Is it safe to fly in my urban neighborhood? (Pic Attached)

[notsojazzyjeff]

I got my FC40 on tuesday, but still haven't opened the box. I want to do everything right because I am afraid of having a flyaway. I wanted to go to big park to test it out, but I hate all the attention these things draw so I was hoping to do at this park (picture below) across the street form my house for a short test flight. Do you think its safe? Its a newer neighborhood so there aren't any power lines (electrical is run underground), but there are tons of wifi signals. Every house has a router (of course). FC40 runs on 5.8ghz channel so does that mean I'm safe? Just wanted to know what the consciences is about flying in this sort of an area since a lot people say you need fly in a big open field.

Thanks

 

[XL-Studios]

Re: Is it safe to fly in my urban neighborhood? (Pic Attache

I would not worry too much at all. I have flown over similar hoods and <1m close to a clustered cell tower without any interference whatsoever. Just make sure you get a good Home lock before take off!!!

 

[notsojazzyjeff]

Re: Is it safe to fly in my urban neighborhood? (Pic Attache

Thank you for your input, it will definitely take some of my worry away. I don't plan on going high (hopefully I don't get too brave) just want to get a feel for the controls, take off, landing before I take it to a larger space. I actually have one of those ebay tracking devices on its way so hopefully nothing bad happens until then. :lol:

 

[XL-Studios]

Re: Is it safe to fly in my urban neighborhood? (Pic Attache

If you promise to follow these five IMPORTANT tips you will be just fine:

1: Make sure you get a good Home lock! (7+ satellites)
2. Don´t decent to fast! (It is so easy to misjudge the decent speed and hit the ground.)
3. Try to move your Phantom while ascending to avoid your own prop-vortex.
4. Stay away from trees!
5. If you loos sight of you´r Phantom, press left stick up for 2-3 sec to ascent safe over threes/houses. Then Initiate the Going Home feature. (Either by switching off the controller or if you have your Phantom set for Naza mode, S1 switch all down) Wait for your favorite new pet to return safely.

 

[notsojazzyjeff]

Re: Is it safe to fly in my urban neighborhood? (Pic Attache

If you promise to follow these five IMPORTANT tips you will be just fine:

1: Make sure you get a good Home lock! (7+ satellites)
2. Don´t decent to fast! (It is so easy to misjudge the decent speed and hit the ground.)
3. Try to move your Phantom while ascending to avoid your own prop-vortex.
4. Stay away from trees!
5. If you loos sight of you´r Phantom, press left stick up for 2-3 sec to ascent safe over threes/houses. Then Initiate the Going Home feature. (Either by switching off the controller or if you have your Phantom set for Naza mode, S1 switch all down) Wait for your favorite new pet to return safely.

lol...thanks kind sir. I ran it today and it worked out well. I'm glad I tried it at this nearby park first because I had some of NAZAM assistant settings configured wrong and it went into the death wobble on the first try so it was nice to be able to run into the house and connect to USB to my computer and adjust some things and come right back out and try again!

As with all new flyers, I love it. I was getting a bit of drift which I think I can work out by doing one of those advanced calibrations and I really hope there is a way that I can swap the joystick configuration for lefties, but other than that I'm all good.

 

[SilentAV8R]

Re: Is it safe to fly in my urban neighborhood? (Pic Attache

Before you start flying anywhere, ask yourself this question. If that were my house, head, car, etc. would I want some guy I know nothing about flying what looks to me like a big white toy over me?

Personally, I never fly over any houses, buildings, people, roads, cars, etc. I am always asking myself what is the worst thing that could happen if this fell from the sky right now. If the answer is it might hit something that does not belong to me or somebody, then I will not fly over it.

Yep, very conservative. But then again I do not want to be the guy who shows up on the evening news after something bad happened.

 

[Madwak]

Re: Is it safe to fly in my urban neighborhood? (Pic Attache

If you promise to follow these five IMPORTANT tips you will be just fine:

1: Make sure you get a good Home lock! (7+ satellites)
2. Don´t decent to fast! (It is so easy to misjudge the decent speed and hit the ground.)
3. Try to move your Phantom while ascending to avoid your own prop-vortex.
4. Stay away from trees!
5. If you loos sight of you´r Phantom, press left stick up for 2-3 sec to ascent safe over threes/houses. Then Initiate the Going Home feature. (Either by switching off the controller or if you have your Phantom set for Naza mode, S1 switch all down) Wait for your favorite new pet to return safely.

lol...thanks kind sir. I ran it today and it worked out well. I'm glad I tried it at this nearby park first because I had some of NAZAM assistant settings configured wrong and it went into the death wobble on the first try so it was nice to be able to run into the house and connect to USB to my computer and adjust some things and come right back out and try again!

As with all new flyers, I love it. I was getting a bit of drift which I think I can work out by doing one of those advanced calibrations and I really hope there is a way that I can swap the joystick configuration for lefties, but other than that I'm all good.

You can change the controls for lefties you just connect your transmitter the computer and use the assistant to change the mode. Easy to do if you have a transmitter with the external USB port but a PITA if you have to take the transmitter apart to get at the USB.

 

[SilentAV8R]

Re: Is it safe to fly in my urban neighborhood? (Pic Attache

Newer models of the P2V transmitter have a USB port on the bottom. Mine does, purchased 3/28/14

 

[notsojazzyjeff]

Re: Is it safe to fly in my urban neighborhood? (Pic Attache

Newer models of the P2V transmitter have a USB port on the bottom. Mine does, purchased 3/28/14

Mine was purchased 4/1/14 but its an FC40 and does not have the port

 

[notsojazzyjeff]

Re: Is it safe to fly in my urban neighborhood? (Pic Attache

Before you start flying anywhere, ask yourself this question. If that were my house, head, car, etc. would I want some guy I know nothing about flying what looks to me like a big white toy over me?

Personally, I never fly over any houses, buildings, people, roads, cars, etc. I am always asking myself what is the worst thing that could happen if this fell from the sky right now. If the answer is it might hit something that does not belong to me or somebody, then I will not fly over it.

Yep, very conservative. But then again I do not want to be the guy who shows up on the evening news after something bad happened.

I flew all of 10 feet in the air so no one was at risk. I will continue to use this park to give it a tune up and flight checks while I adjust the settings, there is a large park about a 10 minute drive, but I'd hate to go all that way and then later find out something is wrong :roll:

 

[SilentAV8R]

Re: Is it safe to fly in my urban neighborhood? (Pic Attache

Before you start flying anywhere, ask yourself this question. If that were my house, head, car, etc. would I want some guy I know nothing about flying what looks to me like a big white toy over me?

Personally, I never fly over any houses, buildings, people, roads, cars, etc. I am always asking myself what is the worst thing that could happen if this fell from the sky right now. If the answer is it might hit something that does not belong to me or somebody, then I will not fly over it.

Yep, very conservative. But then again I do not want to be the guy who shows up on the evening news after something bad happened.

I flew all of 10 feet in the air so no one was at risk. I will continue to use this park to give it a tune up and flight checks while I adjust the settings, there is a large park about a 10 minute drive, but I'd hate to go all that way and then later find out something is wrong :roll:

Sounds reasonable. Basically I always make my flying site decisions based on the answer to the questions: "What's the worst thing that could happen if...."