Could a company make better P3 shells?

Doink · Aug 5, 2016

Here's an antenna spacer he made me

quanticchaos · Aug 5, 2016

Doink said:
View attachment 61500

Here's an antenna spacer he made me

Lucky you, we have to pay good money to have that or to have access to a laser cutting machine

Doink · Aug 5, 2016

He only does it for a hobby, think it cost him about £12000 but that was some years back, he also has a vinyl cutter as well so a few vinyl wraps will be leaving his garage at some point

AlexSP · Aug 5, 2016

Problematic shells are only a fraction of flying P3s. Maybe that's not as a big market for a company to invest in as we're led to believe based on complaints. These things evolve fast too, probably will be P5 time when someone can do it successfully as well... But the real trick is to do it right, just look at it that's really tricky to get the exact tolerances, angles and intricacies of the shell, I've tried myself to mold it and I'm quite used to doing these things, no luck this time tough, it's really complex and precise thus very very hard to get right. Not worth it IMO.

I've fixed/improved a few P3 shells here for friends using carbon fiber cloth and resin, it's a quick, cheap, easy and definitive fix. But it's on the original shell, a new one is quite a tough task. Also had a hard time fixing -actually rebuilding entirely - the screw anchors inside my P3P control, they broke after taking a few bumps in the trunk of my motorcycle during a marathon filming here some time ago. Being more careful now...

Silverwingflinx · Aug 6, 2016

I used epoxy after 6 shell replacements,CF strong arms and alloy strong arms still cracks!! Don't use strong arms any more!! So feed up now I have tried epoxy,top and bottom of shell.no pics of bottom shell but it looks the same as top yes poured epoxy over the lights in bottom shell.if this still cracks aaaaaaagggggggaaain I will compleatly fill the arms!!!!

quanticchaos · Aug 9, 2016

Well... Just bought microheli's. I'll post some images when I get it.

Silverwingflinx · Aug 9, 2016

quanticchaos said:
Well... Just bought microheli's. I'll post some images when I get it.

Yes I would like to see what you got!! Thax

Trackman1 · Aug 9, 2016

msinger said:
Anything is possible -- but, DJI does have a lot of experience making shells. I suppose they haven't perfected it yet though.

Here's an interesting poll on the DJI forum. Currently, 78% of people don't have cracks yet. If we assume that people with problems are more vocal than those with no problems, that 78% number is probably much higher than reported in that poll so far.

I wonder if the shells are perfected. DJI may want them to break first upon striking an object or person. A safety factor. Better the p3 shatters if it hits a plane or car windshield or someones skull.
Making it stronger would no doubt increase it's damage potential.

quanticchaos · Aug 9, 2016

Trackman1 said:
I wonder if the shells are perfected. DJI may want them to break first upon striking an object or person. A safety factor. Better the p3 shatters if it hits a plane or car windshield or someones skull.
Making it stronger would no doubt increase it's damage potential.

I guess if DJI were worried about safety they would sell their drones with propeller guards included since that's something that can really hurt you... And it's not like they are too expensive to make. I really don't think they care at all.

AlexSP · Aug 9, 2016

Trackman1 said:
I wonder if the shells are perfected. DJI may want them to break first upon striking an object or person. A safety factor. Better the p3 shatters if it hits a plane or car windshield or someones skull.
Making it stronger would no doubt increase it's damage potential.

Not likely. Engineering and design have better ways to deal with this that don´t involve cracking or delicate structural parts during regular use. Even more so if the issue can induce a crash or loss of control, not logical.

Besides, the battery is the most compact and heavy part thus the most damage-capable in a ACxAC collision, along with the props in the case of animal or human contact.