P3P Motor Grinding

[Pegasus Robin]

Hi all. I’m slightly concerned. My P3P gimbal is making a grinding noise. Any ideas what this might be? Broken or dirty motors? I’m very careful with it, I have a guard and I always clean it with air after flying near dust.

Cheers

Robin

 

[msinger]

Got a video so we can hear what you're describing?

 

[Pegasus Robin]

Just out at the moment, I’ll post one up when I get home

Cheers

 

[Czechsix]

If it's making a grinding noise it'll be easy enough to gently cycle each axis through it's range of motion. Since it's bad enough to hear I'm sure you'll also feel it through your fingertips when you hit the damaged spot.

At that point you'll have to assess whether you're skilled enough to disassemble and clean/replace the parts (if you can even source them), write it all off, or try to get it professionally repaired.

 

[Pegasus Robin]

Here’s a link to the video I just took, but unfortunately it’s picking up the sonar on my camera even after I turned off the vision positioning. The camera does look a bit crooked. What do you think?
I moved the gimbal to see if there is any resistance when the power was off but all seems fine.
The way it sounds is, when you first power on the drone, it makes a constant grinding, then once it’s spun the gimbal and been through it’s checks, it’s in 1 second bursts every 2 seconds

 

[Pegasus Robin]

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[msinger]

All I can hear is the feedback from your camera. Does it sound like this?

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[Pegasus Robin]

All I can hear is the feedback from your camera. Does it sound like this?

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Hi, yeh, it's similar, but not as strong or as constant. It makes a constant sound when it powers up then 2 second grinding bursts every 2 seconds

 

[msinger]

Is that screw loose at the top of your gimbal?

 

[Pegasus Robin]

Is that screw loose at the top of your gimbal?

No, it doesn't seem to be, but the arm with the camera on it seems to have some play on it. I'll post a video in a sec

 

[Pegasus Robin]

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[Pegasus Robin]

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[msinger]

It looks like you found the cause of the problem. The camera/gimbal should not have that much play.

If you need advice/help on repairing it, you can find some repair shops here.

 

[solentlife]

OK ..... please try this :

The black hex screw has been found on mine and another guy I know P3 to be incorrectly set. Basically the screw was tightened but the gimbal arm was not correctly seated. It allowed the camera and gimbal arm to move. The motors then were activating to keep all in line ...

Once loosened, arm seated firmly, onto the seat not the gimbal board above it, and screw tightened properly - both mine and other guys then were quiet and all worked perfectly.
The same mount is on Std as well as Pro / Adv.



Photo shows the screw and seat .... the screw is a common 1.5mm hex size.

Let us know if this helps ....
Nigel

 

[Pegasus Robin]

It looks like you found the cause of the problem. The camera/gimbal should not have that much play.

If you need advice/help on repairing it, you can find some repair shops here.

Thanks for the info, yeh I suspected as much. Don’t know how it happened, it’s never come down hard or struck anything underneath.
Do you know of any guides which would help me in how I could try and repair it myself?

 

[Pegasus Robin]

OK ..... please try this :

The black hex screw has been found on mine and another guy I know P3 to be incorrectly set. Basically the screw was tightened but the gimbal arm was not correctly seated. It allowed the camera and gimbal arm to move. The motors then were activating to keep all in line ...

Once loosened, arm seated firmly, onto the seat not the gimbal board above it, and screw tightened properly - both mine and other guys then were quiet and all worked perfectly.
The same mount is on Std as well as Pro / Adv.



Photo shows the screw and seat .... the screw is a common 1.5mm hex size.

Let us know if this helps ....
Nigel

Cool man, thanks for the advice. I’ll give that a go too

 

[msinger]

Do you know of any guides which would help me in how I could try and repair it myself?

Issues like this are normally caused by a loose screw at the top of the gimbal. Other than that, I've never seen anything like this (for a Phantom that hasn't been crashed). Perhaps someone else will come along and offer some other things to check out if that set screw is really not the problem.

 

[Wrecked]

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That's the pitch motor that has come loose. Its hold by 3 tiny screws. You need to disassemble it to fix it.

 

[solentlife]

Cool man, thanks for the advice. I’ll give that a go too

Sorry ... forgot to add ... the camera loose like that is another matter which I have no idea ... I was typing quickly and got distracted by the 'wife' !!

Nigel

 

[Pegasus Robin]

That's the pitch motor that has come loose. Its hold by 3 tiny screws. You need to disassemble it to fix it.

Ok, cool. Is it fairly easy to do? I’m used to building and repairing things so I’m quite good with a screwdriver