With the recent upgrade and changes that DJI and made to the Phantom Vision Plus and the Firmware, you are restricted to fly close to an airport. Now I have watched the DJI video concerning this but I wanted to see if someone new more specifically about using the GS near an airport. The new update says that within 1.8 miles you cannot fly your phantom 2 at all, period. Then, as you go further away from that 1.8 miles there are different altitudes that you are restricted to fly until you are past 5 miles than you can fly as high as you like. In the video, they made a comment that you cannot use waypoints at all within 5 miles of the airport. I would think, and hope, that you can use your GS in the same way that the phantom is restricted, i.e no flying within 1.8 miles but then from 1.8 miles to 5 miles you can fly up to varying altitudes up to 4oo feet. Has anyone had any experience using their GS near and airport, thanks.
GROUND STATION NEAR AIRPORT- NEW FIRMWARE
- Thread starter DocSteveMaxi
- Start date
I mentioned this feature of the upgrade to The Department of the Interior's Chief Ranger for the Colorado National Mounument who has been consulting with my company about control of UAV's. They don't want to ban them, they just want to know what their options are as far possible future control if there are too many flying in the park full of sightseeing areas with people and vehicles.
For me, I think this innovation is a great feature.
For me, I think this innovation is a great feature.
@DocSteveMaxi:
I emailed DJI about this specific difference between the flight controllers and the Ground Station over two weeks ago, and guess what..... Yes you're right..... I've still yet to receive a reply.
When DJI first put their video about this on Youtube it was only on line for a couple of hours, the presenter looked as though he'd been found in a dumpster and wasn't conveying the DJI corporate image they'd had with Colin. So the video was removed and the presenter told to get his hair cut, tidy up his beard, and put on a clean t-shirt in preparation for the second attempt.
At this time the new app had not been released so I had been forewarned and disabled the auto update feature on my iPad.
When the second video aired the new app was in iTunes and also the revised PC software was online. As I don't use the PC with the Ground Station I'd decided to update it and see what would happen.
I connected up the Ground Station, let my F550 acquire a 3D GPS lock and low and behold I was now officially in a " DJI no fly zone ".
I'm about four miles from Leeds and Bradford Airport. The airport is 210m ASL where as my flying site is only 55m ASL so the likelyhood of me interacting with any commercial flights is near non-existent but DJI consider me to be a high risk.
My take on the situation is that the Ground Station was originally intended for their bigger airframes ( F450, F550, S800, S1000 ) where those that were flying had built their craft and possibly had more experience. Now because it was compatible with the smaller but more popular Phantom platform there was a higher possibility of misuse. So rather than take the time to educate they have instead chosen to put a blanket restriction on the use of the Ground Station thus angering many like myself and insulting the intelligence of its customers.
Time for a lie down me thinks
Regards
Nidge
I emailed DJI about this specific difference between the flight controllers and the Ground Station over two weeks ago, and guess what..... Yes you're right..... I've still yet to receive a reply.
When DJI first put their video about this on Youtube it was only on line for a couple of hours, the presenter looked as though he'd been found in a dumpster and wasn't conveying the DJI corporate image they'd had with Colin. So the video was removed and the presenter told to get his hair cut, tidy up his beard, and put on a clean t-shirt in preparation for the second attempt.
At this time the new app had not been released so I had been forewarned and disabled the auto update feature on my iPad.
When the second video aired the new app was in iTunes and also the revised PC software was online. As I don't use the PC with the Ground Station I'd decided to update it and see what would happen.
I connected up the Ground Station, let my F550 acquire a 3D GPS lock and low and behold I was now officially in a " DJI no fly zone ".
I'm about four miles from Leeds and Bradford Airport. The airport is 210m ASL where as my flying site is only 55m ASL so the likelyhood of me interacting with any commercial flights is near non-existent but DJI consider me to be a high risk.
My take on the situation is that the Ground Station was originally intended for their bigger airframes ( F450, F550, S800, S1000 ) where those that were flying had built their craft and possibly had more experience. Now because it was compatible with the smaller but more popular Phantom platform there was a higher possibility of misuse. So rather than take the time to educate they have instead chosen to put a blanket restriction on the use of the Ground Station thus angering many like myself and insulting the intelligence of its customers.
Time for a lie down me thinks
Regards
Nidge
At this point, I'm not sure who to believe, I find your news disparaging. What could possibly be the dynamics behind this sort of corporate behavior assuming you know what your saying which I tend to give more credibility too in light of the video switch.
Nidge, are you saying that the GS now effectively has different restrictions than the Phantom's firmware?
OI Photography said:
Yes that's correct. On the map display the restricted area of a five mile radius is is shaded in red, and waypoints cannot be executed in this area. I'm curently writing this on my iPad as I don't have access to my PC otherwise I'd attatch a screen shot of the area around my local airport. The irony here is that the CAA do not have any restrictions in this area for craft such as hobby sized airplanes/helicopters/multirotors/ with an all up weight of 7kg or less other than those associated with regular RC flight. In fact there are two, or more, long established model RC flight clubs also in this supposed restricted airspace.
Regards
Nidge
I thought that was the same restriction (for DJI's designated "Class A" airports) that's now baked in to the Phantom's firmware
So what's the odds of some enterprising young coder changing some of the parameters? Heck, they do it for every other device so I'm guessing someone will eventually hack this? :?:
OI Photography said:
The no fly zones for the flight controller do differ depending on the category that DJI have classed each airport as, a cat B airport has a radial no flyzone of 0.6miles and then the flight is restriction pertains to height with a reduced restriction the further you move away from the centre point of the flight restricted area. I'd have to refer back to the video but I believe the restriction for cat A is no flying within 1.6mile of the centre and again a height restriction that reduces the further you move away from the centre point.
For the ground station it is a total restriction in use up to five mile distance from the centre point irrespective of the class DJI have designated the airport as.
Myself and another member of the forum looked at exchanging the IPA file associated with the ground station between two iPads and this was a non-starter due to the file having an embedded signature associated with that particular iPad.
Someone else suggested that you could just reinstall the original PC software from the installation CD however this software is not actually on the CD but just an executable that directs to the DJI host for downloading.
I do understand DJI wanting to promote sensible and safe use of their products, as any manufacturer would, but if it wasn't for me disabling the auto update feature of my iPad I would no longer be able to fly my F550 as my situation is one where I have great difficulty travelling out of this 78.5 square mile area.
Regards
Nidge
Nidge said:
Understood, and that's the point I had missed, thanks. Fortunately it's a non-issue in the area I live/work, but I'm surprised the GS doesn't just follow the same logic as what they put in the Phantoms. Maybe when waypoints is released for the P2V it'll have the same (more extensive) restrictions as the current GS now has.
Nidge said:
Have a look at where I live. An island 18miles long, 6 wide. I was just waiting the supplier for the Phantom 2 to be in stock. Glad it was a bit late to be in stock so I cancelled the order. Where shall I fly this quad if I had bought it?
What I cannot understand is why the airport is cat A, when larger airports in Italy are cat B. I would have bought it if they changed it to cat B.
BTW. The two green arrows are model aircraft clubs with no restrictions other for weight. Max 20Kg if I remember.
Regards
Joseph
Attachments
I'm about to install the GS but before I download any software I'd like to ask for clarification on this latest update. Is there any way that I can avoid using the airport restricted version of the iPad GS software? (I don't have any DJI software on my iPad yet.)
GearLoose said:
I don't think there is. I was lucky and disabled the update process on my iPad so I'm running with an older version of the APP.
Another chap wasn't so lucky and the update is severely restricting his commercial use. We tried to import the .ipa file from my iPad to his but because it has a digital signature associated with my install it didn't take.
Regards
Nidge
Similar threads
