What is your turn around time on battery life?

Joined
Jun 19, 2014
Messages
773
Reaction score
122
As some of you know I've pretty much just been exploring a local State Park canyon, the 2nd largest in the U.S. and like to see as much of it as possible. I don' want to get caught with 10% battery left and 1 mile away from home point, so, at this time, I always turn around when I hit 65%. Am I being too over cautious? For the sake of the argument lets say there is a light headwind on the way back. Thanks...

Joel
 
Not really. It is advisable to fly against the wind, so, in the case of a hot return home, time at least will be the same or a bit less of the time it took to get there.
It depends how fast and how far you are from home. 65 % is very safe. I guess you could go down to 50%, but no less!!
I am saying this taking in consideration that you travelled as far as as possible to get there.
 
I went about 5% past the low battery warning on my farthest distance run a few days ago(17,740'), and because of that, I had a critical battery landing about 1/4 to a 1/2 mile from home. What is strange is that I had a little bit of a tailwind on the way back so that was one of the reasons I went past the warning. I can't remember now what the warning was at but I think it was at or close to 55%.

One thing I'm happy about is that I run out of battery before losing control and video. Still, I will heed the warning from now on even though that critical landing was safe.
 
As some of you know I've pretty much just been exploring a local State Park canyon, the 2nd largest in the U.S. and like to see as much of it as possible. I don' want to get caught with 10% battery left and 1 mile away from home point, so, at this time, I always turn around when I hit 65%. Am I being too over cautious? For the sake of the argument lets say there is a light headwind on the way back. Thanks...

Joel

I've been out 4 miles from home point and returned at%61 battery and landed with%7 back at home point. 16mph Cross wind blowing forward of home point. The last 1700 feet I was fighting auto land and moving forward.
I would say %80 of the time I land with around%10 battery. All my batteries have around 80 charges and are about a year old. I am of the group of thought that says " the batteries are well made intelligent batteries that have been calibrated so that %0 it's not actually 0, which is not good for lipos. " so I get the most out of my battery time, for the past year and no issues so far.
 
Makes note of the windshield & direction, then note how much battery you have left when you get back. You want to try whenever possible to begin your flights INTO THE WIND. That way when you head back the wind will be at your back & you'll have a cushion. If you do it the other way then you might come up short if you push it too far.

The P4 is extremely conservative in its battery calculations. Mine RTH'ed from slightly over a mile out with 70% battery remaining! You'll have to make notes & pay close attention until you determine how far you can push it past the RTH warning. Again this is where having the wind at your back on the way home really helps.

As some of you know I've pretty much just been exploring a local State Park canyon, the 2nd largest in the U.S. and like to see as much of it as possible. I don' want to get caught with 10% battery left and 1 mile away from home point, so, at this time, I always turn around when I hit 65%. Am I being too over cautious? For the sake of the argument lets say there is a light headwind on the way back. Thanks...

Joel
 

Recent Posts

Members online

No members online now.

Forum statistics

Threads
143,066
Messages
1,467,357
Members
104,935
Latest member
Pauos31