Another frustrated warning to those considering the Mavic, of "go-slows" in honouring warranties.

The background:  I've previously owned a Phantom 4, so not new to drones.  New Mavic, 4th flight, took off and only 1 minute into the flight, at 13m altitude, and 83m away from me, clear blue day, suddenly dropped dead straight into the ocean.  All logs captured by the RC show no errors, no warnings, no battery failures - so appears to be a complete power cutout.  All synced to DJI, sent to them in the ticket, all information provided.

The support since then has been terrible.  No action for nearly two weeks - I follow up daily and get different stories, I've been asked to provide the proof of purchase twice (even through it's part of the original ticket).  I've been told THREE times, that I will need to send the drone in, despite having explained it failed over water and is lost.  I've been told I will need to send the RC in, but never given any details of when/how/where, even before anyone analysed the logs.  And finally, now, after nearly 2 weeks and still the logs haven't even been analysed, I'm told I'm not allowed to escalate in any way for support.

Buyer beware.
Support ticket #410927

I would be surprised if DJI warranties this without retrieving the aircraft. That is why having a supplemental insurance on this is such a good idea.Good luck though.

Sorry for losing it (Mavic AND patience). I hope never to fall into the DJI service hell. Wish you good luck but consider it a lost cause and do not hope to get a respectful treatment. This is just based on what I have been reading on this very forum although the mods (thanks!) do give DJI a more friendly face than it has.
You mind to share the logs on Healthydrones?

Blank Posted at 2017-2-8 16:47
I would be surprised if DJI warranties this without retrieving the aircraft. That is why having a supplemental insurance on this is such a good idea.Good luck though.

Yeh I have Care Refresh as well.  But interesting point - the warranty requires evidence that the aircraft failed (which is different to having the actual aircraft).  In this case the logs prove that (logging halted in-flight at altitude).  Australian Consumer Law in fact requires vendors to provide a warranty in the event that the product failed to function as designed.  

To not honour a warranty just because it failed over water means that DJI products therefore cannot be ever flown over water - it would require DJI to clearly state that the warranty is void if the aircraft is flown over water, which it doesn't.  We will see.  Maybe.

For sure Maclak - here is the link of the fateful flight:  http://healthydrones.com/main?share=POKdeA

xordium Posted at 2017-2-8 17:06
Yeh I have Care Refresh as well.  But interesting point - the warranty requires evidence that the aircraft failed (which is different to having the actual aircraft).  In this case the logs prove that (logging halted in-flight at altitude).  Australian Consumer Law in fact requires vendors to provide a warranty in the event that the product failed to function as designed.  

To not honour a warranty just because it failed over water means that DJI products therefore cannot be ever flown over water - it would require DJI to clearly state that the warranty is void if the aircraft is flown over water, which it doesn't.  We will see.  Maybe.

I have seen similar only last week , dji said compass problem , pilot error , not what I or others taught, but there you go, it may not be that simple.

I hope it goes well for you.

xordium Posted at 2017-2-8 17:12
For sure Maclak - here is the link of the fateful flight:  http://healthydrones.com/main?share=POKdeA

Thanks. Looks awkward, actually nothing strange other than the weak signal at the end (at such close distance). No peaks in power, no compass freaking out. Almost if someone used the almighty drone-gun.

Yeh I believe the weak signal at the end is in fact the moment the drone died, and so the signal dipped triggering a poor signal warning in the remote just before it ended.  My strong suspicion is a GoPro Karma'esque battery connection fault.

Always hard to guess the mavic's last thoughts. DJI surely must pull some very special data out of the " black box" files to determine warranty or not. Being one of the early adopters and knowing the DJI service reputation (1st time droner) I actually gave up on service from the start. If/when mine bricks i'll sure raise questions it but not expect anything. That's just how things work in DJI county. Please post if you get usable info.

Its a bit contradicting if you look at the sensor section: http://healthydrones.com/main?share=POKdeA&page_id=SENSORS

It clearly says good connection there... hmmm...

I'd thought boats, sail boats, boats in general with a radio comms, those things can go out for miles... reckon it might be that jamming the thing?

Heh interesting theory but nah - marine radios are totally different frequencies to what these drones use.  The mavic uses 2.4 GHz to 2.483 GHz, while marine radio uses 156 to 174 MHz - so not even close to interfering.

Sorry about your experience.  I've logged your complaint and will process your case as soon as possible.

xordium Posted at 2017-2-8 22:12
Heh interesting theory but nah - marine radios are totally different frequencies to what these drones use.  The mavic uses 2.4 GHz to 2.483 GHz, while marine radio uses 156 to 174 MHz - so not even close to interfering.

That's very true. And even if anyone was using a radar it would be X-band not S-band so not even close (and let's skip on epirb ;-).

Update on warranty:  After 4 weeks, an exhaustive analysis (not really) from DJI found:
"1. disconnected point: -33.8463268 151.2789344
3 t=01-02 h=12m d=96m record suddenly stopped. At this time, pilot was trying to turn the aircraft to right. And cache video suddenly stopped as well.
Conclusion: insufficient data, reason unknown.
Sorry to hear about the accident. I am afraid there is no sufficient data to find out the accident reason."

Brilliant.   And so despite everyone witnessing the drone fail mid air and drop like a rock, despite there being zero evidence of user error, DJI believe that because the drone didn't log anything (which of course it couldn't if it was a battery connection failure) it is therefore not a warranty issue, or even worthy of a DJI Care refresh replacement.   No explanation on how stopping logging and recording mid-air is considered "normal behaviour".

I am stunned at such shocking customer service - so ranting here to (1) feel better and (2) get the warning out of their practices.
PS. It's not helping me feel much better  ;)

Yeh DJI has the worst customer service out there. Its pretty much an established fact now with all DJI product owners. Sorry for your loss. What makes it worse is that they just give a one liner response and thats it
and no one to escalate this issue to..If they cannot disapprove your reasoning then they should give you a benefit of the doubt and offer a replacement at a discount or something. But, DJI has no concept of keeping loyal customers, its not a mentality in that part of the world (I'm from the Asia region, so dont hate on me)

So a scan through the forums shows quite a few "Karmas" out there - some get replaced under warranty - some don't.   How come DJI?  

This one:  https://forum.dji.com/thread-71911-1-1.html
Mine: https://forum.dji.com/forum.php? ... mp;page=1#pid706309
This guy:  https://forum.dji.com/forum.php? ... 6orderby%3Ddateline
Another one here:  https://forum.dji.com/thread-84875-1-1.html  
This guy: https://forum.dji.com/thread-81256-1-31.html

Very interested to know if others have the same problem as these - all have exactly the same symptom - total power loss halting any logging.

How many need to fall out of the air before it's a problem?  (Yes yes I know, probably more than 5)

Corrected URL: https://forum.dji.com/thread-84621-1-1.html

alirz5 Posted at 2017-2-22 17:21
Yeh DJI has the worst customer service out there. Its pretty much an established fact now with all DJI product owners. Sorry for your loss. What makes it worse is that they just give a one liner response and thats it
and no one to escalate this issue to..If they cannot disapprove your reasoning then they should give you a benefit of the doubt and offer a replacement at a discount or something. But, DJI has no concept of keeping loyal customers, its not a mentality in that part of the world (I'm from the Asia region, so dont hate on me)

The typical mentality is known in the rest of the world...

Is there no chance to find a diver and try to retrieve it?

Am going to attempt exactly this on the weekend, in the hope that DJI will at least honour the care refresh, but having the drone wouldn't change the warranty position, as they are saying "not enough information" in the logs. Ie. Let's assume it is a karma style power failure. The logs on the drone itself would be identical to those recorded by the remote - abrupt ending of logging. So how would having the drone change it? The problem here is DJI have no justifiable position: it's not user error, the drone stopped in mid air, which they acknowledge, but refuse to admit it failed, or explain why it stopped logging mid air. Pretty poor that they've honoured others in exactly the same position. Anyway...Rant rant rant ... Sorry

Posting new thread here due to no response when posting in reply to existing threads.Full history here:https://forum.dji.com/thread-84239-1-1.html
Drone failed mid flight, witnessed by many, and logs plus camera footage show the failure was mid flight with no explanation. But DJI won't honour the warranty, despite doing so in many similar cases. Why??? Unacceptable support, unfair and unreasonable.

Support ticket #410927

We're very sorry about the case.

Even if the battery just suddenly died, or even fell out from the drone, there will still be a traced amount of data showing a voltage drop of the main controller. This is just mysterious and strange. But anyone, I'll escalate this issue and you should hear a response in a day or two.

Do you have a case number that starts with CAS- or RMA number?

Hey Thor, thanks for replying, I do appreciate it. I've never been given a CAS #, only the support ticket # from zendesk #410927. I guess my point is that a failure occurred, there is zero evidence to suggest it is pilot error, and no explanation from DJI as to why it halted mid air. Not being able to explain the failure isn't justification for refusing to honour warranty.
Let me know if the ticket is not a proper support case ticket and if I should raise somewhere else.

As an aside, I do question whether a battery connection loss would be recorded in the logs on the remote. For that to happen, the connection would be lost, but the drone would have to detect, record, AND transmit the voltage drop, while motors and control units like the ICU continue to also draw power. I agree that logs on the device might capture it, but I don't think it can be guaranteed that the drone could transmit that data in that situation. The logs do show a signal drop at the last moment, which would match a dropping out of the transmitter in the drone.