Hello all.

I am a very new purchaser of the Spark Drone Combo kit and have a few basic questions.

I have searched to best of my limited abilities and seem more confused now than before.

A few answers or link references would be greatly appreciated.

I have only conducted a few test flights to judge battery times and flight characteristics, so I am a rookie.

Question 1 - Does an OTG cable actually produce any significant improvements when attached to the iphone and remote? If, so what are they? I received some video hesitation on my iphone during my test flights when a couple hundred feet away.

Question 2 - Do the current US regs on drone use limit the altitude to 120 meters (393 feet) or is that just near any airport or restricted areas? Not that I could go any higher because I couldn't see the drone at its max altitude anyway.

Thanks for allowing me to bore you. I am certain I will have more questions as time goes on.

Arnie R

1) yes, connecting your iPhone to the RC via cable will provide a much better experience, eg a more stable connection and a better range, since the RC will only have to maintain a WiFi connection to the aircraft, and not two WiFi networks simultaneously. For best results, choose a channel from the 2.4 GHz network manually (carefull to select one that isn’t too busy, there’s a graph in the WiFi settings of the app that shows the state of all the channels)
2) I’m not 100% sure about US regs, but I’m quite sure the altitude limit is everywhere, just like in EU countries. It’s to avoid incursions into airspace where manned aircraft fly, which would be extremely dangerous.

KurtVD Posted at 2018-6-30 18:18
1) yes, connecting your iPhone to the RC via cable will provide a much better experience, eg a more stable connection and a better range, since the RC will only have to maintain a WiFi connection to the aircraft, and not two WiFi networks simultaneously. For best results, choose a channel from the 2.4 GHz network manually (carefull to select one that isn’t too busy, there’s a graph in the WiFi settings of the app that shows the state of all the channels)
2) I’m not 100% sure about US regs, but I’m quite sure the altitude limit is everywhere, just like in EU countries. It’s to avoid incursions into airspace where manned aircraft fly, which would be extremely dangerous.

Thank you for your reply. I will have to experiment more.

Answer to your first question is correct.

As far as altitude limits in the states, yes, we are limited to 400ft (120m) with a few exceptions.

If you are on top of a hill, mountain, mesa or ridge line...you can fly 400ft (120m) above it.

If you are within 400ft (120m) distance of the base of a structure, you are allowed to fly 400ft (120m) above the structure.
Example: If a tower that has a restaurant on it (Tower of the Americas San Antonio, Texas) is 750ft (228m) , you can fly up to 1,150ft (350m) so long as you are within 400ft (120m) of the tower.

To do this, you will have to change the max altitude in the settings.
Also note, total max altitude is 1640ft (500m)

KurtVD Posted at 2018-6-30 18:18
1) yes, connecting your iPhone to the RC via cable will provide a much better experience, eg a more stable connection and a better range, since the RC will only have to maintain a WiFi connection to the aircraft, and not two WiFi networks simultaneously. For best results, choose a channel from the 2.4 GHz network manually (carefull to select one that isn’t too busy, there’s a graph in the WiFi settings of the app that shows the state of all the channels)
2) I’m not 100% sure about US regs, but I’m quite sure the altitude limit is everywhere, just like in EU countries. It’s to avoid incursions into airspace where manned aircraft fly, which would be extremely dangerous.

Kurt. I think you have a mis understanding about how the connection works. If you are using the controller, all communication from the spark  is between the controller and the spark. Even the video. The phone gets is video sent from the controller via wifi or OTG. While using the OTG cable will improve video lag on the phone, it will have zero impact on the connection to the drone. All your doing is improving the connection between the controller and the phone, not the spark and the phone. and definitely not the controller and the drone. You can prove this by actually flying without the phone, not that you would.

pmshop Posted at 2018-6-30 19:06
Answer to your first question is correct.

As far as altitude limits in the states, yes, we are limited to 400ft (120m) with a few exceptions.

I kinda figured the 400 foot limit would be the rule. But since I can't see it that high anyway, it's probably a good idea.

I think the OTG cable lets European users get around 5.8ghz limits in their location.  I have a OTG cable that I bought new when I got my Fly More combo but I have never used it.  It does not provide a better connection to the remote than WiFi (in the USA) and gives lots of odd app errors/results.  

Video hesitation/lag is a feature of the broadcast video and its digital compression/decompiling/processing.  Fly it by visual eyeball.  Edit the videos to include only chains of established movements instead of strafe to climb to yaw.

Hello there. I appreciate your time bringing this query to us.

1. Actually, we do not recommend to use an OTG cable to connect your mobile device to your remote controller because Spark's remote controller was designed for wi-fi.
2. That will be really depend on the location you are currently in. It will show or notify in the app if you are close or within a restricted zone. You can refer to this link: https://www.faa.gov/uas