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Site Rank - Old Salt |
Joined: Tue Jun 19, 2007 6:14 pm Posts: 3323 Location: South Florida
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New: Photobucket has apparently changed it's policy again and is allowing hosting of pictures. Accordingly all my pictures are now available on this thread. Hopefully, Photobucket will continue this policy.Because PhotoBucket is no longer allowing my pictures to be posted here unless I pay $400/year, many of my pictures are not available. My apologies! Starting on page 55 and forward, my pictures are hosted by Cloudinary, https://cloudinary.com and are visible.
Cloudinary is terrific, and I strongly recommend them for hosting your pictures.
Keith =============================================================================================================================================================================================== A Drone Test Gone BadI started this drone adventure as a test. I planned to launch my Mavic Pro from a nearby arroyo, fly it at a height of about 185’ over a ridge to my house. Distance was about 900’. The plan was to land it behind the ridge at my house. The question: could I control the drone once it was behind the ridge? Of course, it didn’t dawn on me, if I could not control the drone behind the ridge, what would happen to the drone?
My first try at landing was in tight area between 3 walls. When the Mavic Pro descended to a height of 70’ above the launch, but behind the ridge, I lost control, but, regained control in a few seconds. That should have been the end of the test. I could not control the drone when it was out of sight behind the ridge. But, I persisted. At a height of 150’, I flew it to the back of my house which was more open and again tried to land it. The Mavic descended to about 79’, where I lost control again. This time, I did not miraculously regain control. The Mavic Pro was lost. I was, of course, panicked. I truly had no idea where the Mavic was since the controller had lost touch with the aircraft.
I rushed back to my house and walked the ridge nearest my last contact…no Mavic. I then went to the last place I had contact with it at the back of my house. Amazingly, at this point, I was in touch with the drone via the controller. The drone was still on. The FPV (the view via the drone camera) was displayed on my cell. It showed the drone was upside down, on the ground with some blades of long grass protruding into the blue sky above. It was not very comforting to know my drone was still functioning, because I still had no idea where it was. The FPV view (this is simulated since taking a picture of the FPV was the last thing I had on my mind.)
I don’t know why, but, starting where I lost control near my garage, I began to walk on a line back toward the launch. Because the drone was still turned on, its lights were on. Somehow, I spotted the drone, the drone lights really, on the ground amongst some tall vegetation at the edge of my graveled drive way.
Another view
Looking at the flight log, it is clear what happened. Flight log? Yes, there is a flight log of that whole flight. How DJI, the designer and manufacturer of the Mavic Pro, does that when you have lost controller contact with the drone, is beyond my pay grade. When I lost control of the drone the second time, the drone decided it had to take things into its own hands and head back to the launch (home). It ascended to 97’ (standard) and headed directly to the launch site. At this altitude, it should have cleared everything and returned to home. For whatever reason, maybe the controller regained control, it lowered its altitude to 75', collided with tree branches, and tumbled to the ground upside down but still on. Of course, the propellers had turned off.
A most important lesson learned: always have a direct line of sight to your drone. Your drone may be too far away to see, but there must be a direct line without solid obstacles between the Mavic Pro and its controller. Of course, it says that in the owner’s manual, but I think I was pushing the envelope and went a bit too far.
Kudos to DJI for building a quadcopter, the Mavic Pro, strong enough to stand the abuse which I have given it. I hope my learning period is over!
Keith
_________________ 2015 AI 2, 2014 Tandem
"Any intelligent fool can make things bigger and more complex ... It takes a touch of genius and a lot of courage to move in the opposite direction." A. Einstein
"Less is more" Anon
Last edited by Chekika on Thu May 17, 2018 11:02 am, edited 5 times in total.
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