Just glad it was not me. I would have got to the first set of rocks and been crumpled over wheezing into my inhaler.
Hows this for a Save.....
- Thread starter gecarey
- Start date
DJI SUCKS !!!
I just bought a phantom 2, brushless gimbal 4 and attached a hero 4 go pro black. cost in total about $2700.
It flew fine for about 10 times, when the battery got to 20% it would take itself over and return within 30 feet of original gps starting point. Not great but at least somewhat close.
Within two weeks of owning this thing I was bringing it in for a landing, it was 20 feet from me, it takes itself over and flies UP AND AWAY !!! flies 300 feet out over a lake and decends ever so slowly and drowns itself !!!!
I totally panic, strip down and swim out into a FREEZING LAKE trying to save it, $2700 !!!!!! I almost froze to death and still no luck before it sank.
I rented scuba gear and hired a diver but no luck, deep dark lake with some current at bottom due to inflows.
DJI sent me paper work, I supplied all info, receipts for dive gear and diver, pictures of the recovery, witness' and anything else they requested.
DJI RESPOSE - buy another one at a discounted price !!!! WTF !! is this company for real ???
I am TOTALLY blown away by the response and the complete unprofessionalism of this company and their shitity products and the absolute WASTE OF MONEY!!
If your reading this DO NOT BUY A DJI !!!!
I just bought a phantom 2, brushless gimbal 4 and attached a hero 4 go pro black. cost in total about $2700.
It flew fine for about 10 times, when the battery got to 20% it would take itself over and return within 30 feet of original gps starting point. Not great but at least somewhat close.
Within two weeks of owning this thing I was bringing it in for a landing, it was 20 feet from me, it takes itself over and flies UP AND AWAY !!! flies 300 feet out over a lake and decends ever so slowly and drowns itself !!!!
I totally panic, strip down and swim out into a FREEZING LAKE trying to save it, $2700 !!!!!! I almost froze to death and still no luck before it sank.
I rented scuba gear and hired a diver but no luck, deep dark lake with some current at bottom due to inflows.
DJI sent me paper work, I supplied all info, receipts for dive gear and diver, pictures of the recovery, witness' and anything else they requested.
DJI RESPOSE - buy another one at a discounted price !!!! WTF !! is this company for real ???
I am TOTALLY blown away by the response and the complete unprofessionalism of this company and their shitity products and the absolute WASTE OF MONEY!!
If your reading this DO NOT BUY A DJI !!!!
Phantom pilots should be aware that, when the battery status gets to 20%, the climb capability of the aircraft is pretty much done.
I believe that DJI should do a better job of explaining this to people purchasing these drones.
All I hear is DJI maintaining that the battery provides you with 25 minutes of flight time.
That is incorrect.
I don't know ANY Phantom pilot who gets 25 minutes of flight time with their battery.
My longest flight time was 22 minutes and I was pretty much on the ground at that point.
If you want to shoot some video(or still pics), you need to pre-plan your flight. Know exactly what you want to do, so when you power up your Phantom, you get to altitude and fly to wherever it is you want to go and shoot the video.
Taking into consideration the return trip, you should still be able to accomplish all this within 20 to 22 minutes, allowing you to land with about 20% of battery life.(Cold weather operations really negatively impact battery life and flight time).
If you want to take more shots, then power off your Phantom, swap batteries, and take off again with a fresh battery.
Much better to be safe than sorry.
I believe that DJI should do a better job of explaining this to people purchasing these drones.
All I hear is DJI maintaining that the battery provides you with 25 minutes of flight time.
That is incorrect.
I don't know ANY Phantom pilot who gets 25 minutes of flight time with their battery.
My longest flight time was 22 minutes and I was pretty much on the ground at that point.
If you want to shoot some video(or still pics), you need to pre-plan your flight. Know exactly what you want to do, so when you power up your Phantom, you get to altitude and fly to wherever it is you want to go and shoot the video.
Taking into consideration the return trip, you should still be able to accomplish all this within 20 to 22 minutes, allowing you to land with about 20% of battery life.(Cold weather operations really negatively impact battery life and flight time).
If you want to take more shots, then power off your Phantom, swap batteries, and take off again with a fresh battery.
Much better to be safe than sorry.
Wow! Amazing(and sad) story. I'm sorry about what happened to your Phantom. Out $2,700 and the company blows you off.
Obviously customer relations are not a priority with them.
I would have thought that with all the documentation that you provided they would have either cut you a cheque or replaced your equipment.
I have owned 2 Phantoms and have been pretty pleased with them but I have been reading some stories just like yours where these aircraft sometimes develop a mind of their own and ultimately destroy themselves.
Yikes!
I agree with you 100%.
Rookie mistake.......carried away with flying and NOT paying attention to the top right hand corner of the instrument panel(aka, your smart phone screen) which tells you BATTERY STATUS.
So, the battery got low and the Phantom went to Auto Land.
Hopefully, this pilot learned from this. It could have been an expensive lesson.
I don't think so.
If the battery was low enough(below 20%), I'm not sure the RTH function will get the job done.
When the Phantom goes into RTH mode, the first thing it does is fly up to about 90 feet and then fly to its take off point.
It will hover for a bit(attempting to get the best GPS lock) and slowly decend,land and power down.
All this takes time and , if your battery status is 20% or less, then 2 bad things happen:
1. Your Phantom doesn't have the power to increase its altitude.
2. Your Phantom doesn't have the battery life to make the return trip to your take off point.
Not good.
Strange that this pilot didn't get any audio warning regarding his battery's situation.
My smart phone screen goes off like a nuclear power plant alarm whenever my battery life gets down to 20%.
That grabs my attention in a hurry!
Hendricks, you have no idea what your taking about. It was 20 feet away and coming in slowly for a controlled landing. GPS was correctly set and It takes itself over, flies up 70 feet and out 300 feet to the middle of a lake. Ya rookie move I guess.
Thank you for your support on this !!! All I'm getting is "rookie move", "who flies near 20% battery" kind of comments. I flew this thing many times across inlet's, through forests, and many exciting places. This was different, it totally **** it's pants and flew off 300 feet to the middle of a lake. Not normal. So thanks for having a little faith I knew what I was doing.
Wow tread all over this post and then get confused on hoe is posting what.? ##$^& Sorry got confused.
Woo hoo their guy sorry to see you lost your phantom but you just popped in here and hijacked this thread .
He was not replying to you or even talking about you we where talking about the vid posted
Like I said sorry for your loss but start a thread of your own you are now confusing people
Woo hoo their guy sorry to see you lost your phantom but you just popped in here and hijacked this thread .
He was not replying to you or even talking about you we where talking about the vid posted
Like I said sorry for your loss but start a thread of your own you are now confusing people
He already started one but apparently it wasn't enough.
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now this video I really enjoyed, great pics, good choice of music, and suspense, will he or won't he make it in time
Thanks for sharing the video OP
Thanks for sharing the video OP
And this has got what exactly to do with the thread you have hijacked ???
What was the issue with your Phantom?
Judging from the lights blinking when you were able to grab it before it went in the water, I feel it had to have been a low battery and the aircraft was in Auto Land mode.
Correct?
did your smart phone not emit a low battery alarm about 5 minutes before it started to come down?
Just curious.
Very glad you were able to save your aircraft.
Looks like the auto land activated. You can however still control the phantom when this happens. Steering works but the same but the bird will slowly land itself. If you need to you can ever give some extra throttle and it will rise again. As soon as you let off the throttle however it will start its decent again. Keep this in mind next time and you won't have to go for a swim.
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