Tracking device

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Well guys I had to bite the bullet and bought two different trackers , one is the pocket finder that works with iPhone and the other is a tracking system that works of ham radio signal , yes I have had 3 runaways and lucky got them back with no damage other than broken windshield on my truck . I don't know if the pocket tracker will interfere with the system in the phantom I will be contacting the company in the morning , I will keep you guys updated on the one that works the best . I sent my phantom back it was to unstable to fly I even had the guy that sells them here at our field to make sure that it was not something I was doing when he was flying it took of on him to , let me say I'm not bashing at all I love this thing it is so much fun to fly just really nervous to fly it when it has taken off on me . Hopefully when I get it back it will be fine like the rest of the guys here at the field. If some one else has found a tracker that is working can you post it for us , most of the pet trackers don't have much of a range have a great night all George
 
I've read a lot of the posts and whatever other info I could get my hands on about fly-aways - I'll bet $ to donuts it's all RFI (radio frequency interference) not necessarily caused by the user. I've noticed that it seems many of the problems occur in more heavily populated areas where there is a real potential for heavy WiFi use and quite possibly other transmissions in the 2.4 gHz band. Happily, I live in a rural area and so have not encountered any problems. The answer has to be to go to a different TX/RX combo with either higher power or using the 5 gHz band. Just sayin'.
 
Hey great post geno I fly mine at a rc feild which is at the top of a small mountain which was a dump , there is nothing remotely around , but that does give me something to think about , has anyone changed radios out and if they did has there been any problems , and yes I think it is possibly a radio problem because I did lose total control, the motors went wide open and off it went . And even shut the radio off as instructed by someone and all that did was save the battery's on the remote ha ha . I will say the phantom hauls butt when it goes full throttle and screaming past you . Thanks
 
My Garmin GTU-10 tracker just arrived. Charging and registering it now. Figured $50/yr is a worthwhile insurance / recovery investment, especially given the cost of the Phantom, camera, gimbal, etc.

When not in use, I'll put it on my dog. :cool:
 
darkhorse said:
My Garmin GTU-10 tracker just arrived. Charging and registering it now. Figured $50/yr is a worthwhile insurance / recovery investment, especially given the cost of the Phantom, camera, gimbal, etc.

When not in use, I'll put it on my dog. :cool:

Let us know what kind of range you get with that. Everyone wants to know how the GTU-10 works out in this environment.
 
Really keen to know what you think about the trackers you've got after my own bad experience of almost total Phantom loss.
 
darkhorse said:
My Garmin GTU-10 tracker just arrived. Charging and registering it now. Figured $50/yr is a worthwhile insurance / recovery investment, especially given the cost of the Phantom, camera, gimbal, etc.

When not in use, I'll put it on my dog. :cool:

Have you tested it yet?? What are your thoughts??
 
I got the pocket finder kind of large but will blend in with the phantom , we attached to a buddy plane than he put it down about 3 miles always and we tracked it quick and easy . We were at the desert so it was not in a populated area in case some one want to bust my ball of a dangerous thing we did , the most dangerous thing we did was scare a lizard ,but I apologized to the lizard and gave him a cricket and donated a few dollars to his sons collage fund than we tracked it with no flaws . Althought this does not fix the runaway problem it lets me find my $1400.00 bill hopefully , a lot of the other ones I have resourced have a very short range most only to 400 ft which is useless I can see it from there . The other one I ordered is ham freq. which is a 5 mile range , I'm waiting for it to show up so I can test it , the company of pocket finder claims it will not interfere with the onboard GPS .
 
The Pocketfinder devices are cellular based just like the Garmin unit. So as long as you only fly in areas with good cell coverage then it should work well.

The Garmin comes with a free year of service and is $50 a year after that. The Pocketfinder units are $13/month and don't appear to include any free months. At least from what I can find on the website. Did yours come with any free months?
 
If you buy it from apple it comes with a 2 month trial but apple charges more than amazon does so of course went with amazon . Not realizing that it was apple only I thought they both did it , so far I'm real happy with it time will tell . One thing I do like is it is real time , let me know what you guys think of the garmin 10 , garmin is my favorite product I have all garmin GPS for the cars
 
pwright said:
The Pocketfinder devices are cellular based just like the Garmin unit. So as long as you only fly in areas with good cell coverage then it should work well.

The Garmin comes with a free year of service and is $50 a year after that. The Pocketfinder units are $13/month and don't appear to include any free months. At least from what I can find on the website. Did yours come with any free months?


Pocketfinder uses A-GPS, also known as assisted GPS. Its a locating scheme like the one you have on your smart phones, combining both GPS signal and cell tower signal to triangulate the tracker's location. So as long as you are in an area with either of the two, you should be able to locate what ever the tracker is. They use AT&T for the cellular signals so I would double check the area you are in if it has good signal with AT&T just in case there is not enough GPS satellites around. If anyone is interested in it, you can go to their web site (www.pocketfinder.com).
 
Correct. It uses A-GPS to determine its location but uses regular cellular service to deliver that information to the user via their mobile app or web service.
 
:?:
darkhorse said:
My Garmin GTU-10 tracker just arrived. Charging and registering it now. Figured $50/yr is a worthwhile insurance / recovery investment, especially given the cost of the Phantom, camera, gimbal, etc.

When not in use, I'll put it on my dog. :cool:


How is it going with the Garmin GTU-10. We are anxiously awaiting your opinion on how it works with the Phantom. Thanks. :D
 
auck said:
Pocketfinder uses A-GPS, also known as assisted GPS. Its a locating scheme like the one you have on your smart phones, combining both GPS signal and cell tower signal to triangulate the tracker's location. So as long as you are in an area with either of the two, you should be able to locate what ever the tracker is. They use AT&T for the cellular signals so I would double check the area you are in if it has good signal with AT&T just in case there is not enough GPS satellites around. If anyone is interested in it, you can go to their web site (http://www.pocketfinder.com).

It would be nice if the pocket finder would use either one or the other network to locate itself. To my understanding A-GPS is not using cellphones to locate itself but it uses the cellular network to update its orbital data and sometimes send the data received from the satellites to a server to help the device to determine its position quicker. If my assumption is good, A-GPS won't work if it has only cell network.
 
Kakou67 said:
auck said:
Pocketfinder uses A-GPS, also known as assisted GPS. Its a locating scheme like the one you have on your smart phones, combining both GPS signal and cell tower signal to triangulate the tracker's location. So as long as you are in an area with either of the two, you should be able to locate what ever the tracker is. They use AT&T for the cellular signals so I would double check the area you are in if it has good signal with AT&T just in case there is not enough GPS satellites around. If anyone is interested in it, you can go to their web site (http://www.pocketfinder.com).

It would be nice if the pocket finder would use either one or the other network to locate itself. To my understanding A-GPS is not using cellphones to locate itself but it uses the cellular network to update its orbital data and sometimes send the data received from the satellites to a server to help the device to determine its position quicker. If my assumption is good, A-GPS won't work if it has only cell network.

that is correct. as stated in pocketfinder's FAQ..

"If the device enters an area without wireless coverage, the GPS feature will not be able to report its current location until it re-enters an area with network coverage. Once it reconnects, it will transmit a history of its locations that you can view online."
 
Drummer Boy said:
:?:
darkhorse said:
My Garmin GTU-10 tracker just arrived. Charging and registering it now. Figured $50/yr is a worthwhile insurance / recovery investment, especially given the cost of the Phantom, camera, gimbal, etc.

When not in use, I'll put it on my dog. :cool:


How is it going with the Garmin GTU-10. We are anxiously awaiting your opinion on how it works with the Phantom. Thanks. :D

Been very windy, haven't had a chance to try it yet. :|

One frustrating thing with the GTU-10 is that when you make a configuration change, Garmin says it can take up to 24 hrs for their service to update.
 
I'd love to know how peoples units work out...
I need to purchase two. I recently lost TWO Phantoms in high winds. I recovered one thanks to a good samaritan. I had my company branding on the rig and they looked me up. But the other rig has been missing since last Wednesday. I know it couldn't have traveled far... it was in the process of making a Stage 2 Emergency Landing. I lost sight of it at about 60ft behind some trees.

My concern with the tracking units is their size. That and I wonder if they interfere with the onboard GPS unit. Wouldn't it be nice is DJI started their own tracking service just based off the Phantom's onboard system???
 
Well guys I have been very happy with my pocket finder I have attached it to the bottom side of the phantom and it kind of blends in a little the color is pretty close. As far as coverage it pretty much has coverage everywhere nowadays cell signals are everywhere and are strong enough to overlap dead areas . The company is great to deal with they have answered all my questions and follow up with updating for me . Most of the trackers I have looked up are $29.99 a month where these guys are $13.00 month also a big selling feature to any product is customer service , I hate having to email back and forth to get answers . With these guys you can contact them by phone and poof answers . Me and a buddy have tested two different trackers at the desert both were about 4 miles away and we tracked the pocket finder took me right to it no problem and the other one is still at the desert with no chance of us finding it, there was 3 of us searching for it and I pretty much left money at the desert , the battery is dead by now . We placed it than drove away from both ,we know no body took it we were all by our selfs. I hope this helps you guys we choose the desert for the lack of cell service and we were able to track it without having to work the streets . I hope you guys don't lose you phantoms, it is really disheartening to watch it fly away and than the walk of shame back to your car with a empty box and being so pissed off you can spit nails , knockup dead guys if you all find anything better please keep us informed i will George
 

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