Quad is gone/fly-away

One other thing that I seemed to notice recently...... the NAZA sensors can't handle as much vibration as does the WKM..... althought vibration should always be eliminated at the source. Isolation from vibration can also be an option such as via the Kyosho Zeal tape of the displaced IMU bracket now offered on the new WKM anti-vibration kits.



Lost 800 mm Hexa on the second flight. Equipment setup; Spektrum DX8 TX, Spektrum 8000X with TM1000 Telemetery unit, battery sensor, altitude sensor, motor temp sensor; Naza-M V1, GPS add-on.

After waiting for the GPS to lock and getting confirmation with the four green LED flashes my friend launched the new HEXA all seemed normal, in the GPS mode he commented that it was drifting back to him a bit, but continued the flight as it is not uncommon for the Naza to take some time to settled down and really hold position. He flex the Hexa gently as the goal of the flight was to test the run time of the two 4S 4000mHa batteries with the new configuration. NOTE: The config was completely checked and verified twice using the Assistant program, compass was calibrated as well.

About two to three minutes into the flight my friend hollered that he was having an issue. He told me he had lost control of the Hexa, and had thrown the Fail-Safe and it was not responding. He handed me the TX to see if I could do any thing. All the time the Hexa continued to fly like it was being flown, making turns, flying away from us in north east direction when it reached about 1/4 mile at estimated 100ft altitude, it started to make gentle circles, all the while I was trying to cancel the fail safe which never kicked in. After about a minute the Hexa was headed back to our location at a fast rate, and appeared it may be RTH finally. Well it didn't but after returning in the south-west direction it banked again heading this time to the north east and flew into the distance out of sight.

We gave chase and caught sight of it again about two miles from the take off location, this time traveling east, once again we lost sight of it, never to be seen again. Over 1400.00 USD gone....

Everyone I talk to can't understand whether the radio failed, but then again how is that the thing continued to fly. After reading some of the accounts in this thread I believe there is a bug or two in the DJI firmware.

Wouldn't be nice if they came forward acknowledging the program and told us it has been corrected in V2 of the Naza firmware. IMO I don't look to them to do that.

My friend I are now looking from a backup fail safe system. Maybe motor cutoff with parachute deployment via separate radio system.

Anyone else have a tested secondary backup fail safe system.:dread:

HD
 

djneils98

Member
I'm gonna try the GPS tracker that ridding hood mentioned. I ordered it yesterday comes from china so probably get it in a few weeks.

i had one of the cheap ones off ebay and it was a POS.
When I tested it sometimes it would be accurate to within a few metres, other times more like a few hundred metres.
Maybe I had a dud one but definitely test it thoroughly before relying on it.
There are more expensive ones that do a much better job (Garmin etc) and with an investment of north of £1000 for most FPV/ AP quads they are worth getting IMO
 


damage2008

New Member
Hi guys,
First post here so hello!!!

Anyway thought I would share my experience with my NAZA v2 with GPS module. I have only had it about three weeks and so far it has been great, I have had the RTH functions fine and have been able to remotley engage RTH via my 9x radio and then disengage RTH and take over control without any issues..... Until last night.

I did something a bit stupid as I got carried away range testing, I was about 2.2km away when I suddenly remembered about my flight battery, I looked down at my radio and I only had about 3 minutes of flight time left - it had taken me about 8 minutes to get 2.2km away. At that very point my radio started beeping indicating that I was loosing control, no problem I though RTH has got my back. Well the FW450 turned 180 towards me and began flying home, I was really high but the quad was heading back to me. After about 30 seconds the beeping stopped so I was back in radio control, well at least I should have been. I still had full control over my tilt servo but I had zero control over the quad. It just continued on it RTH flight path - not normally a problem but when my battery was nearly dead it was a BIG problem.

I wanted to take manual control to I could fly home whilst at the same time descending so by the time I reach home I would be much lower. But the NAZA would not let me take control so it stayed at an extremely high altitude all the way back home and then began it's landing sequence. Problem was my battery was completely exhausted and at about 50ft up the quad just dropped like a stone. I managed to catch it and break it's fall but it still slammed into the ground and bust the camera mount and one of he legs.

Luckily for me this is not a fly away story but I would like to know why I could not regain control of the aircraft when it was in range and I had full control of my tilt servo.
 

soler

Member
Hi guys,
First post here so hello!!!

Anyway thought I would share my experience with my NAZA v2 with GPS module. I have only had it about three weeks and so far it has been great, I have had the RTH functions fine and have been able to remotley engage RTH via my 9x radio and then disengage RTH and take over control without any issues..... Until last night.

I did something a bit stupid as I got carried away range testing, I was about 2.2km away when I suddenly remembered about my flight battery, I looked down at my radio and I only had about 3 minutes of flight time left - it had taken me about 8 minutes to get 2.2km away. At that very point my radio started beeping indicating that I was loosing control, no problem I though RTH has got my back. Well the FW450 turned 180 towards me and began flying home, I was really high but the quad was heading back to me. After about 30 seconds the beeping stopped so I was back in radio control, well at least I should have been. I still had full control over my tilt servo but I had zero control over the quad. It just continued on it RTH flight path - not normally a problem but when my battery was nearly dead it was a BIG problem.

I wanted to take manual control to I could fly home whilst at the same time descending so by the time I reach home I would be much lower. But the NAZA would not let me take control so it stayed at an extremely high altitude all the way back home and then began it's landing sequence. Problem was my battery was completely exhausted and at about 50ft up the quad just dropped like a stone. I managed to catch it and break it's fall but it still slammed into the ground and bust the camera mount and one of he legs.

Luckily for me this is not a fly away story but I would like to know why I could not regain control of the aircraft when it was in range and I had full control of my tilt servo.

Once RTH is activated it will stay in this mode until you flip the att /GPS /Manual switch, if in GPS flip to Att and then back to GPS and you will have control again. THe speed at which the Quad flies in RTH is lower than normal speed so if your a long way out this will increase your return time. I had a situation where I activated RTH in strong winds and it was hardly able to make any headway against the wind, Flipping into Att mode I was able to increase the angle and bring it back.
 

damage2008

New Member
Once RTH is activated it will stay in this mode until you flip the att /GPS /Manual switch, if in GPS flip to Att and then back to GPS and you will have control again. THe speed at which the Quad flies in RTH is lower than normal speed so if your a long way out this will increase your return time. I had a situation where I activated RTH in strong winds and it was hardly able to make any headway against the wind, Flipping into Att mode I was able to increase the angle and bring it back.

I see, thank you for this info. I know in the past I have been able to toggle in & out of RTH but probably during my brown pants moment I was just flipping the fail safe switch & not the gps/att switch!
 

b0nafide

Member
Damage,

I think it's likely that you were in RTH x2
- RTH mode as you asked to be.
- Then when you tried to take it out of RTH it went back automatically into RTH due to the low battery.

Check your settings. Could this be the possibility?
 

re:- gps tracker t102 £20-£30 quid on ebay or amazon
i have a vodaphone payg sim in mine could not get the others i tried to work

you could also go the SUPERIOR immersionrc.com EzOsd route

http://www.immersionrc.com/products.php
telemetry and tracking --> iTelemetry app for iphone/android
have a look it works cos i use it myself
i never use the crappy tracker you are looking at because in a crash it stops working and you dont have a clue where it is cos it cant be contacted
believe me i have had lots of crashes faulty equipment errors operator errors the lot
happy flying BUT not for the faint hearted!!!!!!!
tiggy
 
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dazzab

Member
First of all, I'm so sorry for what happened. It's such a gut wrenching experience when these things happen.

I keep hearing that DJI is the only equipment to use but it seems they have just as many issues as any other system given the posts I've read. But what I think is really important is why all the guessing? There must be some way to find out exactly what causes these issues. Like others here I would encourage you to keep on searching so hopefully you will find it. Are there logs on DJI that you can check to find out what was going on? Lastly, as low tech as it is, I have a couple of 'If found please call ...' stickers on my copters. You never know. I've heard of others putting 'Reward if found' info on them as well. On the positive side, at least it took off in to a safe area. Just imagine if this happened at a flying field next to something important or where people were.
 

rwilabee

Member
re:- gps tracker t102 £20-£30 quid on ebay or amazon
i have a vodaphone payg sim in mine could not get the others i tried to work

you could also go the SUPERIOR immersionrc.com EzOsd route

http://www.immersionrc.com/products.php
telemetry and tracking --> iTelemetry app for iphone/android
have a look it works cos i use it myself
i never use the crappy tracker you are looking at because in a crash it stops working and you dont have a clue where it is cos it cant be contacted
believe me i have had lots of crashes faulty equipment errors operator errors the lot
happy flying BUT not for the faint hearted!!!!!!!
tiggy

Would this interfere with an OSD if you are doing FPV
 

38super

Member
OP, make some random generic flyers like if you lost a dog and go put em up. I just had a friend have a similar thing happen to a new disco, he put up flyers with reward on it and 30 minutes later some gal called him up and had it. Somebody swipped the hero2 off it, butt he robot came back
Does anyone know why this happened?
 

MombasaFlash

Heli's & Tele's bloke
Given that the integrity of the radio link is paramount the choice of frequency for the video link should be carefully considered. I use 2.4g for the radio and 5.8g for the video but I fly LOS only. Anything 'FPV' needs good range. The higher bandwidth of 5.8g will give you a better video image but at the expense of range, because it is a narrower beam, unless you have some fancy receiving antennae.

Avoid video frequencies where the harmonics come close to your 2.4g radio, i.e. 1.2g and 1.3g which produce harmonics of 2.4g and 2.6 respectively if no filter is used.

900mHz is arguably an ideal frequency for the video link. It is miles away from your 2.4g and gives really good range.
 

cutter

Member
Hi guys ,Just wondering how many fly offs have happened with Spectrum DX8 radios used ? Remove SD card from spectrum radios before any flight.
 


Can you explain......."5.8g will give you a better video image but at the expense of range, because it is a narrower beam"....? Thanks.
Given that the integrity of the radio link is paramount the choice of frequency for the video link should be carefully considered. I use 2.4g for the radio and 5.8g for the video but I fly LOS only. Anything 'FPV' needs good range. The higher bandwidth of 5.8g will give you a better video image but at the expense of range, because it is a narrower beam, unless you have some fancy receiving antennae.

Avoid video frequencies where the harmonics come close to your 2.4g radio, i.e. 1.2g and 1.3g which produce harmonics of 2.4g and 2.6 respectively if no filter is used.

900mHz is arguably an ideal frequency for the video link. It is miles away from your 2.4g and gives really good range.
 

Maverick

Member
Can you explain......."5.8g will give you a better video image but at the expense of range, because it is a narrower beam"....? Thanks.

Basically, the 5.8GHz video frequencies give better picture clarity, but the range isn't as good - the picture will break up before the other frequencies' pictures will.

Having said that though, with decent receiver antennas, you can still get over 2kms, which is more than ample for plenty of people.
 

What is this "narrower beam" all about?
Given that the integrity of the radio link is paramount the choice of frequency for the video link should be carefully considered. I use 2.4g for the radio and 5.8g for the video but I fly LOS only. Anything 'FPV' needs good range. The higher bandwidth of 5.8g will give you a better video image but at the expense of range, because it is a narrower beam, unless you have some fancy receiving antennae.

Avoid video frequencies where the harmonics come close to your 2.4g radio, i.e. 1.2g and 1.3g which produce harmonics of 2.4g and 2.6 respectively if no filter is used.

900mHz is arguably an ideal frequency for the video link. It is miles away from your 2.4g and gives really good range.
 

Maverick

Member
What is this "narrower beam" all about?

The "narrower beam" refers to the radiation pattern. At least I think this is what he is referring to... This would apply more so to directional antennas, which would have a long narrow beam, as opposed to an omni-directional pattern, which hasn't as long a pattern, but more of a 360 degree reception.

View attachment 14572 View attachment 14573

Read this thread and it will explain it in much more detail : http://fpvlab.com/forums/showthread...Hz-VIDEO-LINK-(AND-SIMPLER-OPTIONS)-EXPLAINED
 

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gtranquilla

RadioActive
Just to clarify for all..... simple data such as morse code requires very little bandwidth which enables extremely long distance communication, e.g., shortwave radio (very narrow bandwidth required)
To get complex data to travel in a timely manner, wider bandwidth is required which is more readily available at the higher frequencies.

But with so much more signal dispersion as a result of greater bandwidth, the range suffers.

There are atmospheric factors to consider as well. In general the moisture content of the air will adversely affect radio range........... some frequencies more than others.

The term bandwidth is not to be confused with beam which has more to do with antenna theory.

VE6GLT
 


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