthyDrones.com - Innovative flight data analysis that matters

 

[dottat4]

I received my rebuilt P3 from DJI a few weeks ago and yesterday I went out and thoroughly tested it out and I received this notification "Propulsions output is limited to ensure the safety of the battery" this is the same notification that I received prior to previous crash. Is this something common? or am I just a lil to anxious?

See my healthy drones log below.

HealthyDrones.com - Innovative flight data analysis that matters

Simply means you flew in a cold enough temp it had to limit the current it was consuming to prevent a shut off crash.

Sent from my SM-T810 using Tapatalk

 

[DB4Tim]

**** I flew at 50 degrees with all systems warm and still got it this weekend....how are you supposed to stop it ...heat the batteries???

 

[Mark The Droner]

I do heat my batteries in the winter before a flight but it wouldn't occur to me to heat them when the air temp is 50 degrees. Ideally, your batteries operate at 30-40 C. 20C is okay but you don't want to go below that. 15C and you may get a warning. 15C = 59F. Since 20C is 68F, and since you keep your batteries in the house, and since the batteries warm up as they discharge, I don't know why you'd get errors. Maybe you had the heat turned down over night, woke up, turned up the heat, flew, and the batteries didn't have a chance to warm up yet?

If you keep them outside in the back shed, I can see you getting warnings at 50F air temp.

 

[Superiorside]

I'd send it back. Something isn't right. I fly in Northern Michigan in Temps at or near 0°c often with no issues. This includes flights with the P3S and P3A. DJI rates safe flying from 0°-40°c. I don't heat my batteries in the least. One thing ice done is wrapped them with one later of heat reflective blanket material or space blanket. Kinda tricky but that my be the reason I have no issues. Hope you get it figured out.

 

[fhagan02]

Man oh man this entire story gives me the willies. I had the same thing happen on my 207th flight. (206 perfect flights up to this point) Compass calibrated before flight. Full battery... all cells monitored for a few seconds before heading out. Perfect mild summer day with 5mph wind. Flying home the copter jerked (yawed) twice to the left then started spinning violently. Came down on it's side slamming into the ground at about 46mph. DJI fixed it free of charge. I sent 3 message but they never told me what happened to cause it. Got the bird back from service and straight out of the FedEx box it had a "battery error" problem with all 5 of my DJI bats. Sent it back for RMA #2 the next day. They fixed that too. Never told be what caused it but it never flew the same after these "fixes".

Bought another brand new P3P and received it last Thursday. FedEx'd it back to B&H photo for an exchange on Saturday. Entire center of the camera frame was out of focus. Sides were tack sharp.

We must really love this hobby.

Hope you're back in the air soon and good luck.