The perfect compass, IMU calibration...

[Dazzauk]

How to do? As title really...

Lately loads and loads of people are getting the warning "message strong interference, be carefull when flying long distances".

Now whilst it doesn't seem to affect flight, it is frustrating and always in the back of your mind. A small minority of people seem to have fixed it, but largely most of us still struggle..

So I have had just a couple of emails to DJI Support, and how it is left for now is that they want a screen shot of my IMU calibration page to check the compass mods.. So he interference is with the compass..

In one of the 1st emails DJI told me this and told me to do a compass calibration, and I told them I have done a couple already, but then this got me thinking.... What if the compass is sensitive and maybe carrying out the calibration really does have to be quite near on perfect - now im not talking about the way you hold the aircraft or the way you spin, im talking about location and what is around you at the time that could possibly affect it...

SO......

How do you make sure you get a very good compass calibration????

I cant think where to go to do my next calibration, One thing I do know is I will get someone to hold my remote and iphone so I can stand a good 10ft or so away to eliminate that as a bad cause.

But what else?? Concrete? Power lines? Metal object?

It seems you need a padded cell outdoors to get a good calibration

 

[solentlife]

Problem is not so much the calibration itself .. its the change of local and unavoidable anomalies.

You can have calibration done at home in the garden ... go fly and have no problem at all ...

Move to an open field or area where margnetic anomaly is LESS and get error warnings. It does not have to be increased area magnetism.

The calibration as I understand it - has a range of figure it accepts along with IMU ... if you are in an area that AC detects fall outside those figures - you get warnings. This is why I always post ... do not re-calibrate unless absolutely necessary.

Lets say you re-calibrate because machine gives warning. The warning is because of local anomaly ... water pipes ... telephone lines ... electric cables underground or whatever. Lets say the calibration falls just inside acceptable range and machine says OK to fly. I hope there is then no problem once the AC rises and moves out away from influence of that anomaly ...

If you have good flying generally - then only if you move significant distance would I ever consider re-calibrating. I regularly fly at 3 locations that are in a 150km radius of each other ... I use SAME calibration as I use at home ...

I agree - it looks like some machines are ultra sensitive to small changes ...

I had one day when I had serious error that prevented flight. That was due to the re-inforced concrete slabs I have laid ready for my Summer Mobile to be rolled onto next to my boats ... I had flown of them plenty of times before without any warning. But one day - she just refused totally.
I moved abut 40m and still I couldn't fly. I restarted all 3 units and it cleared completely and I flew totally free of problems.

I think generally its a problem to find a real solution. But that's my opinion.

Nigel

 

[Dazzauk]

Hmm, I just wanna fly without these constant messages lol, I get these messages throughput my whole flight I have had this in 33 out of 35 flights lol, not sure how to proceed?

 

[solentlife]

Are they stopping you from flying ?

I take it this is when you around Fawley, Calshot ? have you gone out into the New Forest well away from everything ? If you try at Hatchet Pond - where a lot of RC flying is held ... I flew there for many years ... then that would likely throw up errors from the old Airfield Apron and ground construction still remaining.

Other than that ??

Nigel

 

[Dazzauk]

Are they stopping you from flying ?

Other than that ??

Nigel

This is where im at lol.

Doesn't seem to interfere with flying, just making me worry.

Ive flown calshot, (blackfield) Lyndhurst..

Darren

 

[solentlife]

When you say Lyndhurst .. I take it you mean on the Heath just as you enter from Soton side ? Its nice round there ... I used to take my Mother to Lyndhurst for days out ...

Nigel

 

[Dazzauk]

here

Its where I hot 1.135 miles with the dbs lol, its is nice there.

 

[solentlife]

Yep .... that's where I thought ...

I also used to camp / caravan at Ashurst Site just before there on the right of Soton Road ...

I love the New Forest ...

Nice Italian restaurant in Brockenhurst I remember !!

Nigel

 

[Dazzauk]

Yep .... that's where I thought ...

I also used to camp / caravan at Ashurst Site just before there on the right of Soton Road ...

I love the New Forest ...

Nice Italian restaurant in Brockenhurst I remember !!

Nigel

la pagola Love it there. Good memory

 

[solentlife]

I hope to be in UK early summer and also in August ... so hope to let you know and maybe have a flight or even a beer together !!

Nigel

 

[Dazzauk]

I hope to be in UK early summer and also in August ... so hope to let you know and maybe have a flight or even a beer together !!

Nigel

sounds good to me buddy

 

[Andy-M]

I've posted previously how I've had the "strong interference" message from my P3S in the exact area I fly my P3P which doesn't get the message.
Powering everything down and restarting seemed to resolve it.
My thoughts are that it is a firmware issue on the P3S.
I'm no expert obviously but my theory seems plausible.

 

[FrankAN]

I've posted previously how I've had the "strong interference" message from my P3S in the exact area I fly my P3P which doesn't get the message.
Powering everything down and restarting seemed to resolve it.
My thoughts are that it is a firmware issue on the P3S.
I'm no expert obviously but my theory seems plausible.

I think this is where many of us are leaning. The feeling is this may be a software problem with IOS users.

 

[solentlife]

The only thing I'm finding now is that Litchi is failing to connect everytime on first start-up .. I have to power down RC and Litchi to get it to fire up and connect. The wifi is there and tablet says connected to Phantom 3 ... but app doesn't.

But no compass trouble as OP ...

I even flew next to my concrete slabs today .. nothing.

Nigel

 

[Andy-M]

I think this is where many of us are leaning. The feeling is this may be a software problem with IOS users.

I'm an android user.
Just to throw more confusion into the mix....

 

[Dazzauk]

I'm an android user.
Just to throw more confusion into the mix....

No confusion, Actually its good news it proves even further that this is ios related..

 

[solentlife]

I'm an android user as well ... but I cannot see this as a Tablet / Phone matter as the IMU / Compass calibration / data is AC based ... the tablet / Phone only tells the AC to calibrate or reads the data when we want to know it ...

Nigel

 

[Dazzauk]

I'm an android user as well ... but I cannot see this as a Tablet / Phone matter as the IMU / Compass calibration / data is AC based ... the tablet / Phone only tells the AC to calibrate or reads the data when we want to know it ...

Nigel

Id say 90-95% of people getting this warning to the extreme are ios users

 

[Shawn Hughes]

I'm somewhat new to flying - I have a P3s which I've flown since Christmas. I am constantly getting this message - only I'm so new that I did not realize it was not simply the RF interference from general area things where I'm flying. I teach at a university - and when I fly on campus the message pops up every 2-3 seconds for a flight. I figured it was our Wi-Fi cloud.

Also - My brother in law taught me to fly on his P2 - and he recalibrate the compass EACH flight. So that is what I have done. Based on this thread I'm gathering that I should NOT do a full compass calibration for each new flight?

Shawn

 

[Dazzauk]

I'm somewhat new to flying - I have a P3s which I've flown since Christmas. I am constantly getting this message - only I'm so new that I did not realize it was not simply the RF interference from general area things where I'm flying. I teach at a university - and when I fly on campus the message pops up every 2-3 seconds for a flight. I figured it was our Wi-Fi cloud.

Also - My brother in law taught me to fly on his P2 - and he recalibrate the compass EACH flight. So that is what I have done. Based on this thread I'm gathering that I should NOT do a full compass calibration for each new flight?

Shawn

Grey area lol, dji say yes 95% forum users say no.

I say just do one when and as you feel you need to, it does seem you don't have to do it 100% of the time,