New Phantom 3 SE Owner - I Shouldn't Have Trusted Craigslist Seller

[jalpert]

I purchased a Phantom 3 SE a couple days ago on Craigslist, I should have test flown it. He said it was fully working, it is not.

There is some sort of communication problem between the remote and the quad. There appears to be two lines of communication, the one in which the sticks and gimbal knob control the unit, and the video / stats the app displays.

There is no issue with the controls, the light goes green on the remote and stays green, even when the app says it's only connected to the remote, the gimbal still moves.

However, in the camera view in the app, the stats like battery power, the number of GPS signals etc pop in and out, usually 20 seconds on and a minute or two off as the controller struggles to connect with the quad. Further, even when it does connect, I usually only see a frame or two of video, then black. I attempted a manual firmware upgrade, and even during the firmware upgrade the app bounced between aircraft connected and the connected to the remote connected status.

Unfortunately, this being a used unit, there is a lot of information I don't have. Also unfortunate that while the drone still "works" it's pretty useless without video.

Battery and controller were fully charged when I messed with the firmware.

Things I've done:

Firmware upgrade
Firmware downgrade
Taken the SD card out, formatted the SD card, switch SD cards etc.
Tried my wifes phone
re-linked the controller to the quad
opened the remote and re-seated the antenna wires
took pictures with the camera as the camera screen was just black, the pictures came out on the SD card so I don't think this is a camera / video issue
Went outside in case there was some interference in my house.

The quad "works" but there seems to be a very weak signal between the controller and quad. I do get messages about wireless interference. I have a bad feeling that whatever module that handles the wireless communication on the quad is bad.

Is there a WiFi board I can replace maybe in the quad? Sending it to DJI isn't an option, I don't want to put another $200 into it, I'd rather sell it broken and move on.

Any help on this would be greatly appreciated.

 

[PhantomFandom]

Good morning,

Very sorry to hear about the issues. That is one reason why I insist on meeting and performing a full test flight both when buying or selling a drone. The buyer and seller need to both feel comfortable that the item is being sold in the advertised condition before money changes hands.

In this case it seems you have done all of the requisite troubleshooting and it may just be a signal/hardware issue. The problem though is that you can't tell if it is a problem in the drone or in the controller. Pouring money into it without knowing exactly what the problem is doesn't make sense. Did you look at the flight logs to see if perhaps anything stands out at the times where you lose signal?

 

[jalpert]

Yes, I quickly learned the SE is not the most popular drone out there. In fact, I would recommend most people not buy an SE just because resources are not nearly as plentiful.

Since I'm getting a frame of video, and disconnects, it dawned on me that maybe the antenna cable going to the camera module has been cut or damaged. I'll check that tonight.

I did change frequencies many times, along with having the drone in all sorts of positions.

I do have one questions, there appears to be a pot on the back of the controller with an "X" label, what is that? I searched the manual and could not find the info.

Other than that, I'm still open to suggestions.