My advice to new owners

If you can get to Ainsdale beach, I can guarantee it is metal free and clear of any wifi interference. Last time I flew at Crosby was with my P2V - obviously there are a lot of metal statues there but they are far enough apart not be a problem
 
Hey Paul,

weather permitting I shall be taking a trip to Crosby beach on Saturday to test range and hopefully sort whether my compass is bust. Is Crosby beach still good for compass calibration?
 
Hi Bryan
It should be fine, stay away from sea wall and the iron statues during calibration, and fly into the wind until you're happy all is good (so if there's a problem it will blow back towards you).
Good luck!
 
Thanks Paul,

If I get compass errors should I take it back to maplin and see what they say? More than likely they will send it back to DJI which they say are based in their headoffice, apparently Maplin are official providers or in sort of partnership with DJI
 
I would say yes, if you can get a UK repair or replacement - go for it. Given it's still new you're most likely still in time to reject it for refund or replacement, rather than wait for a repair.
For me, I could induce the error simply by rotating on the spot. If it happens, I'd suggest doing it in several locations on the beach, always away from metal objects, and showing Maplin the flight logs - upload to healthydrones and give them a link.

Hopefully it won't happen, and all will be good!
 
Cheers again Paul,

Are the flight logs the ones on the DJI app that maps my route out? Top left corner button from the main screen on app?
 
Yes, you can export from there. Better is to grab the log text files directly off the device. Go to healthydrones.com - there are instructions on doing that - it varies between devices. Whilst there sign up for a free healthydrones.com account. There is also an app - HD Sync - that will upload logs to healthydrones for you without you having to fiddle about
 
Thanks Paul,

Hopefully my tests Saturday will all be fine. I'm also hoping to get better range there, I got 300 metres in my first two flights so 200 from what they advise. Going to be trying the windsurfer add on soon as well . . .
 
I'm sure range will be fine out in the open. Just be careful - if you were to get a compass error that didn't correct at max range - who knows where RTH would take it!
 
It's even worse than you think. If you get a compass error that persists it will switch to atti mode and there will be no RTH.
Compass errors are the worst thing you could want when your 500 metres out as you will be flying manual only. It's very scary when it happens the first time.

If it goes into atti first thing don't panic. Look at your screen and check her heading. Gain a little height to give you a safely margin then use the map screen to bring her back close enough that you can fly it visually. Once you can safely tell her orientation visually you can start to breathe normally again.

Sent from my SM-G900I using PhantomPilots mobile app
 
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Thanks for the advice Paul and I think this is what happened on my second flight which caused it to fail to RTH. That was scary and looking back at the flight log it just hovered in place till I was able to get close enough to it for everything to work again.

Fingers crossed :)
 
Just took a look at my logs from them flights and actually not getting many compass errors and one didn't happen when I lost it for a minute. It just appeared to lose signal and fail RTH for some reason, get a lot of magnetic interference messages though. . .
 
Ok so further to my last,

Took the bird out onto the field by my house, did another compass calibration. First turn gave me green lights which is correct but when I did the next bit were the craft is pointing down I got yellow flashing lights? My phone didn't say the calibration was wrong and said ready to fly. Anyway I got a lot of compass errors on this flight, seems to happen pointing a certain direction at first but then happened to the point were it got 300M away and failed to RTH because of no GPS.

Obviously I've still got to test in a better location but I'm starting to think its a bad compass now. The RTH not working causes worry and surely if it crashed DJI would know it was a error.

I'm going to ring maplin now and ask if it is a bad compass how they would deal with it being only just shy of 2 weeks old . I hope they don't say repair as surely it's still within its refund/exchange policy? Anyway if they do say I can swap it or get money I'm seriously considering getting my money back or. . .pay extra and get the Advance on Tuesdy.

I've noticed my flight logs do not show compass errors throughout but do show it flicking between altti and gps were it's getting the compass errors.

Fingers crossed
 
So after waiting 17 mins to speak to Maplin customer service I finall got told basically if there is a fault they would have to send it back regardless for a test to make sure it's a manufacturer fault which I can understand in respect as if the store just took it back and it was ok I guess it's money lost.

Anyway I basically need to test it in another location now before I decided to send it back, been told though if there is a fault I can pay the extra to get the advance so thats what I will be doing.

Although my thought's are if I do continue to get these errors and they test it and find nothing what could I actually do? I mean if they send me it back but I continue to get the errors? It's all what ifs at the moment but I could end up with a £400 pound paper weight . .

Paul is there anywhere else you can recommend to calibrate compass a test it further? Taking it to Crosby beach sound great but after two failed RTH I'm worried it will go swimming in the Mersey haha
 
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Bryan, any beach is about all I can recommend, unless you know any huge open areas over Wirral side?

Sign up to the DJI official forum - forum.dji.com - post your story and, importantly, the links to healthydrones, for a DJI rep to analyse. They will probably offer a RMA, which they did to me and others. I then took that RMA to Argos, not because I wanted a repair, but as proof that DJI had confirmed a fault, and was therefore rejecting the phantom under the sale of goods act.
 

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