Spontaneous 40' ascend with no input

[John Locke]

Do you always fly at the exact location and have those yoyo effects?
Have you try to go 30 miles away and take both RC with you, in an open space far away from any interference?
I have a friend on the west side of town, at his house the drones P3P P4 Inspire can not be controlled, they go crazy.

Yes, it has done this at various flight locations, however this particular location has the least radio traffic. It's a few hundred feet from the nearest house, out in the hills. As long as I'm up high in a hover I can usually reproduce the anomaly. It never loses or gains altitude when flying forward, only when I'm in a hover.

The YOYO effect takes place toward the end of the flight, right around 15:25. No stick input, yet it descends about 60’, then at 15:51 it starts going back up about 40’ until about 16:02 when it starts to descend again.

Here's the flight log data from today's flight.

Here's a 3min video from the craft during the yoyo event.

 

[Dacon Productions]

Do you have a friend with a P4 and go to the same location to see his in action?

 

[John Locke]

Do you have a friend with a P4 and go to the same location to see his in action?

Yes. He's flown there before with no problem. So have I many times before this started. This started about two weeks ago. It really doesn't matter since DJI needs to verify it via DAT files.

 

[Dacon Productions]

Just flew mine today, no problems at all, when the wind started to go 10-15 to 20mph the drone did a yoyo of about 6-7" but very stable. Took it straight up to 200ft and came down in the exact same spot it started, wind blowing.

 

[John Locke]

Mine has always had the 7' yoyo feature. When it increased to 40'+ was when I got concerned. However even the 7' yoyo is unacceptable for commercial shots. Very annoying, so I use my P3P most the time.

 

[Dacon Productions]

7 feet??? Always??? Bad form the womb...
Mine has sometimes when windy the 6 to 7 inches.
Change it! Fixing is not an option.

 

[skyeboysteve]

I've sent my P4 into DJI this past weekend. It would only maintain altitude while in BOTH a hover and within VPS range--and hold position very well. However, if moving in any mode (P-GPS, ATTI, Sport), it would vary in altitude by several feet, but the logs would show that it was flying nearly perfectly level. I also always had the altitude sink after stopping from flight in any direction.

 

[BengalBoy]

Experiencing the same "YoYo" behavior. Sometimes drastic, sometimes just a few feet either way. This is simply amazing to me that DJI hasn't issued some statement, don't fly, return for exchange, we are working on firmware update,, etc...

 

[John Locke]

Experiencing the same "YoYo" behavior. Sometimes drastic, sometimes just a few feet either way. This is simply amazing to me that DJI hasn't issued some statement, don't fly, return for exchange, we are working on firmware update,, etc...

Is your P4's YOYO effect up to 50+' like mine with no stick input? I'm thinking the P5 should come with 2 barometers.

 

[Dacon Productions]

Just as a question, is your gain set to max 120%?
I played with my P4 a bit last night and set the GAIN to 80% and it was bopping a lot.

 

[BengalBoy]

Once I discovered the "altitude drop",, I spent the next 5 batteries just studying the phenomena. Flying at different altitudes, the most drastic drops were at about 200 feet. The P4 would drop at least 60 feet or more on occasion before readjusting and climbing. Sometimes, the P4 would just begin climbing in altitude, 20 feet or more, but, not as big a concern. The troublesome issues were at altitudes of 100 feet or less. Watching it up close as I would fly it right at me somewhere around 60 feet, stopping within a few yards of my location and just watching it hover. Sometimes it would drop a few feet and rise back up to hover.. sometimes it would climb a few feet and hover,,, other times though, it would begin to drop,,, falling 20-40 feet rapidly before I would lose my nerve and take control of the sticks bringing it back up to altitude. Letting it go back into a hover usually resulted in the P4 trying to climb back up to the original hover altitude. Its sporadic, never the same behavior, always occurs after the P4 flys from a point, then, stops and hovers.

 

[Dacon Productions]

John, you fly the P4 with Inspire RC right?
Do you have the same problem?

Why? Why? Why? not showing???

 

[John Locke]

Once I discovered the "altitude drop",, I spent the next 5 batteries just studying the phenomena. Flying at different altitudes, the most drastic drops were at about 200 feet. The P4 would drop at least 60 feet or more on occasion before readjusting and climbing. Sometimes, the P4 would just begin climbing in altitude, 20 feet or more, but, not as big a concern. The troublesome issues were at altitudes of 100 feet or less. Watching it up close as I would fly it right at me somewhere around 60 feet, stopping within a few yards of my location and just watching it hover. Sometimes it would drop a few feet and rise back up to hover.. sometimes it would climb a few feet and hover,,, other times though, it would begin to drop,,, falling 20-40 feet rapidly before I would lose my nerve and take control of the sticks bringing it back up to altitude. Letting it go back into a hover usually resulted in the P4 trying to climb back up to the original hover altitude. Its sporadic, never the same behavior, always occurs after the P4 flys from a point, then, stops and hovers.

Bengal, you've describe my exact problem to the T. Have you communicated with DJI and provided them DAT files to prove the anomaly?

 

[Havavision]

I am experiencing the same thing. Called DJI yesterday an was told this was the first they heard of this. I say BS! They want me to send them my flight data so they can analyze. Wonder how many others they have told this to.

 

[John Locke]

I got my RMA# today, along with a prepaid UPS label to DJI Carson, CA. It took several attempts with DAT files to convince them because I kept sending the wrong file. Removing the DAT files from the craft with digital assistant on a PC is awkward to say the least, but it's doable. You'll notice when you copy the DAT file to your PC it will rename the file with today's date. Weird.

I included a description if a second problem I have where the craft only flies 15mph with OA Enabled and no wind. It should do 22mph.

 

[BengalBoy]

@John Locke I just received my Brand New 2nd Phantom 4 on Thursday. It was sent to me by Drone World to replace the first Phantom 4 and my initial complaint of "horizon tilt". I calibrated all the IMU's, compass, controller, gimbal,, I think I even calibrated my index fingers with my thumbs...... Took it out on Friday and the new unit immediately began to display the "Altitude Yo-Yo" Something you guys may or may not have noticed, though, is that the DJI Go app is not correctly recording the altitude of the Phantom 4's flight. It has serious errors that will probably not reflect the true variations in altitude on any given flight. Luckily,,,, I made a video yesterday!! I present,, "The DJI Phantom 4 Altitude Yo-Yo Ballet" ....

 

[ianwood]

Wow! Sounds like a bad or partially blocked barometer.

 

[John Locke]

@Bengaluru, welcome to my world. Mine was almost identical behavior before I shipped it to DJI.

 

[Sim597]

@John Locke I just received my Brand New 2nd Phantom 4 on Thursday. It was sent to me by Drone World to replace the first Phantom 4 and my initial complaint of "horizon tilt". I calibrated all the IMU's, compass, controller, gimbal,, I think I even calibrated my index fingers with my thumbs...... Took it out on Friday and the new unit immediately began to display the "Altitude Yo-Yo" Something you guys may or may not have noticed, though, is that the DJI Go app is not correctly recording the altitude of the Phantom 4's flight. It has serious errors that will probably not reflect the true variations in altitude on any given flight. Luckily,,,, I made a video yesterday!! I present,, "The DJI Phantom 4 Altitude Yo-Yo Ballet" ....

Yeah? Lol, how is the tilted horizon now? It's apparent in every single Phantom ever sold ever period, some are worse then others, but after 3 phantoms and the trade ins, and all the BS, it's always the same, some days it's perfect, others, terrible. That alone isn't enough to hate my P4 though, just DJI


Sent from my iPhone using PhantomPilots mobile app

 

[John Locke]

Yeah? Lol, how is the tilted horizon now? It's apparent in every single Phantom ever sold ever period, some are worse then others, but after 3 phantoms and the trade ins, and all the BS, it's always the same, some days it's perfect, others, terrible. That alone isn't enough to hate my P4 though, just DJI

Have you tried adjusting the horizon by holding the C2 button on and rolling the right photo knob?