Crash of The Year Video!

Flyer91 · Jun 7, 2014

Great all around "feel good " story for sure!

Thanks for posting!!

zalph · Jun 7, 2014

Cringe.
As soon as it turns around and you see that chimney you know its go no choice but flying there.

Very lucky to get it back in one piece, and no gimbal damage. Good to know that nice people are everywhere.

But this is why I think that fail safe should automatically ascend the UAV to 100m/300F before returning home. Far less to hit a that height except for buildings.

andrewket2 · Jun 7, 2014

Nice video of my home town. Classic.

Elginet · Jun 7, 2014

midwestjeff said:
So I thought I'd share my story from yesterday!

I was doing some long distance FPV flying with my FPVLR antenna mods and one of my favorite spots to fly in Chicago is near the river. I usually fly south down the river having the sun behind me but yesterday I was trying to cover over a mile of low flying footage in one battery, so I flew a new route when I hit the max "city" range of my setup which is about 4000 feet now. Whenever I hit the end of my range the Return Home activates and it comes back into view and I simply take over control again and keep flying... Well that would have worked fine.. BUT.. well watch and see!

I can laugh now at what happened because I got her back, only damage was propellers! Crazy how lucky I got! When it hit the ground the propellers were still spinning. It landed in this part of the city known as the "Projects" and I normally would not go to that part of town. :shock: I had to get in the car and drive to go attempt to find it based on where I thought it last was. Luckily the person who found it was very nice and saw me with the remote walking around! phewww!

I edited this video down from 14 minutes to 3 minutes.. Enjoy!!

http://vimeo.com/97491394

Absolutely epic! Lol. Who the hell put that smokestack there??!?!?!

Mossie · Jun 7, 2014

Brilliant

I'm really sorry for your crash but that was one of the funniest videos I've seen for some time. You've really cheered up a rainy miserable day here in the UK !

Dorsal · Jun 7, 2014

Awesome!! You can't make this stuff up!

Jayford · Jun 7, 2014

Wow! I can't believe how little damage there was! This may be a record for hardest crash and least damage! I guess because it landed upside down it just mowed the grass and the Camera and Gimbal were fine! HAHAHA

Dirty Bird · Jun 7, 2014

gmbn.inc said:
I agree, 20m is neither here nor there really. Perhaps if we were to contact DJI they might consider writing it into a future firmware upgrade? Even 50m would be a huge improvement. There's not much sticking up above 150ft, unless you're in a city of course.

I wrote DJI's software engineering team a couple of months ago and requested they allow us to select a height for RTH. Write them and make the same request. It should be a simple enough change in the software...just one more selection in the GeoFencing section. If enough of us ask hopefully they will implement the change.

Flyer91 · Jun 7, 2014

Dirty Bird said:
gmbn.inc said:

I agree, 20m is neither here nor there really. Perhaps if we were to contact DJI they might consider writing it into a future firmware upgrade? Even 50m would be a huge improvement. There's not much sticking up above 150ft, unless you're in a city of course.

Click to expand...

I wrote DJI's software engineering team a couple of months ago and requested they allow us to select a height for RTH. Write them and make the same request. It should be a simple enough change in the software...just one more selection in the GeoFencing section. If enough of us ask hopefully they will implement the change.

Good for you Bird!
Did you use the general DJI email or do you have a specific addy?
Great idea!!

TheChief · Jun 7, 2014

My gosh. Woaaah! The worst part of the whole ordeal is that you can see the smoke stack coming, and you just go, no No NO! Not there!

Flyer91 · Jun 7, 2014

The more I think about this viddy, the more I think we 'really' do need crash avoidance or a change to the failsafe program.

I mean here's the scenario .....
You go about flying FPV and an obstacle comes between you and the Phantom.
Your Phantom says "holy crap, I've lost the control signal, I'm heading home!!"
Home (unfortunately) is a direct line between you and the Phantom when it's lost the control signal ....... because that big ole obstacle got between you an your Phantom.

So:
Home-----Obstacle--Phantom ... Home------Obstacle-Phantom ... Home------ObstaclePhantom ... Home-------obstantom!!!

Maybe DJI could program the Phantom control loss failsafe to stop, back the phu-awk up until you get control again .... so you can yaw 360º and see "Danger Will Robinson)!

Flame suit on!

P.S. Bird's suggestion is much better though ....

Dirty Bird · Jun 7, 2014

Flyer91 said:
Good for you Bird!
Did you use the general DJI email or do you have a specific addy?
Great idea!!

I wrote them at [email protected] & also [email protected] - the second one goes straight to China. They did respond saying they would consider my request. Hit 'em up...if enough of us do they may act.

Dirty Bird · Jun 7, 2014

Last week while flying at Sideling Hill I made a tactical mistake and came within inches of a crash. I was near my truck and flew around the other side of the mountain. It dawned on me what I had just done, but it was too late. Suddenly all that granite was between me and the Phantom! She lost both control & fpv, and RTH initiated. When I watched the video later, she was heading straight into the side of the hilltop, and wound up missing some small trees by inches. It wouldn't have been a long fall, but the camera/gimbal isn't very forgiving. :shock: I broke my rule of always staying above the highest object between the Phantom and home!

Flyer91 · Jun 7, 2014

Dirty Bird said:
Last week while flying at Sideling Hill I made a tactical mistake and came within inches of a crash. I was near my truck and flew around the other side of the mountain. It dawned on me what I had just done, but it was too late. Suddenly all that granite was between me and the Phantom! She lost both control & fpv, and RTH initiated. When I watched the video later, she was heading straight into the side of the hilltop, and wound up missing some small trees by inches. It wouldn't have been a long fall, but the camera/gimbal isn't very forgiving. :shock: I broke my rule of always staying above the highest object between the Phantom and home!

I''m up in the Sierra mountains, so at take off I would do a straight verticle climb to above the highest alt above my home point in my flight path, and reset home so the Phantom thought that was home's GL.

Then upon RTH the Phantom will go to 20m/60ft above that alt and spot and then start to land.
As is it's normal mode .... it will just continue to descend until it sees it is not descending anymore (has landed) and then shut off.

It works, but is still not as good as being able to program a default failsafe height, because you need to remember to do it each time you fly in areas of varying terrain or around tall obstacles.

plasmo · Jun 7, 2014

Great video. Glad you got your bird back in one piece! I know that bridge well...

Mori55 · Jun 7, 2014

You guys realize since naza came out , before the phantom 1 , that's been requested from DJI ? as usual nothing , so believe me your pissing in the wind.

Flyer91 · Jun 7, 2014

If the response from DJI to us all writing them about the tilt lever thing is any indication ....... I do believe you are totally right!
But ..... I'm out here in drought ravaged California, so pissing in the wind is pretty much the only way to keep cool!

Elginet · Jun 7, 2014

Dirty Bird said:
gmbn.inc said:

I agree, 20m is neither here nor there really. Perhaps if we were to contact DJI they might consider writing it into a future firmware upgrade? Even 50m would be a huge improvement. There's not much sticking up above 150ft, unless you're in a city of course.

Click to expand...

I wrote DJI's software engineering team a couple of months ago and requested they allow us to select a height for RTH. Write them and make the same request. It should be a simple enough change in the software...just one more selection in the GeoFencing section. If enough of us ask hopefully they will implement the change.

That's a great idea. I pretty much had the same thing happen, and the damage was negligible (a prop) but it would have made it back from a rogue fly-away, if it had another 20' in altitude.

yali · Jun 7, 2014

xgeek said:
LOL what are the chances of that. So much open sky

The chance of that is almost 100%. I bet if you do the same it will hit that tall chimney again. Why ? the reason is very simple. Your vision plus must fly in the sunny area (assume your transmitter is a sun) because the sunshine is her control command source. if she flies into the shadow cast by that chimney, she loses the control signal. When she loses signal, she will go directly home. but there definitely an obstacle between her and her home because it is that obstacle cut her signal.
The only way to avoid this is you moving away from her taking off point or fly higher than that chimney!