Hey guys, I was the proud owner of a Phantom 3 Standard that I absolutely LOOOVED. Only sold because regulation in Canada are getting pretty bad for drones that weights in more than 1kg. Instead of that big and bulky beast, I got a Spark, which so far has been great to fly BUT....

I can't fully trust this drone. Is this just me, or does anybody else has the same feeling? I had a couple compass errors mid flight and I still don't fully understand this... I got a few questions:

1) What happens if my GPS signal is pretty good, let's say 18 satelites and I get a compass error at 500m from the home point, if I press RTH, is the Spark returning home?
2) What if in the same scenario, I get a compass error and "air craft disconnected", is it coming back to the home point?
3) Does it help if my iPhone is connected to the remote controller by cable?

I know it's a lot of questions but I'm having a really hard time trying to trust on that drone, on my P3S I never had a compass error and I knew it would always come back to the home point.

Thanks guys!

1,No compass error set the spark in ATTI mode so Spark is drifting, return flying manually.
2, no ATTI and you cannot return.
3, yes of course.

I rarely have problems, but when I do it's almost always in heavily populated areas, around tall buildings, and near towers or objects that can cause interference. So I try to just NOT DO THAT and I'm fine.
But to answer #1, don't use Return to Home. If you flew a Phantom 3 you have to skill to manually fly it home. I see more posts about crashing their Spark while using RTH than any other topic it seems.

Hey guys thank you so much for the information!

Is it safe to say that if you are getting a picture from the camera on your mobile device, you probably still have control of the drone manually???

#2 is the kiss of death. And some sparks do seem to be prone to it. In this event, the spark will not return to home and you will have no control over it either.

Compass errors will usually result in dropped GPS requiring manually flying. If the remote also disconnects, it might not end well.

I recently got the Spark, and for the four first weeks i frequently experienced compass error and loss of gps signal at the same time. I tried calibrating imu and compass, to no avail. I was really afraid that the drone would just fly off, never to be seen again. However the problem was easily solved. I recommend that you calibrate the drones compass OUTSIDE, at least 40 meters away from any electromagnetic disturbances. I did this in an open field, and the drone has worked flawless ever since. Best of luck to you!

#3 only affects the connection between the phone and RC.  There were some connectivity issues early on when the Spark first came out because of all the mobile devices out there and trying to get the app to work for all of them, but most if not all of those issues have been resolved.  I have never used OTG and never had a problem with RC/phone connection.  Your biggest worry is the connection between the RC and Spark.

#2 Here's what happened when the spark had compass error, lost connection, and tried to land: https://forum.dji.com/thread-139194-1-1.html

DJT_MVSP Posted at 2018-3-14 10:08
#2 Here's what happened when the spark had compass error, lost connection, and tried to land: https://forum.dji.com/thread-139194-1-1.html

That is a great video.  You can see the pilot input wrong commands then really strongly give it wrong commands to tilt way off.  Pilot not orientated to the spark's orientation?  The Spark levels out when it loses radio connection and drifts along on its speed momentum.  Either GPS re-acquisition or Pvision stops the spark in a hover.  Then it returns home on GPS that it relocked on.

Very cool