Newbie tip from a newbie:
Before you fly for the first time, enter the settings and re-adjust your failsafe altitude. I would recommend starting your flight and before you move horizontally, go straight UP. Survey your surroundings and get the copter higher than the tallest structures in the area. Note the altitude on the display. Land the copter and then adjust your failsafe altitude to this height. Don't be like me and leave it set to default (125m I think). I failed to do this and had a nasty crash. Details:
I was flying over the beach in Melbourne Florida getting some nice shots of the surf in front of our hotel. Launched from the beach itself. I was within line of sight the entire time and never strayed more than 1500ft or so, and stayed about 100ft altitude for most of the flight. After about 6-7 minutes I got the itch to get a shot of the front side of our hotel (a 14 story building).
With plenty of clearance, I flew my P3 around the southwest corner of the hotel, which I was probably 300ft or so away from. The instant the copter went around that corner (and out of direct line of sight by about 25ft or so), my screen went black & white and I received the dreaded "connection lost" message. No weak signal message at all...just clear sailing and immediately NOTHING.
At that point, the dancing I was doing with the controller to try and re-establish connection must have looked hilarious to bystanders and I immediately thought to myself "Failsafe altitude...you IDIOT!" and started running after it.
In reviewing the video, the P3 immediately stopped and hovered in the air upon losing signal, as designed. After 3 seconds, it turned to face home and accelerated...right into the side of the building at about the 9th floor.
Frantically I searched and quickly realized that it had probably come down on the roof of the conference center in the front of the building. Sure enough, that's where I found it, expecting total destruction after only five flights with my new baby.
Surprisingly, and despite the distance it fell (60ft or so), it held up pretty well. No cracks in the body, though there was some "road rash" from the asphalt roof on one of the motor arms and on the landing gear. One broken prop. One of the legs took the direct hit and is now flexed ever-so-slightly inward (will be replaced when parts come available). The camera took the biggest beating however and it flew off in the crash, landing a foot or so away from the copter body. There were a few scrapes on the gimbal here and there, but the gimbal arm itself was bent by about 10-15 degrees and the wires connecting the camera ribbon cable to the main body were stripped out of their plastic clip, which was still locked into the gimbal. To be honest, I was surprised at how well it stood up to the crash...I was VERY lucky.
Fortunately within a couple of hours I had it in a local electronics repair shop where a fine technician reseated the ribbon cable wires into the connector and used a couple of small crescent wrenches to very gently bend the gimbal arm back into position. I reassembled everything and tried an indoor flight. Motors powered right up, had a clear video feed, and it was flying stable per the VPS.
Still need to do an outdoor test flight to make sure everything is OK, but not until I received my gimbal guard from UAVBits...which I received and installed last night. BUY ONE OF THESE GUARDS. Don't let your gimbal take a hit like mine did...it's cheap insurance and made of carbon fiber, so very strong and lightweight.
By the way, I did find what I think led to my lost connection. Initially I thought that the building itself was the issue, but with folks reporting connections 2+ miles out, I thought this didn't seem right, particularly since I was only a couple hundred feet away. Prior to flying I was sure to verify there were no antenna towers or power lines nearby before flying and all was clear. What I DIDN'T see was the hotel had cellular antennas mounted to the side of the building up near the roof (on the southwest corner), color matched to building itself. As soon as my P3 flew in front of these, BLAMMO...that was all she wrote. So...while I can't be sure cellular antennas contributed to my crash, I do think it was likely since I had zero warning of a degrading signal, so when flying I would suggest looking for building-mounted antennas and avoiding them.
Still kicking myself for not resetting my failsafe altitude higher...had I done that, my P3 would have cleared the top of the building and come safely back to me. Lesson learned...
Before you fly for the first time, enter the settings and re-adjust your failsafe altitude. I would recommend starting your flight and before you move horizontally, go straight UP. Survey your surroundings and get the copter higher than the tallest structures in the area. Note the altitude on the display. Land the copter and then adjust your failsafe altitude to this height. Don't be like me and leave it set to default (125m I think). I failed to do this and had a nasty crash. Details:
I was flying over the beach in Melbourne Florida getting some nice shots of the surf in front of our hotel. Launched from the beach itself. I was within line of sight the entire time and never strayed more than 1500ft or so, and stayed about 100ft altitude for most of the flight. After about 6-7 minutes I got the itch to get a shot of the front side of our hotel (a 14 story building).
With plenty of clearance, I flew my P3 around the southwest corner of the hotel, which I was probably 300ft or so away from. The instant the copter went around that corner (and out of direct line of sight by about 25ft or so), my screen went black & white and I received the dreaded "connection lost" message. No weak signal message at all...just clear sailing and immediately NOTHING.
At that point, the dancing I was doing with the controller to try and re-establish connection must have looked hilarious to bystanders and I immediately thought to myself "Failsafe altitude...you IDIOT!" and started running after it.
In reviewing the video, the P3 immediately stopped and hovered in the air upon losing signal, as designed. After 3 seconds, it turned to face home and accelerated...right into the side of the building at about the 9th floor.
Frantically I searched and quickly realized that it had probably come down on the roof of the conference center in the front of the building. Sure enough, that's where I found it, expecting total destruction after only five flights with my new baby.
Surprisingly, and despite the distance it fell (60ft or so), it held up pretty well. No cracks in the body, though there was some "road rash" from the asphalt roof on one of the motor arms and on the landing gear. One broken prop. One of the legs took the direct hit and is now flexed ever-so-slightly inward (will be replaced when parts come available). The camera took the biggest beating however and it flew off in the crash, landing a foot or so away from the copter body. There were a few scrapes on the gimbal here and there, but the gimbal arm itself was bent by about 10-15 degrees and the wires connecting the camera ribbon cable to the main body were stripped out of their plastic clip, which was still locked into the gimbal. To be honest, I was surprised at how well it stood up to the crash...I was VERY lucky.
Fortunately within a couple of hours I had it in a local electronics repair shop where a fine technician reseated the ribbon cable wires into the connector and used a couple of small crescent wrenches to very gently bend the gimbal arm back into position. I reassembled everything and tried an indoor flight. Motors powered right up, had a clear video feed, and it was flying stable per the VPS.
Still need to do an outdoor test flight to make sure everything is OK, but not until I received my gimbal guard from UAVBits...which I received and installed last night. BUY ONE OF THESE GUARDS. Don't let your gimbal take a hit like mine did...it's cheap insurance and made of carbon fiber, so very strong and lightweight.
By the way, I did find what I think led to my lost connection. Initially I thought that the building itself was the issue, but with folks reporting connections 2+ miles out, I thought this didn't seem right, particularly since I was only a couple hundred feet away. Prior to flying I was sure to verify there were no antenna towers or power lines nearby before flying and all was clear. What I DIDN'T see was the hotel had cellular antennas mounted to the side of the building up near the roof (on the southwest corner), color matched to building itself. As soon as my P3 flew in front of these, BLAMMO...that was all she wrote. So...while I can't be sure cellular antennas contributed to my crash, I do think it was likely since I had zero warning of a degrading signal, so when flying I would suggest looking for building-mounted antennas and avoiding them.
Still kicking myself for not resetting my failsafe altitude higher...had I done that, my P3 would have cleared the top of the building and come safely back to me. Lesson learned...
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And glad you have a next time.
