Those that had the Phantom go bye,bye....a few questions

Hi Mark
I Joined this group because of your posting you will have to excuse me I am not sure how to post anything it is my first time doing anything with Blogs or groups what ever its called. Did you ever recover it? I bought a new Phantom on 3/13/13 and did not even put it together untill I downloaded all the manuals and read everything I could about it and watched all of Mr Colin Guinns Utube videos But I still had Questions so I call the dealer where I bought it and ask to speak to the person that sold it to me. I was told he was the best helo pilot around He was a young man! anyway they told me that anyone could answer my questions so I asked, Do I have to hook up this Phantom to a computer to download or make any adjustments or upgrade the firmware. They said NO! learn how to fly it first then you can go in and make adjustments . This is not my first Help or airplane I have been Flying these things sense I was a kid oh by the way I am over 50yo. and the manual states that everything was set at the factory and in big bold Lettering its said so you do not have to do anything. I said ok and the on the 17th I installed props and took it out for its Maiden flight in my back yard that is big enough for doing any kind of Mr Collins tests hovering and changing from att to Gps I went by the book and calibrated the gps and comp/ and when is was all warmed up and Calibrated and all lights where correct I started the motors locked in home base and took off straight up at first about 10 feet and the I let it hover for a wail the did some testing like Mr Colin did It did the same thing perfect . I brought it back and landed it then turned the motors off I was going to just say that was all for the night it was getting dark but I did not I started the motors again and took off I stated straight up and took it up above my home that is about 20 ft tall and then down in the front yard and hovered in the drive way everything cool so far Then I moved the throttle up to about 13 deg and It shoot up like a Rocket very fast I lost sight of it for a second so I lowered the throttle back slowly but not under 10 deg and it came back into sight it was now hovering at about 40 feet in front of my house I was still in the back watching I could not get it to come back to me no matter what I tried it wanted to go left or do nothing at all but hover by this time it had been in the air for 8 mins I know this because I have video from home surveillance cam in the back yard any I did not know how long it would fly and I did not want it to drift of into the next neiborhood sense I had no control not even to shut off the motors I turned the TX off like I had seen it don't on so many other videos and That one of the things that I was impressed by and also the Fail safe Clams Well It stared to rotate as if it was looking for something or Direction and it came towed me and was just about over me head when I said Dame it does work! but I was Wrong It tipped to one side and took off I could still see the Lights it was now about 40ft in the air and hovering in one place the next neiborhood so I ran for the truck to fallow it. My DaD was still watching it and said it did the same thing again it did a 360 turn and tipped to one side and took off again! Now there was no error codes LEDs Flashing and it was on somewhat of a decent But The manuals all say that it sould land with in 15s of losing communication with the controller and I was in gps mode anyway I passed out 500 flyers and went door to door hired as many kids on the block and told some teachers that live near me as well as the police and offered a reward But I still have not found it and at that height and time factor Left for flight I do not believe it could have flown a couple of miles away . I am glad I did not buy the cam yet and I have tried to talk to the dealer and two different suppliers and also to Mr. Colin Himself With a complete run around. I hope you Found Yours. And I hope you dont mind this Rambling ON and ON Please let me know if you found yours that would give me some hope and a positive point of view again. or if you know someone that I could contact I would be very grateful for any info including anything I might have done wrong in writing all this Bull. Thanks again Dave
 
My phantom runaway occurred within about 2 km of a series of high output radio antennas. I don't know what frequency they transmit at but since there was nothing else around (over the ocean) I'm making them guilty. I was carrying a gopro 3 with no wifi on. Interestingly, a similar set of microwave antennas used to knock out the engine computer in my 1986 VW Westfalia when I drove by, the engine would mistime and lose power until I got past. It took me years and several trips to the dealer to figure that one out. I had a 1996 VW Passat that actually stated in the manual not to use a cellphone in the car as it interfered with the computer! Old school! Maybe VW makes the IMU controller in the Phantom? LOL Anyway, those pilots who have said they had no issues should just be aware that their circumstances may be totally different and just be aware of signal pollution. Just sayin'...
 
I have not had this problem with my phantom but i try to fly in big open fields away from wifi signals and cell phone and radio towers, i think with such a small crappy reciever in the phantom that other signals are overriding it,, i am researching at this time how to insall my flysky 8 channel reciever and set up the th 9x since it has much better signal strength then the phantom transmitter, will let everyone know how it works.
 
HDLostMe2 said:
Hi Mark
I Joined this group because of your posting you will have to excuse me I am not sure how to post anything it is my first time doing anything with Blogs or groups what ever its called. Did you ever recover it? I bought a new Phantom on 3/13/13 and did not even put it together untill I downloaded all the manuals and read everything I could about it and watched all of Mr Colin Guinns Utube videos But I still had Questions so I call the dealer where I bought it and ask to speak to the person that sold it to me. I was told he was the best helo pilot around He was a young man! anyway they told me that anyone could answer my questions so I asked, Do I have to hook up this Phantom to a computer to download or make any adjustments or upgrade the firmware. They said NO! learn how to fly it first then you can go in and make adjustments . This is not my first Help or airplane I have been Flying these things sense I was a kid oh by the way I am over 50yo. and the manual states that everything was set at the factory and in big bold Lettering its said so you do not have to do anything. I said ok and the on the 17th I installed props and took it out for its Maiden flight in my back yard that is big enough for doing any kind of Mr Collins tests hovering and changing from att to Gps I went by the book and calibrated the gps and comp/ and when is was all warmed up and Calibrated and all lights where correct I started the motors locked in home base and took off straight up at first about 10 feet and the I let it hover for a wail the did some testing like Mr Colin did It did the same thing perfect . I brought it back and landed it then turned the motors off I was going to just say that was all for the night it was getting dark but I did not I started the motors again and took off I stated straight up and took it up above my home that is about 20 ft tall and then down in the front yard and hovered in the drive way everything cool so far Then I moved the throttle up to about 13 deg and It shoot up like a Rocket very fast I lost sight of it for a second so I lowered the throttle back slowly but not under 10 deg and it came back into sight it was now hovering at about 40 feet in front of my house I was still in the back watching I could not get it to come back to me no matter what I tried it wanted to go left or do nothing at all but hover by this time it had been in the air for 8 mins I know this because I have video from home surveillance cam in the back yard any I did not know how long it would fly and I did not want it to drift of into the next neiborhood sense I had no control not even to shut off the motors I turned the TX off like I had seen it don't on so many other videos and That one of the things that I was impressed by and also the Fail safe Clams Well It stared to rotate as if it was looking for something or Direction and it came towed me and was just about over me head when I said Dame it does work! but I was Wrong It tipped to one side and took off I could still see the Lights it was now about 40ft in the air and hovering in one place the next neiborhood so I ran for the truck to fallow it. My DaD was still watching it and said it did the same thing again it did a 360 turn and tipped to one side and took off again! Now there was no error codes LEDs Flashing and it was on somewhat of a decent But The manuals all say that it sould land with in 15s of losing communication with the controller and I was in gps mode anyway I passed out 500 flyers and went door to door hired as many kids on the block and told some teachers that live near me as well as the police and offered a reward But I still have not found it and at that height and time factor Left for flight I do not believe it could have flown a couple of miles away . I am glad I did not buy the cam yet and I have tried to talk to the dealer and two different suppliers and also to Mr. Colin Himself With a complete run around. I hope you Found Yours. And I hope you dont mind this Rambling ON and ON Please let me know if you found yours that would give me some hope and a positive point of view again. or if you know someone that I could contact I would be very grateful for any info including anything I might have done wrong in writing all this Bull. Thanks again Dave
I have not found mine yet, we know basically where it is, its just that the fir tree are notorious for having a very thick and almost hand ( more like dozens of hands) like canopy. The distance is where we aren't positive, the wife who has decent night vision says its barely into the forrest. I was wearing glasses and never planned on it flying off but staying within 100' for a quick shot panning up and around the back yard. My glasses were making a halo around the lights as far as it had traveled in its first fly away, still I was able to swing it back and around and could only see red but still had a halo around the Phantom since dusk was quickly turning to darker than I would fly anything because of my glasses causing a halo. I was saying to my wife " it is getting closer right?' and she replied yes, she knows lights with the glasses I had on create halos so my distance perception was probably off because I thought it appeared further away when it went down but I have had it pretty small in the daytime and it was 700' away. she took me to the spot she said she last saw it and it's only like 30' in the forrest.

I have made multiple flghts into the forrest from the same spot and as the plane starts to disappear I climb and come back and zig zag all over this area of the forrest in hopes of somehow spotting in with a GoPro and the furthest my video goes into the forrest is 100' so we pretty much know its between 30'-100' deep and we both agree on within a 50' wide swath. We've tried just about everything including walking around in the dark with ultra bright flashlights looking upwards but its just so thick on the top 15" of the trees. We even flew a real helicopter around the area for an hour and he never saw it or rotor washed it out, its clinging on for dear life
 
Dave,
Sorry to hear about this... hopefully it didn't get far and someone will recover it and return it to you. Mine was found a week after it got away, so there's a good chance one of your neighbors will discover it.
 
so i opened up my phantom and noticed an interesting thing..... the GPS unit has a padded cover underneath the shell, and it looks like there's copper lining sandwiched in the padding. could it be that DJI knows about this problem with RFI / EMI interference? that lead me to start thinking about about all of the exposed electronics. could a simple fix as easy as lining the RX and MC with copper foil be the answer?
 
auck said:
so i opened up my phantom and noticed an interesting thing..... the GPS unit has a padded cover underneath the shell, and it looks like there's copper lining sandwiched in the padding. could it be that DJI knows about this problem with RFI / EMI interference? that lead me to start thinking about about all of the exposed electronics. could a simple fix as easy as lining the RX and MC with copper foil be the answer?

Hmmm... I wonder if ALL Phantoms have that?
 
yes, it is a type of EMI/RFI shield, how effective it is I don't know. Most gps units I've seen that come with other systems, like
an OSD have a toroid ferrite ring, and the wires for the gps are wrapped around it about 8 times.
I am going to lengthen the wires on my gps, and some other items and install these little babies ! I also plan to shield the individual systems with EMI/RFI shielding.

The toroid ferrite cores I got were from a place called "Digital Products Company" (dpcav.com) located in Folsom, Ca.
right there in Sac-D's back yard.
Item # TOR-001 $0.59 each. I bought 10.

Hobby stores charge $8.99 for a 2 pack. :shock:
 

Members online

No members online now.

Forum statistics

Threads
143,066
Messages
1,467,354
Members
104,934
Latest member
jody.paugh@fullerandsons.