Dropped out of the sky

calvinball10 · Jan 5, 2014

Hey folks. I have a new Phantom v1.1.1 and on the 4th day of flying it went black and dropped out of the sky.
Only about 5 minutes into the flight. Fully charged battery. Batteries have been providing a good 12 minutes of flight time.

No prior crashes. Everything was working fine with the flights on the battery used during the crash and with my two other batteries used before and after the crash. No mods to the copter and camera was not attached for this flight. All software was updated before the first flight a week ago.

It was about 30 feet up and just went black - no lights or leds at all. I have been pouring through this board and Youtube for possible answers but have not found an anything. Can the Phantom be turned off in mid flight without landing with the sticks?

A few scratches and nicks but luckily the machine still flies well. I popped in a third battery and everything was normal but still looking for any possible answers.

Thanks for any help!

LandYachtMedia · Jan 5, 2014

You may want to open it up and check all the electrical connections between the board and the ESCs. There has been one report where a bad solder join was found on one of the main power leads under the cover. That is what was theorized as the source of the magic brick trick his Phantom performed.

Also inspect the battery connectors with a bright light to see if there is any traces of arcing or hot spots from a bad connection.

marcus_canada · Jan 5, 2014

Problems as catastrophic as this are usually the easiest to diagnose. All the lights out, no motors, no 'nothing' means You have a disconnected battery cable on the board or your battery has thrown a cable inside the heatwrap.

calvinball10 · Jan 5, 2014

Thanks for the suggestions.

Just flew it today without incident or problems with with all 3 batteries including battery number 2 - the one that was being used during the crash.

Don't see any signs of issues with the battery, wires, or the interior cable without opening the copter.

The battery connection is very tight - almost too tight - but it is solid.