Phantom Down!

[DronePilot]

DB: Commercial diver cost $150. Certainly gave me piece of mind knowing my bird wasn't littering the bottom of this pristine lake I would be patient waiting for it to dry out. Last thing you want to do is power it up while its still damp or wet.

My normal return flight looks more like this [youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8y0Tjay-xqE[/youtube]
GS lets me take the exact same flight path at different times or different days. (can be viewed in 4k as it includes dual 1080p's)

Cheers!

 

[rrmccabe]

DB try uploading the video to http://mp4repair.org/

Not saying you should pay to repair it but it will give you a full length preview to get an idea of what it looks like without any commitment.

 

[Dirty Bird]

I just recovered the video with Do-It-Yourself Video Repair...used the -single -noctts options. I have the video uploading to YouTube & will post it here once it has finished.

 

[Dirty Bird]

Phantom Down! Video Analysis: At 10:00 I received a low-battery alert and paused to assess the situation. Battery level indicated 58%. I normally receive the first low battery warning ~15 minutes into a flight. I noticed she was beginning to descend and applied full throttle to maintain altitude. This slowed the descent rate but did not halt it completely. Unfortunately the vantage point from my house is surrounded by trees and I need altitude to maintain line of sight, particularly to the south where the bird was located. I was barely above the treeline when this situation occurred and, as she slipped out of sight, I also lost FPV. I initially engaged Home Lock and started bringing her home but, as she slipped out of sight @ 11:00, I was flying blind and just guessing how she was responding. At around 12:00 I finally concluded it was best to let her auto-land straight down. At least I would have a location fix where I could mount a recovery operation, rather than her coming down along the way where I would have no idea where to begin a search.

She settles gracefully atop the forest canopy @ 14:22, and the motors continue to run until the battery expires @ 19:35. This is when she must have rolled over and nestled in among the branches. Not sure why the motors continued to run after she touched down unless she was attempting to return home? No way to tell as In the video the rear LEDs are drowned out by the red navigation LEDs up front. Too bad the motors didn't shut down. She may have remained powered on for another 30 minutes or more with only the electronics drawing power. I may have arrived in time to spot the LEDs in the trees. Watching the gentle landing its easy to see why she suffered no physical damage.

In retrospect it was over 4 minutes from the low battery alert until she settled into the treetops. From my vantage point, her rate of descent appeared to be much faster. I probably could have made it back if only I could have maintained visual or FPV! :roll:

Phantom Down! Video - Full Flight
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6rtMe_RvNck[/youtube]

 

[Fplvert]

Quite the story, and very well written, DB!
Congrats. on retrieving both bird and video!
What is your plan for batteries? (Besides not using #1) It's definitely something that needs to be sorted out. I also have the round pin batteries, no trouble yet.

 

[slothead]

DB, Did you cut some of the video from the end of the footage (I expected to see the leaves still after the motors quit but the video was still running)? I guess however the abnormal shutoff would have confiscated the last 10 seconds of the video, so maybe not.

 

[Dirty Bird]

What is your plan for batteries? (Besides not using #1) It's definitely something that needs to be sorted out. I also have the round pin batteries, no trouble yet.

I am going to lock the bird to the ground and run off #1 and see what happens. I'll have to be careful with the others. They are almost six months old, but only have around 30 flights each. Sad if that is the actual life we can expect from what was, at one time, a $160 battery pack! I won't be able to request a replacement for #1 because the inner frame has a small but noticeable crack in one of the support braces which I epoxied back into place. If #1 is really shot I will disassemble the pack and check into an aftermarket LiPo that fits.

 

[Dirty Bird]

DB, Did you cut some of the video from the end of the footage (I expected to see the leaves still after the motors quit but the video was still running)? I guess however the abnormal shutoff would have confiscated the last 10 seconds of the video, so maybe not.

That was the full video after I repaired it with "Do-it-Yourself Video Recovery Software." It looks like the motors remained running until the battery expired. Probably why I had to repair the file since it just powered off without stopping the recording first. Both the original & repaired files are 1.75 GB so if any was lost it couldn't have been much.

 

[ToThePoint]

Thanks. LOL....ummm...well technically I did not crash...

LMAO DB. It can be considered as a fruit hanging on a tree. Its harvest time anyway.

 

[DownunderPhantom]

Hi DB, nice story, well told.

The battery in question, is it from the early production and has the small round data pin points.

It is, and I purchased it back on April 30th. I believe the batteries only have a 90 day warranty.

I have read a while ago that those batteries had problems. It seems like you have been lucky with yours.

 

[DownunderPhantom]

Thanks. LOL....ummm...well technically I did not crash...

LMAO DB. It can be considered as a fruit hanging on a tree. Its harvest time anyway.

The Phantom new it had a problem so It just decided to hang around and wait for DB to come and collect it...

 

[tpallred]

Thanks. LOL....ummm...well technically I did not crash...

LMAO DB. It can be considered as a fruit hanging on a tree. Its harvest time anyway.

The Phantom new it had a problem so It just decided to hang around and wait for DB to come and collect it...

There's ground landing, hand catching, and tree landing... :lol:

 

[Morgon]

Ah, lucky you. Mine took a tumble today while trying to film my uncle playing golf (orientation went wonky, clipped a tree, and fell 20 feet - camera is now doing the freakout (and I can see the top of the gimble assembly all jacked up))... I'll be testing out that Warrantech thing this week that Amazon suggested to me when I bought it. Should be 'fun'.

 

[Dirty Bird]

I am very happy to report my Phantom appears to have survived her night out in the forest monsoon!

She powered up fine. When I first connected to the Wi-Fi I noticed the video was cloudy. Glancing at the camera I saw the lens was fogged with a bit of condensation inside. I had to disassemble the camera and remove the lens. The lens is glued together and I didn't want to attempt taking it apart and affecting focus. I sat the lens next to a blow dryer on low heat for about half an hour and the condensation evaporated. Reassembled and everything is now functioning normally. The Flytrex Live is still kicking too!

 

[GustavL]

Amazing, it was as if I was reading a fiction thriller!

Towards the end I hoped that your story would conclude something like this:

"and then I woke up and realized that all was just a bad dream"

 

[syotr]

Glad to hear you got her back and functioning fine after the loss.

 

[rrmccabe]

Would be interested to see your video with the Live data !

I don't know if an issue I had a few months ago is relevant to this or not but it sure rings home with me. I took off one day into the wind knowing I was on a battery that had 3 1/2 bars. It was charged but at that time I was having issues with batteries dropping off full bars slightly after sitting.

Anyway I took off into the wind and was about 1/2 mile out when the battery warning started honking. Like you the last thing I remember seeing was the battery in the 50% range. Enough time has passed so I cant remember the details exactly so not going to add anything here as FACT. But I did end up with an auto-land part way home. Fortunately, it was in a nice mowed front yard.

At the time being a newbie (still am) I just thought that the strong headwind is what killed me and wrote it off as that. I basically chewed through that battery in probably 9 minutes. I have since flown that battery and 2 others for 35 flights each and often at a distance of 8 -10 thousand feet.

If I had read everything back then on this forum that I have since read, I would have probably trashed the battery and bought another new one with the same risk.

Sometimes I think the smart battery is not so smart and doesn't always calculate things right. I have no idea what really happened in my case except that it was 50% or more one minute and honking the next.

You are fortunate to have the battery voltage with your live. I would have a nice big gauge on my overlay that I could watch and see if any drops are erratic.

 

[Mark C]

Great story and well told as well!

 

[ToThePoint]

"and then I woke up and realized that all was just a bad dream"

Had the exact same hunch wile reading the story.
DB has missed his vocation ! Or he must have read bedtime story's for his kids ?
He's **** good @ it, that for sure.
DB lucky your bird is back alive.
However the condensation rings a alarm bell for me as that rise thing isn't sufficient enough to take out all moisture.
If it would be my bird i toke apart everything that can be taken apart as far as possible.
Pls double check as latent condensation will cause issue's in the future.

 

[Dirty Bird]

Great story and well told as well!

Thank you!