Another strange behaviour

[Sanababit]

I have been following all the problems that the phantom2 are going trough, like j-hooking and TBE, well here is a new one, three days ago i went out to get some flight time, i was in my first battery and about 7-10 min into the flight my heli started doing what looks like a turbulence washout, it came out of nowhere, thankfully i was high enough to throttle up and save my craft, after experiencing this i brought it back and got it to hover near me, i noticed another washout (which i saved it again) and yaw to the right without stick input (altough just a little bit), the. I went out today and some time into my first flight it did the same, i am loosing confidence on these things, and hopefully someone here is experiencing the same and might have some input on the problem

Sana

 

[ianwood]

Could be you're developing a hardware issue. I would give a pretty thorough inspection starting with the props, then motors, then ESCs, etc.

 

[Sanababit]

Could be you're developing a hardware issue. I would give a pretty thorough inspection starting with the props, then motors, then ESCs, etc.

I know i can easily check props for broken tips, and the motors i can check by turning props and see if they make noise or are stuck, but how can i check the esc's?, the only thing i did before this happened is i got those prop guard clips for easy on/off, oh and i installed the small screws back on motors..

The problem is i get a little bit of yaw towards the right, and i get vrs, all of this without transmiter input, whats weird is it all starts several minutes after i start flying

Sana

 

[WinePrince]

I had an eerily similar, well identical, experience this weekend in Durango CO. I did a quick 5 minute flight up to 300m to scan the area... beautiful btw... then coming down at about 60 to 80 feet I started getting what looked like violent prop wash instability. I've been trying to move horizontally as well as vertically to avoid prop wash when descending. This time was not the mild buffeting of a prop wash. It was a very violent rocking motion. Up had no affect until nearly reaching the ground. after that it seemed fine. I flew it a little longer, low, moved up and down and it all seemed fine so I wrote it off to prop wash. My niece flew it next, never over 60 feet or so and not far at all. Bringing the drone back and descending the identical wild rocking occurred. She hit up to recover the decent with no affect and fell into a pine tree, then tumbled down and smacked the only rock in the lawn shattering the Gopro lens, mangling the 2d gimble and buckling the compass landing leg. Bummed. I re-updated and re-calibrated everything. Even the camera control on the controller responds normally tho the gimbal is toast and does not physically respond. I was able to tape the gimble in a forward slight down and attach the broken Gopro. I put on a new set of props just to be safe. took it out and flew it about the property. Then it happened again in a very mild descent. I could control roll, but up had zero effect. Smacked the ground again. Reupdated, recalibrated everything, checking everything I could think of. Tried once more with feeling over the lawn. All went well. steady as a rock. even flew low below tree branches, took it up 60 to 80 feet, down again no problem. Then one more flight later that day just after sunset flew down the property 50m or so then returning piloting directly toward me in a slope downward the same instability in approximately the same location as my first crash. Up had no effect. lateral control seemed to be there, but tough to use when you can't tell which way the beast is facing. It seemed like it tried to recover and bounced off the ground, but one of the engine mounts bent on that impact and the ship carted over and landed hard upside down. the electronics still appear to respond and calibrate normally. and the engines run, tho one is canted due to the bent shell. So now I need a new phantom 2 shell, props, landing legs, gimbal, and Gopro. Sheesh. Has anyone any clue what might have been going on? I was in NAZA mode, both switches up, fulling updated, and calibrated, compass calibrated, at least 7 GPS satellites at launch.

 

[TodayTrader]

I have been following all the problems that the phantom2 are going trough, like j-hooking and TBE, well here is a new one, three days ago i went out to get some flight time, i was in my first battery and about 7-10 min into the flight my heli started doing what looks like a turbulence washout, it came out of nowhere, thankfully i was high enough to throttle up and save my craft, after experiencing this i brought it back and got it to hover near me, i noticed another washout (which i saved it again) and yaw to the right without stick input (altough just a little bit), the. I went out today and some time into my first flight it did the same, i am loosing confidence on these things, and hopefully someone here is experiencing the same and might have some input on the problem

Sana

Something like this? - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G3cYDw6IVn0

 

[WinePrince]

not so gentle. more violent like this. this is dvr recorded from the first flight where I thought prop wash...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dbHJFtPJq3I

 

[WinePrince]

this is dvr from the second flight that destroyed the gopro and the gimbal.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KPXMuBZLETw

 

[flying hero]

I am having the exact same problem, it has happened to me 4 times and luckily I haven't broken anything...YET.
I took the top off and checked every thing that I could , connections, wiring, etc. I have flown 2 low level
Test flights and it has not happened yet. This is my second Phantom. The first one did exactly the same thing
and I sent it back. Now I am afraid to fly it. When I had the top off I test ran it without the props on and twice
it made a noise like a bearing problem but all the motors checked out ok. I was wondering if the gyro in the NAZA
Could cause that symptom. I also thought maybe running the motors without the props(no load on the motors) might
Cause the noise in the system. I am at a loss. It has about 20 10 min. flights on it. It doesn't appear to be a battery
Problem, I have 4 battery's and it has happened with 2 different battery's between 50 and 75% charge left.
Sorry for your damaged Quad and Camera. Hopefully we can figure this out.
Joe

 

[Sanababit]

I have been following all the problems that the phantom2 are going trough, like j-hooking and TBE, well here is a new one, three days ago i went out to get some flight time, i was in my first battery and about 7-10 min into the flight my heli started doing what looks like a turbulence washout, it came out of nowhere, thankfully i was high enough to throttle up and save my craft, after experiencing this i brought it back and got it to hover near me, i noticed another washout (which i saved it again) and yaw to the right without stick input (altough just a little bit), the. I went out today and some time into my first flight it did the same, i am loosing confidence on these things, and hopefully someone here is experiencing the same and might have some input on the problem

Sana

Something like this? - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G3cYDw6IVn0

Yes, something exactly like this video, it happens suddenly and i have recovered always, it happenes to me twice today, on a side note, i have noticed that when i turn off the heli one motor spins more than the others, and when i switch to atti it looks like this problem goes away

Sana

 

[WinePrince]

I wondered if switching to atti would stop the wild wobbling descent and allow you to recover your descent. I wasn't that quick to think to try that at the time. Next time if there is sufficient height I will hopefully think to try atti. If that does indeed work it would say to me there is a problem involving the gps components, gps software, or gps firmware. I have a new shell and gimbal ordered, and a replacement Gopro on the way, and I'm $700 poorer. But now I'm very concerned about flying over water, concrete, or worse over people. Does anyone know if this a problem dji is aware of? If not, how does one report and or check with dji on a problem like this?

 

[TodayTrader]

I wondered if switching to atti would stop the wild wobbling descent and allow you to recover your descent. I wasn't that quick to think to try that at the time. Next time if there is sufficient height I will hopefully think to try atti. If that does indeed work it would say to me there is a problem involving the gps components, gps software, or gps firmware. I have a new shell and gimbal ordered, and a replacement Gopro on the way, and I'm $700 poorer. But now I'm very concerned about flying over water, concrete, or worse over people. Does anyone know if this a problem dji is aware of? If not, how does one report and or check with dji on a problem like this?

You should be VERY concerned about flying over water. I lost my whole P@ rig 3 weeks ago in the bay. NOT PILOT ERROR

 

[Sanababit]

I went to the beach this sunday and there is where i noticed it more, affraid of losing it in the sand or even worse in the water, i packed it in and called it a day, i will do a imu calibration today and maybe upgrade to 3.0 or even downgrade, who knows

FYI, i am using new prop guards with clip ons, this is the only thing different imdid to my phantom when the problem started

Sana

 

[xtonex]

take those silly guards off and see its still an issue...

 

[Xrover]

take those silly guards off and see its still an issue...

Those definitely make stability worse.

 

[Sanababit]

take those silly guards off and see its still an issue...

I did it today, since i have the easy on, easy off clips, i decided to remove them and test, it still does it, especially when i yaw, i removed gimbal, gopro, transmiter and miniiosd, and still did it, tried an imu advance calibration/ compass dance and it is still doing it, i am running firmware 2.0

Sana

 

[Xrover]

Firmware 2.0?
There have been some decent stability improvements with the newer Firmware. Max Descent rate is one of them. I'm not thrilled about the Airport restrictions but they have not interfered with any flying i have done.

Have you updated the other components in the P2 Assistant Software? Are you running the ver 3.0 Assistant software?

 

[Sanababit]

Firmware 2.0?
There have been some decent stability improvements with the newer Firmware. Max Descent rate is one of them. I'm not thrilled about the Airport restrictions but they have not interfered with any flying i have done.

Have you updated the other components in the P2 Assistant Software? Are you running the ver 3.0 Assistant software?

I will definently do it tomorrow, i did not want to upgrade to 3.4 but have no choice, i was running ver 2.0 assistant software, is there a way to use ver 3.0 assistant software and only put firmware 3.0, intead of 3.4?, thanks

Sana

 

[Xrover]

With the issues you are reporting, I would (if it was happening to me) update everything to the latest versions. There are too many variables when just updating one component and not another. All the components in the P2 interact with each other so you never know what issues might have a firmware fix. Dji has been pretty vague with their descriptions of changes made in all their updates so who knows what all has been addressed or how.

Don't quote me on any of this. The only reason I even update my P2 is in hopes that it will fly better then it did before. It's a Royal Crapshoot!

 

[wkf94025]

Does your violent tumble look anything like this?

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c0nTH7S3sYg[/youtube]

I initially thought it was VRS, but other pilots who have watched it have suggested power distribution problems, or bad harmonics as the Naza becomes unstable, then over corrects, then over corrects some more, etc., until suddenly you're at zero AGL.

Kelly

 

[Sanababit]

Does your violent tumble look anything like this?

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c0nTH7S3sYg[/youtube]

I initially thought it was VRS, but other pilots who have watched it have suggested power distribution problems, or bad harmonics as the Naza becomes unstable, then over corrects, then over corrects some more, etc., until suddenly you're at zero AGL.

Kelly

Hi, saw your video and my heli does not act like that, yours looks like its tumbling down, mine looks like it wants to go down but right side up, no violent drops, heres a more torough explanation

1 power on controller, then Power up heli on gps mode
2 wait for satellites and home point save
3 send it off flying, get some j hook and just a little of tbe (not to much)
4 after some fly time, maybe 5 min, jhook is better but notice strange behaviour
5 when flying my phantom and its going fast, whe. I let go of the sticks, it starts stopping by itself but one of the motors looks like it doesnt catch up with the others and makes this flutter movement which looks like its going to fall
6 i bring it in asap and let it hover close to me, while looking at it i noticed that its unstable and it yaws like 5-10 deg to the right, just a little bit
7 i sent it off again, tough close to me, and most every time i yaw, either direction, i get this weird flutter, or sometimes i get this reeeaaally wide yaw and sometimes i get reeeaaly tight yaw in either direction with some flutter, i am afraid of yawing sp? my heli
8 i just fly close to me, i am afraid of loosing it, sometimes i bring it in a do a compass dance which does not help at all
9 when battery empties i try a new one and go thru all steps described

Sana