Addicted

[semaj]

I'm a new, first time Phantom owner... I dove straight in with the P2V and I am completely addicted... I'm an AR Drone 2.0 owner and had been looking to mod it with an RC transmitter and GPS... I realized that cost and decided I might as well spend a little more and get a device that does all of that... So I looked at the Walkera quad with FPV... Was just about to pull the trigger, but then I ran across a video of DJI's Phantom 2 Vision... That was it... I was sold... I decided to drop $1200 on something I really knew little about... This was on Dec. 23rd... I ordered from B&H... It arrived on Jan. 2nd... I had already been reading the forums and learning everything I could... I did all the updates and decided to take it out that night... It was 11:57PM... I figured, I'd just perform the calibration and maybe just let it hover... Nope... I ended up staying out there over an hour flying away... I sent it out as far as 1014 ft at an altitude of a little over 900 feet... I had NO WiFi drops at all... I decided to take it up a little higher... Next thing I know, I looked down and I'm 1247 feet out and 1124 feet in altitude... I couldn't really see it anymore... Just a faint hint of the red lights in the distant sky... I tried moving the stick to bring it back, but couldn't tell what direction I was really heading and realized I had gone even further away... I then noticed that I had 33% left on my battery and started to panic a little... Did I really just drop $1200 on something and went outside and let it fly away? Oh boy... I then said... "Let's see how/if the return to home works"... I was like... Why not... I followed the directions... I read all the user issues and do's and do not's... So I did... I powered off my transmitter... I then just stared at what I thought was my little star in the sky... Guess what? It was mine... I saw those red and yellow lights just gliding through the sky, still over 1100 feet up... Then it just stopped above me... Looked like something off Close Encounters of the Third kind... Then it started coming down.. Once it hit about 200 feet, I turned my transmitter back on, toggled S1, gave the rudder a push right... It started spinning... I had control... EVERYTHING WORKED EXACTLY AS IT SUPPOSED TO... By this time, it looked at my video time and it was as 19 minutes... My battery % was at 24%.... I decided to fly it around the parking lot I was in to see how long it would fly... At 15%, when the 2nd battery alert went off, I had been flying for 24 minutes... It kept trying to land and I kept giving it throttle... At 4 % I landed it... The time was 28 minutes!... Best night of fun (without a woman) I've had in a long time... Have flown 10 more times over last 2 days... I have 3 batteries and two chargers... I bought two DC inverters and while I'm flying, I'm also charging... When I'm driving to or from a flight, I'm charging... Once a battery is full... I pull over and send it up... Addicted, I am... alarm is set for 6:30... Gonna film a sunrise in the early cold morning...

 

[iDrone]

...So I did... I powered off my transmitter... I then just stared at what I thought was my little star in the sky... Guess what? It was mine... Then it just stopped above me... Looked like something off Close Encounters of the Third kind... Then it started coming down... I turned my transmitter back on... I had control... EVERYTHING WORKED EXACTLY AS IT SUPPOSED TO...

Ha-ha-ha! Great story! So let me be the first to say it: "Welcome to the fold!" I'm sure everyone here appreciates your taking the time sharing the first-person / first-time perspective of what its like taking the Vision out for a spin, and yep... night skies add greatly to the Oooo-Ahhh Close Encounters factor!

iDrone :lol:

 

[BenDronePilot]

Nice post. I felt the same way when flying my Vision for the first time. I also came from flying the Parrot AR Drone 2.0 as my first Quad rotor FPV plane and the Phantom 2 Vision has been such a leap forward from that it's crazy.

It's also nice to hear what a positive experience you had. If more people who have had good first flights would post as opposed to the mostly doom and gloom posts of problems, fly aways as well as user error related crashes, then things would be a lot happier around here.

I also have 3 batteries, I may bump that number to 5 when I have more cash to play with Also very impressed with the range you got with the stock setup. But that all varies depending how isolated a location it is.

Well Happy New Years! Congratulations on your new P2V and happy flying to all!

 

[Pull_Up]

Welcome to the addiction. Only downside is the withdrawal when the weather sets in bad for a period of time...

I know you're more experienced with it now and have probably sussed this, but don't forget to use the "radar" function on the app if you lose orientation. One little press and you'll see exactly which way the nose of the aircraft is pointing and will be able to fly back accordingly.

The only other thing I'd say is if you want to get the most out of those expensive batteries of ours you don't want to be regularly dipping the charge level too far below 20%. Lipos don't like regular deep discharging and in extreme cases they like it so little they can go up in flames!