RTH anxiety

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Anyone else? Ive only owned my black p4, (drone Vader) for about a week, but I have a little anxiety about automated flying everytime I test out a new function. RTH especially worries me, as it flies so quickly and there are alot of variables involved. I've activated active tracking for a few moments only, then immediately shut it down. I seem to be way more comfortable in total control of my AC, and I refuse to use auto anything, so far. Does this go away after awhile?

Sent from my XT1254 using PhantomPilots mobile app
 
Don't worry it's only because you're a newbie :) the more you fly the less anxiety you'll get! Just trust the bird...
Fly safe!

Sent from my SM-G925F using PhantomPilots mobile app
 
Learn step by step, make yourself comfortable first and then move to next step.

RTH feature us a safety feature to get your drone back in case you lose connection with your drone. It's important to set it before you take off your drone. One most important parameter is altitude during return. I fly usually in open areas and for me 200' is more than enough.

You can also initiate RTH if you lose the site of your drone by pressing RTH button but this needs connection between RC and AC available that time else you will not be able to send RTH command to your drone.

It's not rocket science, it's just a flying stable machine in air


Sent from my iPhone using PhantomPilots
 
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Anyone else? Ive only owned my black p4, (drone Vader) for about a week, but I have a little anxiety about automated flying everytime I test out a new function. RTH especially worries me, as it flies so quickly and there are alot of variables involved. I've activated active tracking for a few moments only, then immediately shut it down. I seem to be way more comfortable in total control of my AC, and I refuse to use auto anything, so far. Does this go away after awhile?

Sent from my XT1254 using PhantomPilots mobile app
Sure it does. For me, what helped was becoming familiar with the software which talks to my little birdie, first DJI Go, then Ultimate Flight, so that I was sure I knew what I had told it to do before it went off alone.

The first time I sent mine on an autonomous flight mission out of sight and out of contact I found myself frantically rechecking everything before it came back into sight.

A lot of the critical settings stay set after you initially get everything right, like your Return to Home altitude. And if you can, find a nice soft grassy field to experiment over, rather than like some of these guys testing out unknown features over the Gulf of Mexico. :)
 
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All good advice and I agree. Like you, my phantom 4 was my first drone. I have had it for about 1 month now and with each flight I get more confident in the crafts ability to fly. It is super solid as long as you dont abuse it. I watched tons of YouTube videos, read a lot of "How-To's" and just made myself super familiar with the DJI software.

I would say the RTH altitude is the most important settings. Make sure you set it higher than all other items in the area. Remember, your phantom doesnt necessarily come back home the same way it went. So to ensure you set it before each flight.

Also remember while the return to home point is set, it can be slightly off upon landing. So do not trigger a return to home if it is not save for around 20 meters around you.

Lastly.....relax. If you lose sight or need to have it return home....trust in its capabilities and trust in your skills (once you learn them). Dont panic and start frantically trying a bunch of things. It is going to return home....
 
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As long as the Return To Home altitude is set above ALL objects in the path to home.....
 
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Set it up properly, learn part of RTH that can get you in trouble such as activating RTH within 20 meters of your launch point, and eventually you'll swear by it. Where I live in the high mountains I have lost my signal many times and each time it has come home, landed, and shut down before I could get back to my launch site. Just remember to set the return altitude high enough when you initially set it up. If you live in flat farmland with few trees and no power lines you'll most likely be safe setting it at 200' but my usual launch site is surrounded by over 100' trees so I set mine to 400' and it amazing to watch my P4 return, stop at a hover right above my takeoff spot, and then descend vertically between very tall trees 10' away, and land. Read all about it and try it in flat land and soon you'll swear by it! Good Luck!!!

Sent from my VS995 using PhantomPilots mobile app
 
I'm also new.

My first 'flight was 9ft up and back down, I have the video it's boring ;). Second flight was 4 mins and maybe 900ft distance. After those tests I felt more comfortable and went up 300ft and played a bit more. My first 15 flights were no more than 10 mins long and all included some type of test I wanted to try.

RTH I fully tested (except OA which will be unexpected when it happens) so I fully understand how it works. I tried it close, nothing happened as expected. I tried RTH height to 150ft and initiated RTH from 30ft AGL, it went up then home and then down/landed as expected. I tried it from 200t AGL and it came home at that height and then landed, as expected. I believe I know how it works since I saw it happen, I'm comfortable with RTH although have yet to see what happens with signal loss OA etc. I'm kinda scared to deliberately test those failsafe features but I'm sure they will happen at some point. When they do I know what to expect and look for.

I also loaded up litchi and so far have only used pano automation, very cool feature.

My next steps will be trying A mode before the other automate Go4 features like active track etc. Slow and steady, I don't want a wife unit conversation about 100s bits of broken plastic and electronics right now ;). Bad time of the year for me, it's darn cold here in Colorado and I want to fly :)
 
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I think that in addition to flying it, you should pick an empty field, set a nice flat spot for the home point, set RTH for the flight, fly it out and trigger it.

It builds confidence to actually see it come back on it's own. And a sense of wonder, I remember watching an Inspire come back home on its own, just too cool!

Be safe.
 
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I've flown RCs for 40yrs, but I have flown DJI craft for about 18mos now and feel very confident in the RTH when I trigger it. It grows on you, however, when I lose signal and auto RTH triggers automatically, I still get nervous because I don't feel in control. Auto RTH doesn't happen very much for me because I try to prevent it, but it can happen. It happened a lot with my P4 controller (GL300C), but after moving to the Inspire controller to fly my P4, it rarely happens now. One tidbit of advice for newbies, make an effort to closely watch the signal strength bar level of the RC icon when you're beyond 3500' away. At this point you'll be flying FPV anyway, so make a habit of regularly glancing up at the signal strength meter, every 10sec. You should watch the HD bars too, for the same reason. When you go from 5 bars to 4, don't go any further away. Those RC bars can drop fast once you reach the outer fringe of communication distance capability of the RC. If you lose control signal with the RC, your HD video bars will be shut off and you will see no more video feed. At that point the only thing you can do is double check how you have your antennas pointed to increase efficiency of the signal, hopefully regaining a connection. If you're using a directional antenna (such as Windsurfer parabolic dish, or Itelite DBS2.2), make sure you are pointing the antenna at the craft. This is a common oversight by newbies using Windsurfers.


upload_2016-12-13_10-56-28.png
 
I've been a little nervous about the RTH feature as well. I've flown my p4 for a few week now and am having a lot of fun. I have pushed it quite a bit on the range and so far have lost video signal but not rc signal. I then raise the altitude and the signal comes back. I know RTH kicks in if you loose rc signal for over 3 seconds but how do you know its actually kicked in when you cant see the fpv feed. Do you just have to wait until you see the video come back up or does the rth button on the controller light up before you see the signal?
 
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I've been a little nervous about the RTH feature as well. I've flown my p4 for a few week now and am having a lot of fun. I have pushed it quite a bit on the range and so far have lost video signal but not rc signal. I then raise the altitude and the signal comes back. I know RTH kicks in if you loose rc signal for over 3 seconds but how do you know its actually kicked in when you cant see the fpv feed. Do you just have to wait until you see the video come back up or does the rth button on the controller light up before you see the signal?
When RTH kicks in, my iPad talks to me and tells me it's coming home, but I'm unsure if that's occurs real time or when the craft gets back into range.
 
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One very important item I forgot to tell you; once you set your max altitude, and then set your RTH altitude, don't forget to set RTH in your setup as what you want your P4 to do when you lose your signal. It might be set to stop and hover. Again, set RTH for when you lose your signal.

Sent from my VS995 using PhantomPilots mobile app
 
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And make sure the RTH alt. is what you think it is. Meters/Feet. Don't confuse meters with feet!
 
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I'm also new.

My first 'flight was 9ft up and back down, I have the video it's boring ;). Second flight was 4 mins and maybe 900ft distance. After those tests I felt more comfortable and went up 300ft and played a bit more. My first 15 flights were no more than 10 mins long and all included some type of test I wanted to try.

RTH I fully tested (except OA which will be unexpected when it happens) so I fully understand how it works. I tried it close, nothing happened as expected. I tried RTH height to 150ft and initiated RTH from 30ft AGL, it went up then home and then down/landed as expected. I tried it from 200t AGL and it came home at that height and then landed, as expected. I believe I know how it works since I saw it happen, I'm comfortable with RTH although have yet to see what happens with signal loss OA etc. I'm kinda scared to deliberately test those failsafe features but I'm sure they will happen at some point. When they do I know what to expect and look for.

I also loaded up litchi and so far have only used pano automation, very cool feature.

My next steps will be trying A mode before the other automate Go4 features like active track etc. Slow and steady, I don't want a wife unit conversation about 100s bits of broken plastic and electronics right now ;). Bad time of the year for me, it's darn cold here in Colorado and I want to fly :)
I am also in Colorado. East of the Springs. I am a newbie...my first drone and have not flown yet. I'm in the reading, watching, listening phase.
 
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