P3P is landing hard

[msinger]

I guess not going from a standard version to a professional makes it hard to see how big of a difference there is, if you ever fly a standard and use the auto land you will be pretty amazed with the difference between the two.

I don't know since I haven't compared the auto land feature in the P3S and P3P. As I said though, other people have also reported what you're saying. I'm not sure which point I could be missing since you and I both agree that there is a difference between the two models.

As far as being amazed, I'll be amazed as long as my Phantom safely lands in a case where the auto land feature must be used.

 

[Wulfman_78]

I might be explaining it wrong because you are totally missing my point. I may never use the auto land feature as long as I own the professional but I would think that if I ever do use it then it should work as smoothly as the standard. I guess not going from a standard version to a professional makes it hard to see how big of a difference there is, if you ever fly a standard and use the auto land you will be pretty amazed with the difference between the two.

I totally agree. I sold the standard for an advanced (has new shell type and motors), and the advanced (just received it from dji yesterday) slows down couple inches from the ground, but it almost feels like it would "fall" the last couple inches before landing. That happens, regardless of auto landing or manually landing. The standard on the other hand lands very smoothly. There must be something fundamentally different in the way the standard and the advanced/pro determine the distance above ground (maybe the vps). Anyways, I prefer the landing behavior of the standard a lot. Unrelated to this little issue, I can say that light-bridge makes the drone so unbelievable much better, I don't know how to even word the level of improvement correctly

 

[CaptPhantom]

I empathise with your frustration. People here are pounding you with why are you relying on that, why are you doing this, why does it matter instead of exploring and answering the damning question.

I wish everyone would chill out here and stop being so product defensive. You're the loyal paying consumer after-all!

I'll take a stab. I've noticed it too on my machine with VPS on or off. I put the drone in the fridge for 10 minutes, placed it on a dead level surface and then performed an IMU calibration. I am on firmware 1.3.20. The calibration helped although I occasionally get a little bounce some of the time.

 

[Wulfman_78]

I empathise with your frustration. People here are pounding you with why are you relying on that, why are you doing this, why does it matter instead of exploring and answering the damning question.

I wish everyone would chill out here and stop being so product defensive. You're the loyal paying consumer after-all!

I'll take a stab. I've noticed it too on my machine with VPS on or off. I put the drone in the fridge for 10 minutes, placed it on a dead level surface and then performed an IMU calibration. I am on firmware 1.3.20. The calibration helped although I occasionally get a little bounce some of the time.

I totally agree! Why being so super loyal and understanding - DJI should adress these issues, after all. I am no engineer nor programmer, but why the cheaper drone lands more gently than the more expensive ones is a mystery. Anyways, great that the IMU calibration helped your drone with landing more smoothly. My P3A is brand new (new shell version with the same motors as on the standard), and I did the IMU calibration. I thought it might be firmware related (I'm on the latest version for drone, rc and battery.) since your P3 is on an earlier firmware and seems to land well (after the fridge-IMU-calibration) treatment.
I will add that I had a p3p for a couple of weeks (with the old motors, 1.4.something FW) which I had to return to B&H because the camera had problems. This one landed in a rough manner too. Gimbal shaking.

 

[CaptPhantom]

Yep, these questions should be answered! I have the earlier revision (older style motors), maybe that is also a factor.

The agenda of the firmware upgrade train has been surreptitious to say the least.

1.4 was known for drift and some have complained of gimbal shake. I never had gimbal shake. I downgraded from 1.4, less new features but I'm happy to be at 1.3.20 for now. I may try 1.4 again but I have no motivation to go to the "New System" 1.5 or higher.

 

[Oso]

I might be explaining it wrong because you are totally missing my point. I may never use the auto land feature as long as I own the professional but I would think that if I ever do use it then it should work as smoothly as the standard. I guess not going from a standard version to a professional makes it hard to see how big of a difference there is, if you ever fly a standard and use the auto land you will be pretty amazed with the difference between the two.

I've been curious about this since the P3S was released and we heard from people that it lands as well as the P3A/P3P used to land. The threads usually die quickly with no real answers. Most just say "hand catch" so I guess there's not much interest or concern with finding out why the difference between models.

NEW P3 Pro Hard Auto Landings Compared to Standard P3. How to adjust? | DJI Phantom Forum

 

[happydays]

Learn to hand catch. End of problems and no risk of tip-overs.

 

[cybrrmage]

DJI asked me to land it and send them a video, between weather and work I haven't had time yet but I will update when they let me know. I will try the fridge trick.

Hand catching doesn't explain the differences in landings between the standard and advanced/professional.

 

[ACC]

I too have noticed how the P3S is much smoother at landing than the P3A.. . The S acts like it is the one with VPS. The A acts like it just kind of drops to the ground. I have experimented with VPS ON or OFF and the behavior is the same, the A just kind of drops to the ground.​

One other thing I have noticed unrelated to landing... The A tends to be off target on RTH than the S. Anecdotally, the S always seemed to come back to the almost exact home point position, not so the A. I have done multiple recalibrations.

I was searching to see if someone knew how one knows if VPS is working when I came across this thread. I have tried 'VPS' switch in DJI GO to ON but so far it does not make any difference as I described above