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Never thought of that one. Thanks for that. As for landing, hand catch is easier/faster than anything and the least likely to result in accident.
Takeoff/landing pad
- Thread starter 3rdof5
- Start date
This whole discussion reminds me of a chat i was having about flying real AC with a friend who's an actual pilot. He said taking off and flying is easy compared to landing. Any landing you can walk away from is a GOOD landing, any landing in which you can still use the plane afterwards is a GREAT one lol.
Why would VPS cause any problem for Hand Catch ??
All it does is feed back to Flight Control reference data from its sensors detecting ground ... to assist to stabilise flight ....
The only time VPS could be a nuisance - is if it was close to ground and long grass waving about etc. But at sort of height - you should not be hand catching !!
To add to the negative altitude question ... I have many times flown lower than my take off point. My rear garden slopes to my boat mooring area by approx. 4m and the waterlevel is approx 2m below that. Flown down into my channel just above water ... and surprised how accurate the displayed altitude was !
I also have taken off from my 2nd floor balcony ... that adds another ~3m ....
Nigel
All it does is feed back to Flight Control reference data from its sensors detecting ground ... to assist to stabilise flight ....
The only time VPS could be a nuisance - is if it was close to ground and long grass waving about etc. But at sort of height - you should not be hand catching !!
To add to the negative altitude question ... I have many times flown lower than my take off point. My rear garden slopes to my boat mooring area by approx. 4m and the waterlevel is approx 2m below that. Flown down into my channel just above water ... and surprised how accurate the displayed altitude was !
I also have taken off from my 2nd floor balcony ... that adds another ~3m ....
Nigel
Sorry cannot agree. 4 meat cleaving props whirring away do not say to me safety.
Having rushed more than one person to Energency Service at Hospital for prop strikes ... - I never wish to see again.
Nigel
Occasionally, when I have the luxury of a second person to catch it for me, I usually hover at that person's extended arm height. Once the 'copter is stable in the hover, they grab the skids and I turn it off, all at arm's length.
In the introduction video on Dji's website to the P3P you see exactly that. A second person doing a 2 hand catch at the bottom skids. Looks very cool. To be honest, which i why i asked earlier, i assumed he just initiated autolanding, set the RC down and caught it himself. Definitely looks doable.
Set Autoland .... put Controller down and then catch it ??? Are you serious ?
When I do it - ONLY when really necessary ... I bring it down to hover so I reach out and up and put all fingers round one skid but as low as possible ... firm grip and shut down motors. I do not move that machine till those props have stopped.
But in reality ....... it has to be on a boat or bad location to need hand catching. And I most CERTAINLY do not agree with some peoples statements that its safest way to land the model !!!! They cannot have seen the results of a bad catch then is all I can say.
Nigel
I tend to agree Nigel, I have never tried it as I'm sure those props would be nasty, even a light nick could be serious. If some prefer hand take offs and landings so be it. I if wanted to do thati would never have built a landing pad lol.
People claim that DJi props won't do much damage ... that's BS ... as it depends on where they 'hit' ...
I can give a prime example of a 10x6 standard E prop when testing a 1000kv Brushless motor on a workbench.
Motor was securely clamped and all wires etc. led safely. The prop was well clear above the bench. Fired up the motor ... and as I was opening throttle - at about 3/4 throttle one blade sheared and sliced into the bench.
The bench was at least 1.25" thick in multi layer hard ply ... not something you can cut that easy !!
The blade buried itself over half blade width into that bench edge. I could not remove the blade - even with grips ... I have to physically cut the blade out ...
Imagine if that was my arm or neck ...
I have taken people to hospital after having 'incidents' with props small and large.
One guy - Paul... I was on Tx and he was hand launching the new plane he'd built. He asked me to maiden it for him.
40 Glow motor, 10x6 prop ... He lifted the plane up and was getting ready to launch. Engine was idling and I waited for his OK. He said OK - I opened throttle ...
Next I knew model was on the ground, Paul was grabbing his hand with blood dripping through his fingers. Myself and another wrapped rags around to try stem the blood. Other guy rushed Paul to hospital.
Later that day Paul returned to the field to collect all his stuff and his hand was bound up ... luckily he had not lost fingers - but they were seriously lacerated.
He told us what he did ... When I opened the throttle - he thought the plane would tip and he raised other hand to the FRONT to steady it - forgetting about the spinning meat cleaver prop.
Weeks later he after numerous visits to Hospital could not bend his index fnger ... they could not understand why.
A month or so later - he showed us why ..........
A dark shadow appeared under the skin near the scar ... and it worked its way to the surface .. a sliver of the GFN prop ! GFN is the same material used for DJI props. X-ray could not see it ...
Once he had it out - finger healed and was fine ... but hand to this day still carries the scars.
He was very lucky that it had not cut tendons or even lost fingers ...
Last point :
People get lured into false sense of safety with Electrics. They think fuel motor powered props are more dangerous. That's exact opposite actually.
Fuel motors are loud and you KNOW they are running. Stick a hand into a prop and the motor will stall - even large motors and stop ... (after taking serious lumps out of course). They also cannot start up without YOU physically turning it over.
Electric motors are quiet and silly error can have it spin up without need for physical like the fuel job. Second - stick your hand into a prop of an electric motor - and the motor will just keep on demanding amps till it stalls - but when you remove your hand - will take another bite at you !
Electric props tend to be thinner knife like blades as well.
Nigel
I can give a prime example of a 10x6 standard E prop when testing a 1000kv Brushless motor on a workbench.
Motor was securely clamped and all wires etc. led safely. The prop was well clear above the bench. Fired up the motor ... and as I was opening throttle - at about 3/4 throttle one blade sheared and sliced into the bench.
The bench was at least 1.25" thick in multi layer hard ply ... not something you can cut that easy !!
The blade buried itself over half blade width into that bench edge. I could not remove the blade - even with grips ... I have to physically cut the blade out ...
Imagine if that was my arm or neck ...
I have taken people to hospital after having 'incidents' with props small and large.
One guy - Paul... I was on Tx and he was hand launching the new plane he'd built. He asked me to maiden it for him.
40 Glow motor, 10x6 prop ... He lifted the plane up and was getting ready to launch. Engine was idling and I waited for his OK. He said OK - I opened throttle ...
Next I knew model was on the ground, Paul was grabbing his hand with blood dripping through his fingers. Myself and another wrapped rags around to try stem the blood. Other guy rushed Paul to hospital.
Later that day Paul returned to the field to collect all his stuff and his hand was bound up ... luckily he had not lost fingers - but they were seriously lacerated.
He told us what he did ... When I opened the throttle - he thought the plane would tip and he raised other hand to the FRONT to steady it - forgetting about the spinning meat cleaver prop.
Weeks later he after numerous visits to Hospital could not bend his index fnger ... they could not understand why.
A month or so later - he showed us why ..........
A dark shadow appeared under the skin near the scar ... and it worked its way to the surface .. a sliver of the GFN prop ! GFN is the same material used for DJI props. X-ray could not see it ...
Once he had it out - finger healed and was fine ... but hand to this day still carries the scars.
He was very lucky that it had not cut tendons or even lost fingers ...
Last point :
People get lured into false sense of safety with Electrics. They think fuel motor powered props are more dangerous. That's exact opposite actually.
Fuel motors are loud and you KNOW they are running. Stick a hand into a prop and the motor will stall - even large motors and stop ... (after taking serious lumps out of course). They also cannot start up without YOU physically turning it over.
Electric motors are quiet and silly error can have it spin up without need for physical like the fuel job. Second - stick your hand into a prop of an electric motor - and the motor will just keep on demanding amps till it stalls - but when you remove your hand - will take another bite at you !
Electric props tend to be thinner knife like blades as well.
Nigel
I, personally, always had catch. Just make sure it is downwind of you and stable in the hover. When it is in position and before you reach for it, do a full turn with the yaw to make sure it turns on it's axis and does not do the washing machine effect, which is usually caused by the compass being out of it's calibration range. Actually, it is worth doing it at the beginning of the flight too, just to check all is well.
I must admit I've never used rth or auto land. (Do I even have it on my p3p?)
Maybe I'm simple or simply lucky but hand launching is the easiest for me (and I only skinned my knuckles once)
Yes, the 2-hand catch on the bottom skids. When I do a one-hand, myself, I usually get one of the vertical parts of the gear, and that makes me a little nervous. If I can help it, I'll scope out a decent spot so I don't have to do it alone by hand. If I take my time, I can land it back on my case, if needed.
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All very elaborate and beautifully made but why go through all the trouble when the Phantom 3 base plate is all that is needed to protect the camera gimbal (so we've found).
Thats cool. Altho, as I said earlier, one of my needs was being able to take off and land where I'm surrounded by snow, and I'd rather avoid prop wash blowing snow up and back down over the AC. Same goes for dry conditions where the only take off point is deep grass or dirt ground where dust gets blown around in the same manner. I've never hand catched or launched and I like the precision landings. And if i can stay away from adding any weight or anything that could possibly affect air flow from the props, I will.
An update all, we got a good dump of snow in the last 2 days and this was a good test of my pad. Large enough to avoid prop wash and solid enough to never blow away (at least not in safe flying conditions lol). No snow blown back up at all.
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