New P4 Pro Obsidian - The First use? - SOLVED

[SimonH78]

Ok had many Phantoms over the years - just got a P4Pro (Obsidian) - its all activated fully charged and ready to fly out of the box - BUT do I do what I did with ALL my other Phantoms and do a compass calibrate before the first flight or IMU cali or not ? - The Go-4 app says all good to go the instructions dont really mention ...... So do I ????

 

[Meta4]

Ok had many Phantoms over the years - just got a P4Pro (Obsidian) - its all activated fully charged and ready to fly out of the box - BUT do I do what I did with ALL my other Phantoms and do a compass calibrate before the first flight or IMU cali or not ? - The Go-4 app says all good to go the instructions dont really mention ...... So do I ????

The manual doesn't tell you to ... because there is no need to.
Under normal circumstances you should never need to calibrate either.
My First P4 pro is over a year old, has been flown a lot and flown hard but nothing on it has been calibrated since new.

 

[SimonH78]

That fine but if you machine is showing its having an issue - had the first flights yesterday - all seemed ok apart from the app yellow warning message pop-up saying it had weak gps - but it was showing 17-19 in the counter icon on screen - plus the top bar going red occasionally saying switched out of GPS mode etc ...apart from that all was ok it is still on the firmware it arrived on - v1.4.6 (i seem remember) & uses the latest Android app vers 4.1.22. It was a clear blue day in an open rural area - no trees - my old trusty P3A was rock solid flying the same location

 

[Speedmeister]

My P4PO stock version was 1.4.0703. I have not done any calibration except for camera gimble calibration. It flew fine with stock firmware with no problems. Upgraded firmware to 1.5.0300. Checking all known problems reported on P4P white to see if exibits same problems. No problems to report yet. DJi says that camera gimble are the same except for the finish but I am starting to believe that they may have fixed known problems.

 

[msinger]

do I do what I did with ALL my other Phantoms and do a compass calibrate before the first flight or IMU cali or not ?

All is usually fine for most people even when those calibrations are not done. You won't hurt anything by doing them though (if you want to for some reason).

 

[SimonH78]

That's all fine but why the weak gps signal warnings when its showing 18 satellites plus the loads of yaw errors in the flightdata.....???

 

[msinger]

That's all fine but why the weak gps signal warnings when its showing 18 satellites plus the loads of yaw errors in the flightdata

Neither would be the result of a needed IMU/compass calibration. Perhaps the flight log will reveal more details.

 

[OldBlueHeron]

My P4PO stock version was 1.4.0703. I have not done any calibration except for camera gimble calibration. It flew fine with stock firmware with no problems. Upgraded firmware to 1.5.0300. Checking all known problems reported on P4P white to see if exibits same problems. No problems to report yet. DJi says that camera gimble are the same except for the finish but I am starting to believe that they may have fixed known problems.

I also have received my second P4PO (first one was DOA) now and have upgraded to the 1.5.0300 . I suspect that you may be right about the gimble fixes.

 

[SimonH78]

Deleted the flight data txt - but this was the airdata info for part of the flight - too many yaw errors for my liking.... ps it visually flies just great no problems..??.

 

[SimonH78]

OK- Update from todays flight reveals - A compass calibration for me CURED a whole host of issues the P4Po was having - last flight was full of warnings - 1748 to be exact for the whole 12 minute flight - todays was same with just 2 warnings from the vision sensors from it detecting me on take-off and landing - The interference warnings ( those popup's in yellow boxes ) - The weak gps satellite never showed - the bar didnt go red - it showed 18 satellites as before - so The compass calibration FIXED all my issues DJI i would recommend that you do this, even though you said I dont need to do this. If it says its happy - The change is day and night!! - Today a pure perfect flight - Happy days.

 

[John Locke]

When taking possession of a new phantom I recommend always doing a compass, imu, RC, vps, and gimbal calibration. Three reasons. 1. The quality consistency from dji is notoriously sub par. I would never trust DJI to do a good job at calibrations 100% of the time. 2. Successfully calibrating all of these ensures all systems are working right and calibrations work as needed. 3. It familiarizes newbies with each calibration process and what to do if something occurs while in the field.

If any of the calibrations fail to work correct, and don't complete each calibration successfully, you may want to return it to the seller and exchange it to get a good craft. This is why it's so important to buy Phantoms from a vendor that has a quick and easy 30 day exchange policy, so you don't have to wait three weeks for it to be repaired by DJI.

A cold imu calibration can help to launch faster with each mission, shortening the warm up time. This is something DJI doesn't do because it takes more time.

 

[Meta4]

OK- Update from todays flight reveals - A compass calibration for me CURED a whole host of issues the P4Po was having - last flight was full of warnings - 1748 to be exact for the whole 12 minute flight - todays was same with just 2 warnings from the vision sensors from it detecting me on take-off and landing - The interference warnings ( those popup's in yellow boxes ) - The weak gps satellite never showed - the bar didnt go red - it showed 18 satellites as before - so The compass calibration FIXED all my issues DJI i would recommend that you do this, even though you said I dont need to do this. If it says its happy - The change is day and night!! - Today a pure perfect flight - Happy days.

The most common cause of yaw errors is from launching from steel or reinforced concrete surfaces.
A yaw error is related to a compass error and when your flight controller is getting conflicting data from the GPS and compass, it drops the GPS data because the Phantom can't fly witjhout compass.
The "Weak GPS Signal" message is very badly worded - your GPS signal was fine (it always is unless you fly under cover).
It was related to the flight controller dropping the GPS data.
It's most likely that you had nothing wrong with your compass at all and calibration was unnecessary.

 

[SimonH78]

Fully understand this - but it was launched from a remote rural UK field with a totally clear view of the sky, with a massive bunch of errors as noted above, - but after a calibration it was a perfect machine no errors - really was night and day difference so in my cause the calibration was 100% needed - maybe with others as well -

 

[John Locke]

Fully understand this - but it was launched from a remote rural UK field with a totally clear view of the sky, with a massive bunch of errors as noted above, - but after a calibration it was a perfect machine no errors - really was night and day difference so in my cause the calibration was 100% needed - maybe with others as well -

If you launched in the exact same place in that field, then yes, you may have had a calibration issue. But what meta4 explained is true and very important to know. Also, just because you see no metal objects above the ground doesn't mean anything. Magnetic anomalies can easily be caused by buried metal objects, like rebar in concrete, or buried relics, especially in the old country, UK.

If you ever get a compass error at launch time, DON'T recalibrate, especially where the error is occurring. Move to another location, you'll likely have no errors when you move.

You shouldn't haven't have to recalibrate the compass after you get a good calibration.

 

[Speedmeister]

If you launched in the exact same place in that field, then yes, you may have had a calibration issue. But what meta4 explained is true and very important to know. Also, just because you see no metal objects above the ground doesn't mean anything. Magnetic anomalies can easily be caused by buried metal objects, like rebar in concrete, or buried relics, especially in the old country, UK.

If you ever get a compass error at launch time, DON'T recalibrate, especially where the error is occurring. Move to another location, you'll likely have no errors when you move.

You shouldn't haven't have to recalibrate the compass after you get a good calibration.

I set my P4PO on top of my washer and told me compass error to move different location..not the exact words but close to it. Whould you get same error also incase of hidden metals.

 

[SimonH78]

If you launched in the exact same place in that field, then yes, you may have had a calibration issue. But what meta4 explained is true and very important to know. Also, just because you see no metal objects above the ground doesn't mean anything. Magnetic anomalies can easily be caused by buried metal objects, like rebar in concrete, or buried relics, especially in the old country, UK.

If you ever get a compass error at launch time, DON'T recalibrate, especially where the error is occurring. Move to another location, you'll likely have no errors when you move.

You shouldn't haven't have to recalibrate the compass after you get a good calibration.

Ok this was a new out of the box P4P - the last time it was calibrated was somewhere in China with DJI - when it arrived with me in the UK it wasnt a happy drone, the top of the range drone with lots of warnings, weak gps, it could of been sent back but we went to various locations not all the same but the warnings persisted, but flew fine - the app said all was good apart from the warning yellow pop-ups -

So YES I decided to RECALIBRATE the compass, in a clean area well away from any problems - it was transformed almost magically into a PERFECT drone... I rest my case - I really recommend it

 

[nollzr]

Have they fixed the gimbal flip issue?

 

[Speedmeister]

View attachment 93471 Have they fixed the gimbal flip issue?

I tried to recreate the gimble flip but it didnt happen. I am on ios 11.2.2 and GO4 4.1.22.

 

[nollzr]

Finally some answers on this! Thank you! I have always suspected that there is alot more to this gimbal than just a coating. Some on this forum disagree, but if one thinks about it, it's easy to see they had fixed something for the extra cost. Thanks again

 

[Speedmeister]

The P4PO was shipped with firmware 1.4.0703. This was not in P4P general publication. Prior to 1.5.0300 the original P4P was on 1.4.06. Why not introduce to the original P4P? I have seen more than 1 original P4P pilot report the 180 degree video flip with the new firmware. I have yet to see a reported original P4P problem on the P4PO. The specs are the same but are all the parts that make up the whole the same too? I dont know the answer but I would expect the mfr to choose superior parts on newer productions but then again, they are in the business of making money.