Drone blew away in high wind, any suggestion on how to calculate where it may land?

[dangrand1103]

If all of a sudden I get "compass error" while flying my P3P, should I then flip my switch from P mode to A mode and try to bring it home?

 

[flyNfrank]

Absolutely, or land it and go retrieve it.

 

[George_Sav]

Just to throw in my thoughts on possible recovery...
The way it's done without log information would be to stand at the last spot that you saw the drone and useing a mapping compass find North then sight down the last known location. This will give you a bearing, now walk down the bearing, with luck your downed drone will be within sight once you walk down the bearing, however this cannot take into consideration the RTH which may have kicked in once the drone dropped below a wind speed less than its forward speed.
This technique works at sea for a MOB !

 

[Mark The Droner]

Good morning Mark. Dan Grandmaison in Duluth, MN
I lost but found my P3P. I didn't know about trackers. I want to buy one. I don't care how much it costs. What should I buy. Thank you.

Good morning!

If it was me, I'd buy a Flytrex Live 3G Plus for your P3P. They're pricey but I don't care, I'm sold on Flytrex.

But you should do some research and while you're at it, also check out the Trackimo to figure out if that's better suited for you.

Hope this helps.

 

[Hoovermaneuver]

Tape this to the underside of the drone...lol
https://www.amazon.com/Tile-Mate-Fi..._1?ie=UTF8&qid=1481386223&sr=8-1&keywords=xy3

 

[flyNfrank]

Good morning!

If it was me, I'd buy a Flytrex Live 3G Plus for your P3P. They're pricey but I don't care, I'm sold on Flytrex.

But you should do some research and while you're at it, also check out the Trackimo to figure out if that's better suited for you.

Hope this helps.

That company has made so many broken promises with members on this website alone that the mention of them should almost not be allowed. There has been a lot of good people on here that have been dealt with in a very poor manner. I have a brand new Live 3G Plus I installed and made one flight, the data on the flight logger was not correct. I made numerous attempts at contacting with no response. They have on going quality issues with all their products, and they maintain the worse customer support in the industry. I would not recommend their products to anyone until they clean up their issues.

 

[jlrsn]

I also use a Marco Polo. I flew my P3 and then my P4 for almost 6 months without a tracker but I lost my P4 1/2 hour after I attached my new Marco Polo which led me back to my P4. It hit the very top of a 100'+ Ponderosa far from everything in very rough heavily forested mountainous backcountry up at 8,000' in the Rocky Mountains. I'd have never found it as I've never wandered into that area that gets 8'+ of snow. I have no cell service in my area and GPS Signals under the heavily forested mountain is spotty if at all. That Marco Polo was the best $220+ accessory that I could have ever bought!

Sent from my VS995 using PhantomPilots mobile app

 

[MichaelMcG]

This is one of the things that terrifies me about buying a $1000 vulnerable piece of kit which I have very little control over when its high up in the air or over open water. But unless it is in one or both of these places, its of very little use.

I already asked the priest who will be officiating at my daughter's wedding, if he'll let me use it inside the church during the service and he wasn't very warm to the idea. I tried showing him the dji promotional video, but he was having none of it. I'm joking, of course.

 

[pounder35]

Maybe this has already been brought up but somewhere in DJI GO and Litchi is a "Locate my Aircraft" function. It's based on the last recorded GPS coordinates. I've used it three times (shows I'm a sorry pilot) and it's put me dead on my aircraft in wilderness areas. Within about five yards at least.

 

[CharlieU]

I was flying my Phantom Standard 3 and it got too high where suddenly winds started pushing it away. I hit RTH, which made it climb higher and by the time I realized it would be smart to just land rather than RTH, it was out of range of my controller so I just watched it drift off into the sunset.

I was using Litchi app so was able to upload my flight into Healthy Drones. Seems to have mostly gone in a straight line towards the end - is there a way to predict how long it remained in the air before the battery went down to the point it would auto land? I'm sure it is somewhere along that line, but I'm not sure how to best calculate where.

I was flying my Phantom Standard 3 and it got too high where suddenly winds started pushing it away. I hit RTH, which made it climb higher and by the time I realized it would be smart to just land rather than RTH, it was out of range of my controller so I just watched it drift off into the sunset.

I was using Litchi app so was able to upload my flight into Healthy Drones. Seems to have mostly gone in a straight line towards the end - is there a way to predict how long it remained in the air before the battery went down to the point it would auto land? I'm sure it is somewhere along that line, but I'm not sure how to best calculate where.

I had two phantom 4's not return home, one on mission and one on FPV. I recovered both by clicking"find my aircraft" in settings in Litchi app I was flying with. I followed the red triangle (my aircraft) and found both. A hike up a mountain for one and the other in a backyard a half mile away. The home owner didn't see my note on his front door and called the police. The cop saw my note and knocked on my door at 9:30 pm with my phantom. We had a nice chat. Thank you Phoenix Police Dept. Good luck.

 

[RodPad]

I think the idea is, if it landed safely or even crashed and the battery stayed intact, you can go out looking for it and if there's enough battery for it to stay on for a while, you might pick up the signal on your flight app as you get somewhat close to it - with its GPS location...

I'm still stupid about Litchi,
Is Litchi better the Dji app for finding a lost Phantom?
Both the Dji app and Litchi would have the location data until you lost connection with your phantom?
Both apps could use the remote to reconnect to the powered on Phantom for an updated location?

So if you were running a Litchi way point mission, with out the remote picking up the Phantom, then Litchi would have no clue where within the route where your Phantom went?

Sorry, been sick since Friday

Rod

 

[Meta4]

I'm still stupid about Litchi,
Is Litchi better the Dji app for finding a lost Phantom?

They are both only as good as the data they are able to show.
And if the Phantom continues on after signal is lost neither will show where the Phantom is.
But sometimes there is enough evidence to join the dots and work out which way the Phantom was going and look for obstacles that may have stopped it.
Sometimes there isn't, particularly with the Standard because of the limited signal range.

 

[RodPad]

They are both only as good as the data they are able to show.
And if the Phantom continues on after signal is lost neither will show where the Phantom is.
But sometimes there is enough evidence to join the dots and work out which way the Phantom was going and look for obstacles that may have stopped it.
Sometimes there isn't, particularly with the Standard because of the limited signal range.

Thanks Man,
That's what I thought, and that is what I thought needed to be cleared up.

Rod