solentlife Posted at 2017-10-8 08:13
OK .... first .... lets ignore the BS replies.

" I rebooted the app, no luck. I booted up Litchi and it was still disconnected, but I could at least activate RTH." ..... that is the real item.

I hope that's true.  I have never lost control, but I know it would be easy to freak out.  I hope that if it ever happens, I remember this post... take a breath and allow the app to work properly......

Epicdoom Posted at 2017-10-8 09:12
I Have also encountered several incidences where helicopters were flying below 400ft one of the closest calls was when I was filming a fire in the distance. I heard the rotor thump of a helicopter looked behind me and there is was coming straight at my drone I pulled my stick full down and dropped from 390ft to 200ft by the time the chopper was right over my drone the rotor wash from the helicopter actually pushed my drone another ten feet or so downward and almost upset its orientation for upright flight.

Second close call was when I was flying over a pagoda at 160ft up I was just about to engage POI when I heard the helicopter coming, but couldn't see it due to the pagoda blocking my view (I was standing right at the base of the pagoda) I flew backwards and down at the same time just as the helicopter flew over the Pagoda extremely low . several folks watching said if I hadn't dropped out of the sky like I did that helicopter would have hit my drone for sure.  

What confuses me is talking about dropping down but no mention of other evasive action. You can drop at only a few mph but you can move horizontally at 30+ mph. If the helo is coming right at you, sure drop altitude but also move to the side as fast as you can. It should not be passing right over your AC if you can help it. Get some horizontal clearance too.

Trouble is - we are not there to see exactly relation of P3 to the Helo's ...

Nigel

MrRobert5823 Posted at 2017-10-10 05:21
Scary.  I would be afraid that RTH would blindly crash into the helicopters.  What a mess!

Yeah good point...but it is the world we currently live in and I for one I'm not interested in seeing it get more restrictive.  

Genghis9 Posted at 2017-10-10 10:33
Yeah good point...but it is the world we currently live in and I for one I'm not interested in seeing it get more restrictive.

Yeah, and it will likely get more restrictive.  I am planning a trip to San Francisco later this year and I wanted to take my drone.  Then I did a quick lookup on the restrictions... Oh My!  After seeing them, I won't be taking my drone out there any time soon.  It's such a shame....

MrRobert5823 Posted at 2017-10-10 13:26
Yeah, and it will likely get more restrictive.  I am planning a trip to San Francisco later this year and I wanted to take my drone.  Then I did a quick lookup on the restrictions... Oh My!  After seeing them, I won't be taking my drone out there any time soon.  It's such a shame....

Cali is the epitome of governmental control and restrictions...I don't see how people are even allowed to breath there anymore

Genghis9 Posted at 2017-10-10 14:27
Cali is the epitome of governmental control and restrictions...I don't see how people are even allowed to breath there anymore

That's a valid point! Hopefully the rest of us never go down the same road as them. Must be Hollywood

Glad of the outcome. Could have been a lot worse I guess. But yeah when you lose signal "WIFI" camera, RTH will kick in. Just be calm a wait and 9 out of 10 you will get picture back but if not wait till you can see AC and you will  still have control for landing

Michgolden Posted at 2017-10-10 15:12
That's a valid point! Hopefully the rest of us never go down the same road as them. Must be Hollywood

I literally pray about that

Sunny D Posted at 2017-10-7 23:22
P3s with iPad Air 1.

Thanks for getting back to us. The WiFi might be disturbed by the environment. Please change another location and test the performance first.

Michgolden Posted at 2017-10-10 15:12
That's a valid point! Hopefully the rest of us never go down the same road as them. Must be Hollywood

Yes, I am sure that's the reason... Regardless, there is a lot that is being lost because of it!

KM5RG-Robert Posted at 2017-10-10 05:58
What confuses me is talking about dropping down but no mention of other evasive action. You can drop at only a few mph but you can move horizontally at 30+ mph. If the helo is coming right at you, sure drop altitude but also move to the side as fast as you can. It should not be passing right over your AC if you can help it. Get some horizontal clearance too.

I could hear it before I could see it, and since it was flying low (300’ or so) because of the neighborhood trees, I couldn’t see it until it was right over me, and under my drone. Which is also likely why I lost connection. Going horizontal (further away) would not have helped, I would’ve just been going out of VLOS with no video, and no idea where the helo was or was going.

I lost signal flying my P4P directly above my garden in the earlier days of getting - then I realised I had to push the antenna down to full 90 degrees and it regained immediately

solentlife Posted at 2017-10-8 08:18
I also doubt the Heli's caused disconnection of your AC / RC.

I fly in NATO airspace (former soviet union) with daily patrols ..... where you would expect such - nothing.

There is a local medical helicopter that frequently passes over my house and it almost always causes connection problems between my RC and Spark. I'm always flying below 400 ft but when I hear the helicopter and I also try to decent as fast and safe as possible. Most of the time it causes video lag and disconnect problems, but I just wait it out and it usually reconnects after 30 seconds or so. So my point is, I DO believe that the helicopter caused his video to disconnect, but I would have waited for the app to regain connection.

DustMan Posted at 2017-10-10 15:19
Glad of the outcome. Could have been a lot worse I guess. But yeah when you lose signal "WIFI" camera, RTH will kick in. Just be calm a wait and 9 out of 10 you will get picture back but if not wait till you can see AC and you will  still have control for landing

Loss of WiFi Camera signal does NOT initiate RTH ....

Loss of CONTROL link of RC / AC initiates RTH .....

If you lose WiFi Camera link all that happens is your screen freezes and you then have no idea what AC is doing ...
Best action then is to manually action RTH using the S Switch or Button if you have an Adv / Pro machine.

I have had a number of occasions where video stops ... you just let go sticks ... few seconds later manually start RTH.

First time it happens - panic is the first thing you feel ! Take a deep breath, leave sticks alone ... calm down and use the Controllers RTH ...

Nigel

solentlife Posted at 2017-10-14 04:11
Loss of WiFi Camera signal does NOT initiate RTH ....

Loss of CONTROL link of RC / AC initiates RTH .....

Sorry Buddy my RTH kicks in when I've lost wifi several times

I walked between mine and my house, aluminum sided house, it was about 50ft up and about 150ft away, and lost app signal, never lost control, and it took me a few seconds of just looking at it, hanging out up in the air, wondering why it wasn't crashing, to figure out what happened  hahaha

weird thing was, my app never reconnected, i couldn't even get it to reconnect by logging out and back in, etc. i'd brought the bird back and landed, tried everything i could to get the app to log in to save the video, and once i brought it inside and powered down, pulled the sd card, and it had recorded every second of what it had done, i just didn't see any of it until i pulled it into the computer.  it was a big relief honestly, i'm glad i have the video, but i'm pretty cool with even if i lost app, i still have control of the thing!

I can explain that - assuming you have a P3S like the OP.  

Some of the Androids (not all of them) will not reconnect automatically after losing wifi because it thinks you don't want the signal because the signal does not include internet.  You must reconnect manually.  You have to tap on the little square at the bottom of the screen, then go to the Android's Settings, tap on wifi, and you'll see the wifi for the phantom connection.  A message under it will say "No internet, will not connect automatically."  So you must tap on it and then tap on the word "connect" which means you are connecting manually and it will connect within a few secs.  When you again tap on the little square and go back to the flight app, you will have normal wifi with FPV and telemetry.  

I suspect this is what happened to the OP too - when he lost the 2.4 and it wouldn't reconnect, although I don't know for sure about apple.  On Android, a manual connection solves the problem.  

To solve the problem in advance during flights towards the edge of range or behind obstacles where you think you may lose the wifi, you can connect manually even if you are already connected.  Do this before you launch.  You never need to connect manually more than once.  Any subsequent loss of wifi will automatically reconnect.  

Hope this helps.