Lost in lake!

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Well, I went to my flying area near my home where there is a small lake. I wanted to try some FPV flying. That went well though the video cut out and froze a couple of times. I was flying about 15' altitude most of the time.

After reading some posts here about top speed I thought I would try some speed tests. We had no wind so my first test was around 35MPH. I decided to try the same pass in ATTI mode. A pass along the shore. I took off and glanced at my phone video. When I looked up the Phantom was heading into the water. Apparently in ATTI mode it doesn't hold altitude! SPLASH!!

I ran to where it hit about 6' from shore. Emptied my pockets and went in. Couldn't see a thing! Felt around but nothing. I learned that at about 6 to 8' the bottom falls out on this lake. I was up to my neck trying to feel something. I went home and got a garden rack. With rake in hand I did a grid search. Low and behold, I found it. Camera was missing but the Phantom was intact.

I have completely diss ambled it, rinsed it, and dried it. It now sits opened under a fan. I won't try to power it up until tomorrow. It was somewhat of a miracle I found this thing. Still...the camera. So I'm trying to decide if I will go back in the morning with rake in hand and try to recover the camera. It is a muddy MESS there. But, the camera is $500.00!

I'm wondering how much chance it can be saved? It just unplugged itself when it hit the water and the rubber vibration things just popped out. No damage really. It also has my 23GB Sd card.

All in all I don't feel too bad. Lesson learned I guess.

Geo
 
Geoelectro said:
Well, I went to my flying area near my home where there is a small lake. I wanted to try some FPV flying. That went well though the video cut out and froze a couple of times. I was flying about 15' altitude most of the time.

After reading some posts here about top speed I thought I would try some speed tests. We had no wind so my first test was around 35MPH. I decided to try the same pass in ATTI mode. A pass along the shore. I took off and glanced at my phone video. When I looked up the Phantom was heading into the water. Apparently in ATTI mode it doesn't hold altitude! SPLASH!!

I ran to where it hit about 6' from shore. Emptied my pockets and went in. Couldn't see a thing! Felt around but nothing. I learned that at about 6 to 8' the bottom falls out on this lake. I was up to my neck trying to feel something. I went home and got a garden rack. With rake in hand I did a grid search. Low and behold, I found it. Camera was missing but the Phantom was intact.

I have completely diss ambled it, rinsed it, and dried it. It now sits opened under a fan. I won't try to power it up until tomorrow. It was somewhat of a miracle I found this thing. Still...the camera. So I'm trying to decide if I will go back in the morning with rake in hand and try to recover the camera. It is a muddy MESS there. But, the camera is $500.00!

I'm wondering how much chance it can be saved? It just unplugged itself when it hit the water and the rubber vibration things just popped out. No damage really. It also has my 23GB Sd card.

All in all I don't feel too bad. Lesson learned I guess.

Geo


Thats a bummer, I feel for you. The camera Lens is probably a mess, water infiltration most likely ruined it.
 
I still don't understand why people continue to do things to the P2V that were not meant to be done, this is a flying camera not a speed racer...when you push the speed the initial tilt of the copter makes it loose some altitude hence the reason why you crashed you were flying to close to the surface and did not allow room for altitude loss. ( GPS is not military spec. therefore it is not accurate to the inch.

Lesson learned.
 
Sorry for the crash, but I admire your perseverance! Hopefully you can salvage most of it.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing, of course, and I guess this does illustrate a little of why DJI chose not to make the additional flight modes you get from switching to Naza mode available out of the box and calls them "advanced".

In any accident it's always the ground that hurts, never the fall, so aim to fly a mistake or two high if trying anything other than basic flight.

Keep us informed how the drying out goes and if we can help trouble shoot any issues you run into. Good luck!
 
Pull_Up said:
Sorry for the crash, but I admire your perseverance! Hopefully you can salvage most of it.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing, of course, and I guess this does illustrate a little of why DJI chose not to make the additional flight modes you get from switching to Naza mode available out of the box and calls them "advanced".

In any accident it's always the ground that hurts, never the fall, so aim to fly a mistake or two high if trying anything other than basic flight.

Keep us informed how the drying out goes and if we can help trouble shoot any issues you run into. Good luck!

+1

No need to be berating anyone. Hey we all make mistakes, hell I wish I didnt marry my first wife so that puts flying a vision into a lake into perspective.
Hopefully she'll fly again for you. Sorry for your troubles.
 
Next morning update:
Reassembled Phantom and powered up with new battery. It powered up normally! Started the motors and they ran normally. I have not attempted to fly it yet. As soon as it is light I'm going back for the camera. Who knows...

The Battery that was dunked doesn't appear to be working. It lights up when you press the button but it doesn't seem to want to charge.

Yes, lesson LEARNED. I know it's a flying camera and not a racer. Doh! After watching this guy on Vimero flying FPV through all kind of obstacles I was a little...inspired. Anyway, some lessons are harder than others!

Geo
 
Sorry to hear! I learned through flying that ATTI does not hold altitude at full speed. It will hold it at a hover though. Hindsight is 20/20. No worries. Have fun racing it around, I do. Next time when flying that low just make sure to keep it in normal GPS mode.
 
You might want to call your local rental store and see if they rent metal detectors. They make water proof detectors, and you just might get lucky. You might also try posting on lostmystuff.net. This is a site that metal detectorists from all over the country volunteer their time to help find lost items with their metal detectors. Maybe there is a member nearby that will be able to help.

Good luck.
 
Mal_PV2_Ireland said:
+1

No need to be berating anyone. Hey we all make mistakes, hell I wish I didnt marry my first wife so that puts flying a vision into a lake into perspective.
Hopefully she'll fly again for you. Sorry for your troubles.

definitions:

bigamy = one wife too many
monogamy = see bigamy

:D :D :D

-slinger
 
Thats a bummer, sorry to hear about your crash. The small screen on a phone makes it very hard to see what is going on at low level. Add to that a slight lag in transmission on the vision. The final killer was the attempt to regain line of sight to the quad. Its easily done and something that probably happens several times a day but generally not resulting in a crash. The transition from using the screen to acquiring line of sight is always risky. In a crisis your probably better off not trying to look for it but rather just hit climb and halt forward movement. Not saying you did anything wrong but its worth people thinking about how they should react should they have the same misfortune.

Hope your back in the sky asap.

If you can afford a new one then I would go new rather than fit a new camera to the crashed one. Keep the old one for practicing line of sight flight.
 
2nd. Update:
Could not find the camera :(

I did fly it briefly and it hovered well. Sounds like it is all working. Unbelievable!

Geo
 
Geoelectro said:
2nd. Update:
Could not find the camera :(

I did fly it briefly and it hovered well. Sounds like it is all working. Unbelievable!

Geo

Excellent news !!! Too bad about the camera, but I'd bet that even if you found it, it would yield, at best, spare parts...

-slinger
 
Sweet. glad you got her going. I searched briefly for any cameras at a discount. All seem priced the same.
Thank you for sharing this accident, at your eXpense others can learn.
I will keep an eye out for a camera. I know some have taken the camera off to swap in a gopro and zenmuse gimbal.
Maybe you could do that or look for one of those used cameras someone took off for the swap.
Geoelectro said:
2nd. Update:

I did fly it briefly and it hovered well. Sounds like it is all working. Unbelievable!

Geo
 
Lesson here is stunt flying over water is not recommended...

Sent from my HTC One using Tapatalk
 
gunslinger said:
Mal_PV2_Ireland said:
+1

No need to be berating anyone. Hey we all make mistakes, hell I wish I didnt marry my first wife so that puts flying a vision into a lake into perspective.
Hopefully she'll fly again for you. Sorry for your troubles.

definitions:

bigamy = one wife too many
monogamy = see bigamy

:D :D :D

-slinger

Haha couldn't have said it better myself mate :)
 
Pull_Up said:
Mal_PV2_Ireland said:
Hey we all make mistakes, hell I wish I didnt marry my first wife... Hopefully she'll fly again for you.

Just realised what a generous offer you made, although I suspect the lady in question might want to at least be consulted first...

Nah I was just thinking of a giant caterpult ;)
 

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