Phantom 3 malfunction and crash (flight record video)

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If someone can explain what the hell just happened, I'd be awfully appreciative.

Trying to troubleshoot the "jello" issue, I had my P3P in the air floating around 90 feet while changing settings. I go to bring it a little closer and it goes absolutely crazy. With nothing around it, it spins, rocks from side to side and as you can see from the video below, crashes. It's completely totaled (gimbal broken, shell busted, ripped apart). Thankfully no one was hurt! My neighbors were scared, but really just felt bad for me. They saw it just go crazy.

Thankfully there's flight records so I can prove it went completely crazy with ZERO input from me... however does that matter? Is this considered user error? I'm just out?

Stunned.

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Holy crap!! That was definitely a complete meltdown!!
Did you buy it directly from dji? If not I'd be in contact with the dealer.
 
Holy crap!! That was definitely a complete meltdown!!
Did you buy it directly from dji? If not I'd be in contact with the dealer.

I bought from Advexure and I think they're all off until Tuesday. I just have no idea what the process is when this happens. Will they take the time to check the flight records and see that it wasn't user-error? Has anyone else been through this? It's gonna be a loooooong weekend.
 
My guess is a prop flew off.
 
I bought from Advexure and I think they're all off until Tuesday. I just have no idea what the process is when this happens. Will they take the time to check the flight records and see that it wasn't user-error? Has anyone else been through this? It's gonna be a loooooong weekend.
Not sure how they'll handle it but you definitely want to take every measure possible to avoid dealing with the dji repair abyss!!
You think the weekend is going to be "looooong"? Your grandkids will have kids by the time dji even looks at it....
 
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Not sure how they'll handle it but you definitely want to take every measure possible to avoid dealing with the dji repair abyss!!
You think the weekend is going to be "looooong"? Your grandkids will have kids by the time dji even looks at it....
There is no repair for this drone. It's 100% totaled. Camera is destroyed, Gimbal is destroyed - 2 of the 4 arms ripped open. Maybe the prop motors themselves and the board are salvageable... but again, I'm not going to get something repaired unless it's my fault. It wasn't and I have the flight records to prove that - so I guess I get to be the guinea pig going down this road...
 
Did it fly near anything metal...like a metal roof....and had you done a compass calibration before the flight?
 
There is a 2nd hidden microSD card located in the battery bay on bottom of the main board. It is hard to remove but is likely what dji will want to look at, and can look at rather then having your quad sent right away.

-Frank
 
56mph! That's the fastest I've seen one of these fly yet... oh wait, that was vertical speed! Not good. Let us know how the follow up repair goes. This is a good lesson why you shouldn't fly over other people. I wouldn't want to be hit in the head by a P3 at 56MPH!
 
Did it fly near anything metal...like a metal roof....and had you done a compass calibration before the flight?

Nothing remotely metal around. I have had the metal issue before on the roof of a parking garage. I've flown around my neighborhood probably 5 times before this. There weren't even power lines around. And note, this was after already being in the air for 8 minutes. In fact, it was sitting there hovering for a good 30 seconds before I started to move it. Absolutely bizarre.
 
56mph! That's the fastest I've seen one of these fly yet... oh wait, that was vertical speed! Not good. Let us know how the follow up repair goes. This is a good lesson why you shouldn't fly over other people. I wouldn't want to be hit in the head by a P3 at 56MPH!

It's good to see you're so sympathetic knowing the guy just lost his quad.

Some people are just ruthless.
 
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It's good to see you're so sympathetic knowing the guy just lost his quad.

Some people are just ruthless.
I'm in so much shock right now, that didn't even register as rude. It literally feels like my dog just got run over.
 
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I'm in so much shock right now, that didn't even register as rude. It literally feels like my dog just got run over.
Having seen my dog get run over I would smash a hundred flying toys to the ground before gong through that again.

You're bummed and understandably so but unfortunately it's part of the hobby. I watched my 2 week old P2V+v3 drop from 200' like a rock for no reason. Definitely sucks but don't let it ruin your whole weekend!
Hopefully it'll get taken care of petty quick and you'll be back in the air in no time.
 
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Trying to troubleshoot the "jello" issue, I had my P3P in the air floating around 90 feet while changing settings.

Thankfully there's flight records so I can prove it went completely crazy with ZERO input from me.

you contradict yourself

what were your exact settings changing you were doing, could that have caused the problem?

I do feel bad for you, no one likes to see someone else lose their bird and investment
 

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