Avoiding shell arm cracking

[Phantom309]

Does anyone have any suggestions about steps to take to reinforce drone arms on P3S to help prevent or prolonged cracks from starting around the screws. I have read so many posts about this dreaded plague that I am scared to do much flying. I am new to drones and started with the cheapest Phantom I could learn with the Phantom 3 standard. I would like to stick with this particular series and move up as I gain experience but if the shell cracking is a big problem I am weary of this. These birds are expensive! Thanks for any input.

 

[Meta4]

Does anyone have any suggestions about steps to take to reinforce drone arms on P3S to help prevent or prolonged cracks from starting around the screws. I have read so many posts about this dreaded plague that I am scared to do much flying. I am new to drones and started with the cheapest Phantom I could learn with the Phantom 3 standard. I would like to stick with this particular series and move up as I gain experience but if the shell cracking is a big problem I am weary of this. These birds are expensive! Thanks for any input.

Despite what you've read, most Phantoms never develop any cracking at all.
If your Phantom is like most of them, it needs nothing at all to reinforce it.
If you are unlucky enough to get one from a bad batch, it's not going to disintegrate in the air and DJI will replace the shell for you.

 

[msinger]

Does anyone have any suggestions about steps to take to reinforce drone arms on P3S to help prevent or prolonged cracks from starting around the screws

You can buy arm reinforcements -- like these or these. There is no guarantee that they will prevent cracking though. Nobody really knows what causes that to occur.

 

[coger]

Most of cracks I've read about occurred at the motor mounts. I've fitted set of prop guards as they come with small mounting plates which attach to each motor using longer replacement bolts. This will help spread out the stress of each motor so it's focused more on the plate you fit and not the frame. The prop guards fit into the mounting plate and are detachable so you can choose to use them or not. It's a fairly inexpensive way of beefing up this area.

 

[WilliamM]

Most of cracks I've read about occurred at the motor mounts. I've fitted set of prop guards as they come with small mounting plates which attach to each motor using longer replacement bolts. This will help spread out the stress of each motor so it's focused more on the plate you fit and not the frame. The prop guards fit into the mounting plate and are detachable so you can choose to use them or not. It's a fairly inexpensive way of beefing up this area.

Same thing here, installed prop guards awhile back even though I don't use them anymore. Was thinking about taking off those plates you mention, but now after reading your post I might just leave them.

Sent from my HTC 10 using PhantomPilots mobile app

 

[mknmd]

I backed the screws out about 1/2 turn after I bought mine over a year ago, no cracks so far