camera or drone slowly dying

[vincent228]

This one really has me stumped.
I took my phantom 4 pro out for a little flight on saturday. clear skies and 50 degrees.
I notices when my camera was facing ahead or slightly down, I had some jello to the video.
camera straight down was rock steady.
i checked all the usual. props were okay (even tried 2 other sets) nothing on gimbal. gimbal moved freely, etc.
then yesterday, i tried another flight, and same deal.
I tried to calibrate the gimabal, and no matter what i did, the calibration would stop at 50%. I followed some of the posts here about reloading software, etc, no dice.
I sometime came up with a "gimbal overload", but then would dissapear, and start again.
Then i noticed after restarting the phantom, the gimbal would kick sideways about 8 seconds into initializing, and then the gimbal would start drifting slightly mostly left and right, but a little up and down, like it was searching for something.
I calibrated emu as stated in some of the posts both ways (through pc software, and sitting on side, upside down, etc), and still no dice.
Then! sometime i could get the gimbal to calibrate, but the gimbal would not move during the calibration, and when finished, the gimbal would lock itself all the way to the right.

NOW im getting no transmission from the camera to the ipad.

I swapped the camera from one of my other P4P's, and the problem followed the camera, not the drone.

Has anyone ever had this cascading problem?

if you repaired it yourself, which board did the trick?

This one has me stumped.

 

[Capt KO]

Sounds a bit like your tilt motor is getting weak so can’t complete calibration. Just guessing but have done a few myself. Also hard landings could have damaged the ribbon cable. Diagnosing gimbles and cameras is often expensive trial and error. Thankfully you have others to switch out and the tilt motor is easy to access. Possible gimble board but they usually work..or don’t, not cheap either.

 

[efrieb]

This one really has me stumped.
I took my phantom 4 pro out for a little flight on saturday. clear skies and 50 degrees.
I notices when my camera was facing ahead or slightly down, I had some jello to the video.
camera straight down was rock steady.
i checked all the usual. props were okay (even tried 2 other sets) nothing on gimbal. gimbal moved freely, etc.
then yesterday, i tried another flight, and same deal.
I tried to calibrate the gimabal, and no matter what i did, the calibration would stop at 50%. I followed some of the posts here about reloading software, etc, no dice.
I sometime came up with a "gimbal overload", but then would dissapear, and start again.
Then i noticed after restarting the phantom, the gimbal would kick sideways about 8 seconds into initializing, and then the gimbal would start drifting slightly mostly left and right, but a little up and down, like it was searching for something.
I calibrated emu as stated in some of the posts both ways (through pc software, and sitting on side, upside down, etc), and still no dice.
Then! sometime i could get the gimbal to calibrate, but the gimbal would not move during the calibration, and when finished, the gimbal would lock itself all the way to the right.

NOW im getting no transmission from the camera to the ipad.

I swapped the camera from one of my other P4P's, and the problem followed the camera, not the drone.

Has anyone ever had this cascading problem?

if you repaired it yourself, which board did the trick?

This one has me stumped.

I had a similar issue with my P4, after replacing Gimbal Camera Motherboard Image Transmission Board problem solved.

 

[vincent228]

Sounds a bit like your tilt motor is getting weak so can’t complete calibration. Just guessing but have done a few myself. Also hard landings could have damaged the ribbon cable. Diagnosing gimbles and cameras is often expensive trial and error. Thankfully you have others to switch out and the tilt motor is easy to access. Possible gimble board but they usually work..or don’t, not cheap either.

Thanks for the suggestions.

when you talk about the gimble board, are you talking about the 2 boards in the top of the gimbal?
the 1 has the fan attached, and the one below takes the micro sd card and micro usb?

 

[vincent228]

I had a similar issue with my P4, after replacing Gimbal Camera Motherboard Image Transmission Board problem solved.

thanks for the suggestion.
are you talking about the 2 cards in the camera housing itself?
or the 2 on top of the gimbal that has a fan, and the other takes the sd card?

 

[Capt KO]

thanks for the suggestion.
are you talking about the 2 cards in the camera housing itself?
or the 2 on top of the gimbal that has a fan, and the other takes the sd card?

The gimble board is on back of camera, expensive. Tilt motor attaches to it. Small board, cheap, on back of gimble does the other 2 motors roll, yaw. Trade parts if you want to try. Otherwise if you had a hard landing, probably ribbon.

 

[Capt KO]

If you trade parts without success, replace ribbon but only use oem. Little more $ but only one that actually works.
Have fun, brings back memories, Lol

 

[vincent228]

If you trade parts without success, replace ribbon but only use oem. Little more $ but only one that actually works.
Have fun, brings back memories, Lol

Thank you.

I havent had any hard landings at all.

thats why im so baffled.

I guess i just chalk this one up to murphys law.

Thanks again

 

[Capt KO]

I love my P4 + P4P’s. P4’s can haul stuff, like for fishing. Have MA2 for travel too. If ribbon ok,switch out gimble board or tilt motor, then flip if needed.
Post solution when solved, helps others here with similar problem.

 

[efrieb]

thanks for the suggestion.
are you talking about the 2 cards in the camera housing itself?
or the 2 on top of the gimbal that has a fan, and the other takes the sd card?

I replaced the lower one not the one connected to the fan. Also if you replace it add additional thermal grease.