Lost 3A

[Rock Shelter]

Was out flying at twilight yesterday and the bird stopped responding to controls and began drifting with the wind to the northeast. Pretty sure I can get her back. Had to call the farmer that owns the fields for permission and will go out soon. I got a limited propulsion mobility restricted error... Tried everything I could think of to regain control but nothing but the slow drift until it landed about a mile and a half out.

Phantom Log Viewer - PhantomHelp.com

Any thoughts? I did smoke one of the motors pretty good on a flip land but...

 

[Richard R]

Looking at the log, you were in GPS mode the whole time until it went into autoland at 14:32. Should not have been drifting. Did you do an imu calibration after you repaired the motor? Was this the first flight after repair? And it was climbing (to over 1100 ft). Solid telemetry the whole time, no obvious reason for it to not respond to control inputs. Did you try punching RTH?

 

[msinger]

At 7m 94s in your log, you initiated RTH. While your Phantom was returning home, it was flying at about 10 MPH and was moving about 10-15 feet further away from the home point per second.

Was it really windy? If so, your Phantom was probably trying to fly into a strong headwind on the way home.

 

[Rock Shelter]

I was up pretty high (I live in the middle of nowhere) and I'm sure the upper winds were higher than the 8 mph @ 300 when I decided to fly.

Richard R; Did you do an imu calibration after you repaired the motor? Yes. I didn't repair the motor. It got so hot it melted some of the supporting plastic. I just bolstered that up.

msinger; While your Phantom was returning home, it was flying at about 10 MPH and was moving about 10-15 feet further away from the home point per second. That, is exactly what it felt like. No matter which way I turned, it still drifted NE. With the restricted mobility I imagine it was just fighting headwinds. I did bring her down to try getting some headway.

It was an old beat up bird and a bad decision to take her up that high. However before it stopped forward movement, it was handling fine. Thank you for the thoughts.

 

[Meta4]

I imagine it was just fighting headwinds. I did bring her down to try getting some headway.

You left the Phantom up over 1050 feet until low battery triggered autolanding.
It was blown almost a mile away while this happened.
Winds up that high can be significantly higher than on the ground.
When your Phantom is being blown backwards despite trying to come home, leaving it up in those headwinds is a good way to lose it.
Bringing it down to 100 feet would have
A much smarter strategy to keep the Phantom is ..
Don't fly out downwind in high winds.
Fly upwind and give your Phantom an easy flight home.

 

[Rock Shelter]

Color me surprised to be updating this post. First and most important, dynotag works. This bird was tagged and yesterday I got a message from dynotag saying the tag had been flashed. Two hours later the sheriff's department was on the phone asking me if I lost a drone. After establishing my bona fides, the officer offered to stop by and drop it off. Really nice guy, we chatted for an hour about the possibilities for drones and LEO's.

Here's the second amazing part; it wasn't scratched. The deputy said a guy found it up in a tree. He did not notice it because he had a heart attack mid-December and didn't get out much during the winter. I had a heart attack December 6... The call from the sheriff came on my birthday.

The bird didn't even have a broken blade. Hoping against all hopes, I popped a fresh battery in and it worked like the day it flew off over 3 months ago. 3 months outside... Wow.

Here's the third thing. It was a good half mile from where my telemetry had it. Almost 2.5 miles away.