How long has your craft made it, MTBF (Mean time between failure)

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Ok guys, I've been looking around and trying to determine the MTBF for the Phantom. I know it's limited if we have had crashes. However if you haven't and have been flying a while how long and how good of quality do we have in this product. As an example a hard drive in a computer has a listed value of 250,000 hours mean time before failure. So how long have you had yours flying. Let's hear from some long time flyers. Trying to see what the failure rate is.
 
I doubt if anyone keeps a running total of the number minutes in the air since they bought it. And the few who might (if any) would be too small a test group to statistically be of any value. As DJI has gradually improved some components over time, as well as created new reliability concerns with the P2V+_3, the point in time when one purchased would also be a huge factor. It isn't worth your effort, IMO.
 
Ironically it's my Vision Plus' 1 year anniversary today and 150 flights, zero crashes under her belt . Exactly 1 year ago my jaw dropped. I could not believe what the P2VP was capable of, especially how stable the gimbal was.
The only failures I had was the piss-poor wifi module design where the heat could not dissipate due to poor thermal paste and the battery swelling (auto early landing).
Over time, I discovered the weakness in the camera - poor bitrate in 1080p and the ribbon cable design flaw. This lead to selling the gimbal and camera and i eventually ended up with the hybrid Vision Plus + H33D Gopro3 mod.

if you maintain and continue learning, then you should be able to prevent crashes and failures.

Now my jaw drops again and I have "upgraded" to the P3 - this is what had thought the Phantom 2 should have been...

View attachment 18802
 
I doubt if anyone keeps a running total of the number minutes in the air since they bought it. And the few who might (if any) would be too small a test group to statistically be of any value. As DJI has gradually improved some components over time, as well as created new reliability concerns with the P2V+_3, the point in time when one purchased would also be a huge factor. It isn't worth your effort, IMO.

I believe the battery keeps track of how many times its been charged. Assuming you run it down to yellow or red before landing, that's about 20 minutes per battery charge...right?.
 
I rarely run it all the way down to yellow or red. If I don't feel I have enough battery for my second flight (I usually have certain shots or particular video in mind), I'll just pop in a fresh battery for my second flight. Maybe people operate differently than I do. I doubt if anyone stays in the air 20 minutes on a regular basis - that is, if they want to make sure they make it back home and land okay. So battery minutes spent each time you charge is also a huge variable.
 
I rarely run it all the way down to yellow or red. If I don't feel I have enough battery for my second flight (I usually have certain shots or particular video in mind), I'll just pop in a fresh battery for my second flight. Maybe people operate differently than I do. I doubt if anyone stays in the air 20 minutes on a regular basis - that is, if they want to make sure they make it back home and land okay. So battery minutes spent each time you charge is also a huge variable.

Agreed. But its just an estimate. Each of us has a pattern -- you may never run to yellow, and I bet you rarely recharge with only 5 minutes on a fresh charge. The real number is somewhere in between. As your number of flights gets past 100 or so, an estimate somewhere in the middle will be a good statistical approximation. Assuming you're someone who wants to keep track. Might be an interesting app to build though. I wonder how many owners would really be interested.
 
Have had my V2+ for 13 months now. One self-induced crash (required new camera) and one failed battery caused crash (required new shell). Total flight time probably around 100 hours. Still looking good!
 
Ok we so far have a good 13 months of flying with no failures. Any of you guys have longer than that?
We are not looking at crashes that were self caused. We are trying to determine reliability of the aircraft. Length of good service... How long?
 
Have had my V2+ for 13 months now. One self-induced crash (required new camera) and one failed battery caused crash (required new shell). Total flight time probably around 100 hours. Still looking good!

Nice record. : )
Although I too have had my P2+ for almost 13 months now, my record has been no where near as impressive. More like around (50 hrs.) in the sky. I've also just recently found the need to replace the Wi-Fi module as well. Other than that all has worked well.
 
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I flew my P2V+ V3. 44 times before fly away. About 8.8 hrs or 528 min.
I was hovering about 150 ft making sure all was ok then right about when I hit the go button on a GS mission it went into ATT mode, lost all satellites and took off in opposite direction of where it should go. I now flipped the switch to ATT mode and back to GPS mode, nothing. Tried to steer it , nothing, hit the come home button, nothing. RTH switch, nothing. I Found Phantom thanks to GPS tracker about 1/2 mile away high in a tree.. Got it back and checked camera footage and the camera cut off about half way thru flight, so did not get the crash on camera. It show it taking off going backwards and then about half way into flight turning around and going forward then video shut off . By looking at camera file dates, the flight I had just before the 'fly away' flight had the right file date. The 'fly away' flight had a file date of 12-31-2007. Seems like the phantom lost its brain for a little bit as it flew away. When I went next to turn it on it had a MC Data Error, MCU IMU Calibration error. So I plug into Phantom Assistant and recalibrate then do a compass calibrate and now it flies again. The video file dates are now back to normal.
 
Ok guys, I've been looking around and trying to determine the MTBF for the Phantom. I know it's limited if we have had crashes. However if you haven't and have been flying a while how long and how good of quality do we have in this product. As an example a hard drive in a computer has a listed value of 250,000 hours mean time before failure. So how long have you had yours flying. Let's hear from some long time flyers. Trying to see what the failure rate is.
P2V+ V3: 4 batteries cycled 30 times each over a 6 month period - no crashes and then my Wifi Extender burned out.
 

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