I took the Phantom 2 out for a flight before dinner tonight. I did a few lap around the property, harassed the cat, took a photo of the weather vane on the roof. Normal stuff, I guess. A neighbor kid came by and asked how high it could go. For no good reason, I showed him. Really. I took it to the point where my neck hurt from looking straight up for so long, and I almost could not see the poor thing. Again, I have no excuse for this other than I guess I was curious to see the video when it came down. Anyhow, after throttling back to bring it back down to a sane altitude, the Phantom 2 got really unstable, and before I realized what it was doing, it was upside down, then tumbling. This is not a good feeling, when you're looking at $1400 bucks falling out of the sky and about to be reduced to scrap plastic.
Helicopter Rule #1: Helicopters do not like to go straight down. There's a lot of good aerodynamic reasons for this, but let's just say that going straight down is pushing the envelope. They'll do it, for sure. But in doing so, you are pushing boundaries that you don't want to push. Google: "Helicopter: Settling with power" if you are interested.
It took some faith to let go of the controls and let the Phantom at least right itself. Then I eased in some serious forward stick to get the Phantom moving in a direction other than straight down, and once I had it stable did I begin to throttle back again and bring it down and home. I don't plan on repeating this trick.
The moral of the story, go easy when throttling back. Avoid long straight descents - slide a little one way then the other - to maintain directional control. Ease it down, baby.
Helicopter Rule #1: Helicopters do not like to go straight down. There's a lot of good aerodynamic reasons for this, but let's just say that going straight down is pushing the envelope. They'll do it, for sure. But in doing so, you are pushing boundaries that you don't want to push. Google: "Helicopter: Settling with power" if you are interested.
It took some faith to let go of the controls and let the Phantom at least right itself. Then I eased in some serious forward stick to get the Phantom moving in a direction other than straight down, and once I had it stable did I begin to throttle back again and bring it down and home. I don't plan on repeating this trick.
The moral of the story, go easy when throttling back. Avoid long straight descents - slide a little one way then the other - to maintain directional control. Ease it down, baby.