Phantom 3 S falls out of the sky at 300 feet

[Andreas Pashiardis]

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[Andreas Pashiardis]

Here is a picture of it. When I found it the camera was like 30 feet away and parts were scattered everywhere working like a 20 foot radius. It was 300 feet up and hit the cold hard dirt at 60 mph


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[Gearbox]

You would be surprised at what is repairable , but you never know . , Even though its over a year ,I would start a ticket up on it & see what they say , sometimes they will honor a Warranty .

 

[msinger]

Wow so you think they won't give me a replacement even though it was not my fault?

Props don't fly off unless they are installed improperly and/or are damaged (either prior to or during the flight). Neither of those cases are covered under DJI's warranty.

 

[Gearbox]

Props don't fly off unless they are installed improperly and/or are damaged (either prior to or during the flight). Neither of those cases are covered under DJI's warranty.

I don't completely agree with you , I did a bunch of research after mine came off & its not that uncommon of an event . True , they may damage themselves in flight , but if you don't hit anything, it should fall under warranty for a defective Prop, if still under warranty .

 

[Backwoody]

Well, a repair may not be cost effective. Seeing your debris, there is no way a shop can repair for less than the price of new. Pay attention to the Black Friday sales at DJI...a new P3S for $399.

 

[msinger]

I don't completely agree with you

It seems DJI does though. In this post, I can see you had to pay to get your Phantom fixed.

 

[RodPad]

I don't completely agree with you , I did a bunch of research after mine came off & its not that uncommon of an event . True , they may damage themselves in flight , but if you don't hit anything, it should fall under warranty for a defective Prop, if still under warranty .

The OP, and @Meta4 , both stated it was over a year, there would be no warranty, is there some kind of extended warranty I'm missing?

Rod

 

[Robert Smith jr]

Walmart has the Standard for $365 today ...


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[RodPad]

@Andreas Pashiardis, Hey man, that sucks, so yeah the compass error would have been when the unit was falling out of control. I haven't had my props off in months, this makes a good reminder a lot of these maintenance checks.

So looking at you battery levels, those seam suspicious but I guess not a cause. Wow, all that happened in a minute.

What happen to me a week a go a had flight that was fine, but when I started the motors, I try to watch and listen for home point and RTH. There was some other message that I didn't catch nor I wasn't sure if the ones I watch for even happened. Everything looked fine on the screen, off I went. When I played back my flight on my tablet, I saw what the message was, low battery temperature warning.
Should we have a way to keep or scroll what the alerts were while we are in the air?

Anyways maybe a new thread.

Sorry for loss, thanks for sharing your grief

Rod

 

[Meta4]

Phantom Log Viewer - PhantomHelp.com
okay here you go. let me know what you can find.

Without looking at engine data, I wouldn't be so sure that a prop flew off.
What the flight data shows is enough to completely explain the Phantom falling from the sky.
The flight started at 95% 16.7V and a battery warning that said:
Battery Temperature Below 15°C (59F). Warm battery to above 25°C (77F) before flying.

The Phantom was pushed hard at max speed and another warning (Propulsion Output Limited. Aircraft mobility has been lowered.) came in at 32 seconds.
By this time the battery had dropped to 94% and 13.5V.
The Phantom was still driven hard at max speed + max climb until at 57 seconds it started falling.
The compass error 1.5 seconds later when the Phantom has fallen 30 feet is simply showing the Phantom falling and is unrelated.
(compass errors don't cause Phantoms to fall)

Given the circumstances of the flight where it driven at max speed and max climb despite two warnings and that it was over a year old, I would be more than surprised if DJI offered a replacement.

 

[Andreas Pashiardis]

I'm not sure I have gotten that warning before and it doesn't mean much. Also the prop was gone when I found it


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[Andreas Pashiardis]

Also I could not find the other propeller no matter how long and hard I searched


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[RodPad]

I believe those messages should have been on your screen, but not long enough.
Play back your flight in the flight log and see if they show up, not all of them do, I have also found that if you stay on that flight on replay, those warnings won't come up until you exit that screen and re pick your flight again, that was in the past.

Rod

 

[rocketflyer]

By this time the battery had dropped to 94% and 13.5V.
The Phantom was still driven hard at max speed + max climb until at 57 seconds it started falling.

So you're saying it simply ran out of power or shut down? Shouldn't it have initiated RTH?

 

[RodPad]

I think @Meta4 is going toward a motor failure, or power failure do to to much current draw to the motors.
RTH would only happen on loss of remote signal, he wouldn't have the whole log if lost remote control signal.

Rod

 

[Andreas Pashiardis]

I believe those messages should have been on your screen, but not long enough.
Play back your flight in the flight log and see if they show up, not all of them do, I have also found that if you stay on that flight on replay, those warnings won't come up until you exit that screen and re pick your flight again, that was in the past.

Rod

Yeah I never saw any of them on screen and I don't think they would cause the drone to fall out of the sky. The propeller fell off 100%

 

[RodPad]

@Andreas Pashiardis,
Just thought if the mother board is scrap, you could pull the internal sd card (Black Box) and get the data to be looked at, I don't know how it would be done, but I bet it requires steady hands and a soldering iron.

Rod

 

[Meta4]

Yeah I never saw any of them on screen and I don't think they would cause the drone to fall out of the sky. The propeller fell off 100%

They are there in the flight record.
When the battery drops from 16.7V to 13.5V in 32 seconds and you keep pushing it to the max something's got to give.
There are many cases of Phantoms falling from the sky with cold/depleted batteries like that.
Your battery was unable to give you more power because it was pushed beyond it's limit which is what the warnings were saying.

So you're saying it simply ran out of power or shut down? Shouldn't it have initiated RTH?

RTH isn't going to happen unless the Phantom loses control signal or the conditions for smart RTH are fulfilled.
The operator kept hard on the sticks, sapping the battery beyond a sustainable limit.
In this case, there was no power available to RTH or anything apart from falling.

 

[rocketflyer]

The operator kept hard on the sticks, sapping the battery beyond a sustainable limit.

I see, although I'm surprised the phantom firmware doesn't throttle back under these kind of extreme circumstances?