Why ATTI mode is not for me

[r62ewa]

I have only ever flown distance type flights in Sport mode, thus GPS enabled allowing straight flight. I fly the 30-32 MPH range keeping the RPM gauge out of the red zone and have done a 45,000 ft round trip flight. Easy on the ascent and descent to conserve battery to allow more distance.

 

[Meta4]

Today, I go back to my usual launch spot - and again it says strong magnetic field yet each calibration failed. Finally the third try it calibrated.

But when I was about to take off I don't remember hearing the voice "RTH recorded". So i flew in pmode, switched to s mode, then back to P mode, controller lit up saying GPS 17 sats. Hmmm..so I hit RTH button and guess what, did not return home, just hovered a few hundred feet away. I manually brought it in and landed.

Does all of this make sense?

The fridge is made of steel so you should get a compass error warning (magnetic field interference).
Normally having difficulty calibrating the compass is an indication that you are close to a lot of steel (including reinforced concrete) or electric cables.
Perhaps your flight data would help explain what happened on the flight.

Go to https://www.phantomhelp.com/LogViewer/Upload/
Follow the instructions to upload your flight record.
Come back and post a link to the report it provides.

 

[jsposito]

I have only ever flown distance type flights in Sport mode, thus GPS enabled allowing straight flight. I fly the 30-32 MPH range keeping the RPM gauge out of the red zone and have done a 45,000 ft round trip flight. Easy on the ascent and descent to conserve battery to allow more distance.

nice, 30-32 mph must be the sweet spot so i hear,

 

[r62ewa]

45,000 feet and landed with 18% battery so could have gone further but over water leaves no room for error.

 

[Erised]

Two things I like about atti,1, to check wind direction and speed, I take it up about 100 feet then switch to atti, see the drift and get wind speed in GO, you even get a nice line on your map of how the wind is blowing you. This helps me plan my route in order to have a tail wind on my way back when possible (don't forget the wind may change so don't bank on it). No 2, when taking video and there is no chance of smacking into anything I like how smooth the transitions become, the drifting makes my video's less jerky when I yaw and drift around instead of a abrupt stop and go. I usually fly in s mode most of the time but it's nice to have the choice.

 

[ussvertigo]

That's because in ATTI it's not even trying to stop - it's just coasting. It will only slow down due to air drag. You have to pull the right stick back (or opposite to whichever direction it is moving relative to the aircraft) to apply any braking.

It's like a hockey puck on ice, and drifts with the wind, which is good to know the winds at that altitude

 

[sar104]

It's like a hockey puck on ice, and drifts with the wind, which is good to know the winds at that altitude

It is certainly good for that.

 

[Mudge]

When I first learned to fly R/C years ago I was always to heavy on the sticks. An old timer told me to lighten up and handle the controls very gently. As he put it "It's kind of like milking a mouse". Now I never milked a mouse but you get the idea.


.

True, ATTI mode is faster and quicker response than gps -P.

I have read that atti is fun, that you learn that way. So I tried it today for about 24 minutes ( 2 times) and if that's supposed to be fun and greater at piloting well then I guess I'm just an unfunny horrible pilot. LOL

Requires constant stick intervention, requiring flying straight yet having to manually ascend, roll left and right. Forward and back.

During this stunt flying the tiny bit of wind brought it somewhat downward and let the momentum roll left nearly crashing. Here again, hands on sticks.

By "almost" getting this bird to fly straight a great amount of battery can be used.

But, it is a necessary thing to learn though I have no love for it. If Iose GPS I will have to learn to bring this home ( increase pilot skills).

Flying in ATTI is not fun at all for me. It is a constant "oops, too much that way or this way.

True, ATTI mode is faster and quicker response than gps -P.

I have read that atti is fun, that you learn that way. So I tried it today for about 24 minutes ( 2 times) and if that's supposed to be fun and greater at piloting well then I guess I'm just an unfunny horrible pilot. LOL

Requires constant stick intervention, requiring flying straight yet having to manually ascend, roll left and right. Forward and back.

During this stunt flying the tiny bit of wind brought it somewhat downward and let the momentum roll left nearly crashing. Here again, hands on sticks.

By "almost" getting this bird to fly straight a great amount of battery can be used.

But, it is a necessary thing to learn though I have no love for it. If Iose GPS I will have to learn to bring this home ( increase pilot skills).

Flying in ATTI is not fun at all for me. It is a constant "oops, too much that way or this way.

It appears to behave like a kite in the wind - no fun. Guys, I don't want an aircraft simulator .

Why not just skip ATTI and go right to sport? Racing has its place, P MODE is conservative and relaxing to fly.

Others like this mode, many others! So, I must be the minority. But my heart rate stays normal : )

Cheers

It appears to behave like a kite in the wind - no fun. Guys, I don't want an aircraft simulator .

Why not just skip ATTI and go right to sport? Racing has its place, P MODE is conservative and relaxing to fly.

Others like this mode, many others! So, I must be the minority. But my heart rate stays normal : )

Cheers

 

[Duchunter]

It is nice to get around fast and on the water you can get some great profile shots of a boat at full speed and keep up no problem.

 

[Vexed]

True, ATTI mode is faster and quicker response than gps -P.

I have read that atti is fun, that you learn that way. So I tried it today for about 24 minutes ( 2 times) and if that's supposed to be fun and greater at piloting well then I guess I'm just an unfunny horrible pilot. LOL

Requires constant stick intervention, requiring flying straight yet having to manually ascend, roll left and right. Forward and back.

During this stunt flying the tiny bit of wind brought it somewhat downward and let the momentum roll left nearly crashing. Here again, hands on sticks.

By "almost" getting this bird to fly straight a great amount of battery can be used.

But, it is a necessary thing to learn though I have no love for it. If Iose GPS I will have to learn to bring this home ( increase pilot skills).

Flying in ATTI is not fun at all for me. It is a constant "oops, too much that way or this way.

It appears to behave like a kite in the wind - no fun. Guys, I don't want an aircraft simulator .

Why not just skip ATTI and go right to sport? Racing has its place, P MODE is conservative and relaxing to fly.

Others like this mode, many others! So, I must be the minority. But my heart rate stays normal : )

Cheers

Try flying a helicopter

 

[avark]

True, ATTI mode is faster and quicker response than gps -P.

I have read that atti is fun, that you learn that way. So I tried it today for about 24 minutes ( 2 times) and if that's supposed to be fun and greater at piloting well then I guess I'm just an unfunny horrible pilot. LOL

Requires constant stick intervention, requiring flying straight yet having to manually ascend, roll left and right. Forward and back.

During this stunt flying the tiny bit of wind brought it somewhat downward and let the momentum roll left nearly crashing. Here again, hands on sticks.

By "almost" getting this bird to fly straight a great amount of battery can be used.

But, it is a necessary thing to learn though I have no love for it. If Iose GPS I will have to learn to bring this home ( increase pilot skills).

Flying in ATTI is not fun at all for me. It is a constant "oops, too much that way or this way.

It appears to behave like a kite in the wind - no fun. Guys, I don't want an aircraft simulator .

Why not just skip ATTI and go right to sport? Racing has its place, P MODE is conservative and relaxing to fly.

Others like this mode, many others! So, I must be the minority. But my heart rate stays normal : )

Cheers

You really should try a little bit of ATTI when you fly. Twice a week for 10 minutes would be good. Gives you muscle memory and time for it to sink into your selfcontious. You may not believe this, but all of a sudden you are going to get it. Things will settle in just fine and you will wonder how you possibly had such a hard time with it.

Happened to me as a manned helicopter student trying to learn how to hover. Then I got to see when students "found the light" when I was an instructor. Well, guess what? It happened to me this past week with my Hubsan X4. The whole reversal of control when it flies towards me? Thought I was never going to get it fast enough to be just reaction. And all of a sudden it sunk in.

OK back to Phantoms. I flew for about an hour in GPS and then went to ATTI when I got it this past Feb. Stayed in the alfalfa field and always had it facing away from me. Got handling wind just fine, but initiating wrong stick with it facing me? Yep way too often. Until this week when it sunk in with the X4. I could not wait to get the Phantom up. I was thrilled that I could do turns about a point (me as the point) with it facing me the whole time and keeping radius a constant ten feet.

Yeah, it took me a lot of words to say "patience, Grasshopper" and keep at it. All of a sudden all those stick corrections will drop into your subconscious and you will fly like a champ in ATTI - and maybe even you will LIKE atti.

Best of luck and enjoy the process.

 

[RammerJammer]

I strongly second the notion of starting with small quads. However, taking the hand-sized ones outside is a real crap shoot. Some of them are so under powered that a slight breeze will take them over the roof, across the road and who knows where. Even my larger quad (about 2/3 the size - Not weight - of a Phantom) can't handle wind well. It's the one that almost crossed the road . . . Fortunately, I got it on the ground before it got me in trouble. Of course, being larger makes it less than great indoors because the air off the props can scatter papers and blow small objects off tables.

I tried both the small ones and the larger one outdoors 3 or 4 times. Never lost one but came close often enough to learn it's not the best idea. And, that was in very light wind. Very light.

If you get to the point where you can fly the small ones indoors, without crashing or breaking anything, you should do fine with larger drones outdoors.

After flying those things for 3 or 4 years (even to the point of replacing the hard-wired batteries in the small ones), I found it almost comical that many Phantom pilots said they wouldn't think of flying without the Go or some other app. OK, OK, I get it for longer flights. But, it's simply more fun, and challenging, to fly using your instincts.

Now, I'm learning many won't fly in anything but P mode. And, I get that, too - A warmer, fuzzier more comfortable experience. And, we are talking about hundreds instead of tens of dollars. To each his own but it seems they just might be missing out.

I still remember the first time I saw a P3 hover - It was like someone had cast a spell on a drone. It seemed impossible. But, there it was, in a look-Mom-no-hands hover. Something my $15 quad could never do indoors or out. So, P mode ain't all bad!

 

[Robz]

I fly in all modes all the time. Sports mode is my favorite though.

 

[jsposito]

You really should try a little bit of ATTI when you fly. Twice a week for 10 minutes would be good. Gives you muscle memory and time for it to sink into your selfcontious. You may not believe this, but all of a sudden you are going to get it. Things will settle in just fine and you will wonder how you possibly had such a hard time with it.

Happened to me as a manned helicopter student trying to learn how to hover. Then I got to see when students "found the light" when I was an instructor. Well, guess what? It happened to me this past week with my Hubsan X4. The whole reversal of control when it flies towards me? Thought I was never going to get it fast enough to be just reaction. And all of a sudden it sunk in.

OK back to Phantoms. I flew for about an hour in GPS and then went to ATTI when I got it this past Feb. Stayed in the alfalfa field and always had it facing away from me. Got handling wind just fine, but initiating wrong stick with it facing me? Yep way too often. Until this week when it sunk in with the X4. I could not wait to get the Phantom up. I was thrilled that I could do turns about a point (me as the point) with it facing me the whole time and keeping radius a constant ten feet.

Yeah, it took me a lot of words to say "patience, Grasshopper" and keep at it. All of a sudden all those stick corrections will drop into your subconscious and you will fly like a champ in ATTI - and maybe even you will LIKE atti.

Best of luck and enjoy the process.

yep, sure why not - must find a wide open field so need to move my location. But wow, I love S MODE.

 

[jsposito]

I strongly second the notion of starting with small quads. However, taking the hand-sized ones outside is a real crap shoot. Some of them are so under powered that a slight breeze will take them over the roof, across the road and who knows where. Even my larger quad (about 2/3 the size - Not weight - of a Phantom) can't handle wind well. It's the one that almost crossed the road . . . Fortunately, I got it on the ground before it got me in trouble. Of course, being larger makes it less than great indoors because the air off the props can scatter papers and blow small objects off tables.

I tried both the small ones and the larger one outdoors 3 or 4 times. Never lost one but came close often enough to learn it's not the best idea. And, that was in very light wind. Very light.

If you get to the point where you can fly the small ones indoors, without crashing or breaking anything, you should do fine with larger drones outdoors.

After flying those things for 3 or 4 years (even to the point of replacing the hard-wired batteries in the small ones), I found it almost comical that many Phantom pilots said they wouldn't think of flying without the Go or some other app. OK, OK, I get it for longer flights. But, it's simply more fun, and challenging, to fly using your instincts.

Now, I'm learning many won't fly in anything but P mode. And, I get that, too - A warmer, fuzzier more comfortable experience. And, we are talking about hundreds instead of tens of dollars. To each his own but it seems they just might be missing out.

I still remember the first time I saw a P3 hover - It was like someone had cast a spell on a drone. It seemed impossible. But, there it was, in a look-Mom-no-hands hover. Something my $15 quad could never do indoors or out. So, P mode ain't all bad!

II was going to with a toy quad at first - but went with the P4 - love it. Coming home manually while in Sport mode is my latest achievement and sucessful. But that P mode, well for casual flying just fits the bill too.

 

[len750]

Ditto.

For me it always seems that when I want to dabble into Atti mode the wind isn't very cooperative.

Kinda like when I decide to rake leaves......

I always wait for the windiest days to use my leaf blower. It blows all my leaves to my neighbors house! Gotta be upwind while doing this though.

 

[jsposito]

I always wait for the windiest days to use my leaf blower. It blows all my leaves to my neighbors house! Gotta be upwind while doing this though.

Yesterday the winds were 20MPH with gusts at 25 and the Phantom 4 in Sport mode cut through the wind like butter. Held a pretty steady hover in P mode, with a roll of no more than 3 feet either way. I don't like these conditions but wanted to do the test, and yep there is a battery drop as expected but not a huge amount.

 

[Duchunter]

The toy quads is the way to go for sure when it comes to learning to fly with the sticks except you gotta throttle the motors yourself to stay at altitude so that's a whole nother dimension you don't have to worry about with a GPS quad. I've crashed every conceivable way of crashing a small quad and I've never broke so much as a prop on one of these things. I can't say there all like that but I know the sky viper drones are. I bought a box of store returns for $150 and got I think 12 quads working. I've crashed hundreds, if not thousands of times and every one flew away with there original props. Still got 2 to go but I'm trying not to lose those cause they're my drone equivalent to a tow truck. When I get one stuck in a tree I fly up some fishing line and use that to pull up a small nylon rope. I've gotten quite good at getting drones out of trees. Lol

 

[jsposito]

The toy quads is the way to go for sure when it comes to learning to fly with the sticks except you gotta throttle the motors yourself to stay at altitude so that's a whole nother dimension you don't have to worry about with a GPS quad. I've crashed every conceivable way of crashing a small quad and I've never broke so much as a prop on one of these things. I can't say there all like that but I know the sky viper drones are. I bought a box of store returns for $150 and got I think 12 quads working. I've crashed hundreds, if not thousands of times and every one flew away with there original props. Still got 2 to go but I'm trying not to lose those cause they're my drone equivalent to a tow truck. When I get one stuck in a tree I fly up some fishing line and use that to pull up a small nylon rope. I've gotten quite good at getting drones out of trees. Lol

I was thinking of placing a very bright tac light that weighs 8 ounces centered on top of the drone for night flying. I'd have to use velcro no doubt and might tarnish the shine on the bird. I have read that the P4 can lift that amount. So temped to try it.

 

[Fester]

I was thinking of placing a very bright tac light that weighs 8 ounces centered on top of the drone for night flying. I'd have to use velcro no doubt and might tarnish the shine on the bird. I have read that the P4 can lift that amount. So temped to try it.

As I recall, the GPS antenna assembly is just under the top deck shell center. Even if that didn't partially block GPS signals, you would be raising the CG of the aircraft (not good), so maybe small lights on the landing skids would be a better choice.