Lost my P2V+ after two days.

Joined
Jul 18, 2014
Messages
140
Reaction score
1
Location
Tunbridge Wells, England
So I got P2V+ and fell in love with it after the first flight.
I was enjoying it for about two days relaying on the return home feature makig sure that it always have home GPS position recorded.
What I didn't realised is that it can lose GPS reception during flight.
So I was flying it above some trees and lost it out of my sight then few seconds later it got out of range.
I wasn't really bothered by that as I was sure it will return to me within seconds but coming home message didn't appear on the screen of my phone then I started to worry.
I could hear it buzzing few more seconds and then it went silent.
At that point it was obvious that I've lost it.
I was looking for it couple hours a day for three days then I gave up.
So I went and bought another P2V+ hoping that it will help me locate the lost one but had no luck.
I actually found a place where my phone was connecting to WiFi range extender and according to the manual it will only connect to it if the range extender is connected to the aircraft.
Unfortunately I couldn't find it anyway.

Newer mind as I got another one now and I'm loving it.
I've done aluminium foil mod and since then my P2V+ didn't lose GPS signal even once.
 
Sorry for your loss and reinvestment.

RTH is not meant to be a main mode of operation. Its a failsafe if signal is lost. I would advise not to use the RTH as part of your routine flight operation. If you are flying LOS then then the need for RTH should rarely be needed. If you lose GPS then then if you can see it you can use ATTI to get it home. Its not that difficult - just compensate for the wind using your sticks. On RTH it probably did not rise high enough to clear trees/obstacles.

If you could hear it before it stopped and you obviously knew the direction you were hearing it from then its not too far away. If I were you I would keep looking. If it got hooked up in some tree branches the damage may not be too severe. Then you'll have two!

I envy you being able to just go out and buy another one!
 
If anything you can use home lock in Naza mode. But ilflying around trees isn't good especially if the trees are in the way of your Los of your signal. It doesn't penetrate through trees and buildings.
I would never rely on Rth.
I would look in the trees for your old one.
 
Mori55 said:
If anything you can use home lock in Naza mode. But ilflying around trees isn't good especially if the trees are in the way of your Los of your signal. It doesn't penetrate through trees and buildings.
I would never rely on Rth.
I would look in the trees for your old one.
You can actually get a elevated home point but resetting the hompoint by switching S2 up/down 5 times 20m up from takeoff point for example. Then your RTH will be 40m high. :)
 
Sorry for your loss brother,
That sucks! I NEVER fly without my tk102b attached, and active!
$40 insurance investment! I'm glad you got a new one,
And wish the best of luck to you, in finding your lost bird!

Take care, fly safe!
 
z10m said:
What I didn't realised is that it can lose GPS reception during flight.
So I was flying it above some trees and lost it out of my sight then few seconds later it got out of range.
I wasn't really bothered by that as I was sure it will return to me within seconds but coming home message didn't appear on the screen of my phone then I started to worry.
I could hear it buzzing few more seconds and then it went silent.
At that point it was obvious that I've lost it.

Assuming you were in Phantom mode not NAZA mode. If you lost GPS lock (<6 sats) along with the control signal, the craft will enter Non-GPS ready-to-fly mode, then immediately into RTH without GPS. When it does this it will land "straight" down wherever it is. I quote "straight" because in non-GPS, it is likely anything but straight. It will drift with the wind, and if you had any significant height and any wind, that could land it a considerable distance from straight down. If you don't believe me, manually switch to non-GPS (can you even do that in Phantom mode??) and watch how far it drifts in 30 seconds.

As was said by others, try not to lose LOS with the control signal. If you go out of control signal range, that is another matter, but if you are flying within the distance range of the controller, don't go behind obstacles that can block your signal. Especially if you are unfamiliar with resetting a home point higher than the highest obstacle between the home point and the craft. If you lose sats you are in a whole new world of crap that only experience will get you out of.
 
Did you go to "Find my Phantom" to locate your bird? Being that you could hear it before you lost it, it definitely marked its last location on your smartphone. I hope putting a new Phantom on the phone didn't erase it.
 
Find My Phantom only is of use when the Phantom has gone down while FPV is still available/active. Otherwise FMP simply records the last position of the Phantom at last point of FPV connection. Oftentimes the Phantom can continue to fly a good distance away from the last recorded FMP location
 
phantomguy said:
Find My Phantom only is of use when the Phantom has gone down while FPV is still available/active. Otherwise FMP simply records the last position of the Phantom at last point of FPV connection. Oftentimes the Phantom can continue to fly a good distance away from the last recorded FMP location

Not true. The 1 time it worked for me I had lost everything. No FPV and frozen screen. Still showed up as an icon on the map. It was exactly where was telling me it was.
 
Hovtech said:
phantomguy said:
Find My Phantom only is of use when the Phantom has gone down while FPV is still available/active. Otherwise FMP simply records the last position of the Phantom at last point of FPV connection. Oftentimes the Phantom can continue to fly a good distance away from the last recorded FMP location

Not true. The 1 time it worked for me I had lost everything. No FPV and frozen screen. Still showed up as an icon on the map. It was exactly where was telling me it was.

I am pretty sure PG is correct. There is no way for FMP to mark a GPS location when it is lost connectivity. It may have been in your case that although the screen was locked and you were not receiving telemetry or video display, it was still receiving GPS location. There have been other threads that discussed how it works. And I'm pretty confident that unless it is still receiving the GPS data from the Phantom, there is no way that FMP can depict the proper location.
 
I won't rely on RTH anymore even though GPS reception is very stable after the mod.
Find my phantom showed "No flight data"
Yes it was windy and most likely it drifted away with the wind.
I got so addicted to it I couldn't stop thinking about it so I had to go and buy another one even though my fiancée wasn't very happy about it.
 
z10m said:
I won't rely on RTH anymore even though GPS reception is very stable after the mod.
Find my phantom showed "No flight data"
Yes it was windy and most likely it drifted away with the wind.
I got so addicted to it I couldn't stop thinking about it so I had to go and buy another one even though my fiancée wasn't very happy about it.
I have used RTH successfully more than 100 times but 90% of the times I actually still have FPV that confirms it´s going the right way etc. Before I started to us GPS Plan it hade two close calls when the RTH failed due to loss of satellites (<6) If you know you have set the home point and are >6 satellites you really don´t have to worry!
 
BlackTracer said:
z10m said:
What I didn't realised is that it can lose GPS reception during flight.
So I was flying it above some trees and lost it out of my sight then few seconds later it got out of range.
I wasn't really bothered by that as I was sure it will return to me within seconds but coming home message didn't appear on the screen of my phone then I started to worry.
I could hear it buzzing few more seconds and then it went silent.
At that point it was obvious that I've lost it.
.... If you go out of control signal range, that is another matter, but if you are flying within the distance range of the controller, don't go behind obstacles that can block your signal. Especially if you are unfamiliar with resetting a home point higher than the highest obstacle between the home point and the craft.....
I don't understand this and I've seen others repeat. Why the need to reset a home point higher than the highest obstacle? You do know that if the P2V+ is ABOVE 20m/60ft it will return at the higher altitude? It seems common sense, and good flight safety, to always fly higher than the highest obstacle in your area. In my main flight area the highest tree is 100ft. I always fly 150ft+. During fail safe/RTH the P2V+ stays at 150ft+ and there are no obstacles to hit during the RTH. And yes I've tested this - rock solid.
 
My P2V+ flew away after a connection loss the other day. I just ordered a Walkera TALI H500 to replace it. I'm done with DJI's ******** mondset about addressing the firmware/GPS issue.
 
RTH is useless if it lost GPS. There's no GPS to tell it where home is or where it is.
So if it looses GPS, it's in Atti mode and if you don't fly it manually, it will just hover and drift with the wind. If it loses control signal it will land where it is, not return to home.
Home lock is also not possible without GPS. So keep it within LOS and visual range and learn to fly manually so you can when you need to.

It never fails to amaze me how careless people can be with something so expensive. Flying BVR on the second day out?
If I lose mine, I don't get another one.
 
BlackTracer said:
As was said by others, try not to lose LOS with the control signal. If you go out of control signal range, that is another matter, but if you are flying within the distance range of the controller, don't go behind obstacles that can block your signal. Especially if you are unfamiliar with resetting a home point higher than the highest obstacle between the home point and the craft. If you lose sats you are in a whole new world of crap that only experience will get you out of.
This raises a question to which I have yet to see an unimpeachable answer, and regarding which the manual is vague:

If am flying at an altitude of, say, 70-100 meters, and if I lose control signal but retain a good GPS signal, will RTH be at the existing altitude, or will it automatically descend to 20 meters to make the trip home?

I understand that I can reset home point altitude. However, if I am maintaining a flight altitude well above any obstacles that might be encountered during RTH, do I need to do that?
 
How do I switch from GPS mode to ATI when not in NAZA mode.

BlackTracer said:
z10m said:
What I didn't realised is that it can lose GPS reception during flight.
So I was flying it above some trees and lost it out of my sight then few seconds later it got out of range.
I wasn't really bothered by that as I was sure it will return to me within seconds but coming home message didn't appear on the screen of my phone then I started to worry.
I could hear it buzzing few more seconds and then it went silent.
At that point it was obvious that I've lost it.

Assuming you were in Phantom mode not NAZA mode. If you lost GPS lock (<6 sats) along with the control signal, the craft will enter Non-GPS ready-to-fly mode, then immediately into RTH without GPS. When it does this it will land "straight" down wherever it is. I quote "straight" because in non-GPS, it is likely anything but straight. It will drift with the wind, and if you had any significant height and any wind, that could land it a considerable distance from straight down. If you don't believe me, manually switch to non-GPS (can you even do that in Phantom mode??) and watch how far it drifts in 30 seconds.

As was said by others, try not to lose LOS with the control signal. If you go out of control signal range, that is another matter, but if you are flying within the distance range of the controller, don't go behind obstacles that can block your signal. Especially if you are unfamiliar with resetting a home point higher than the highest obstacle between the home point and the craft. If you lose sats you are in a whole new world of crap that only experience will get you out of.
 
Werz said:
This raises a question to which I have yet to see an unimpeachable answer, and regarding which the manual is vague:

If am flying at an altitude of, say, 70-100 meters, and if I lose control signal but retain a good GPS signal, will RTH be at the existing altitude, or will it automatically descend to 20 meters to make the trip home?

I understand that I can reset home point altitude. However, if I am maintaining a flight altitude well above any obstacles that might be encountered during RTH, do I need to do that?

On RTH, IF it is less than 20 meters above the home point, it will ascend to 20 meters and fly home at that altitude.
IF it is already above 20 meters, it will fly home at whatever it's current altitude is. It will not descend until it reaches home.
IF you have lost orientation and you need to use RHT, you should give it additional altitude before triggering failsafe.
 

Members online

No members online now.

Forum statistics

Threads
143,066
Messages
1,467,358
Members
104,936
Latest member
hirehackers