Was flying too low I admit, but I was trying to get a shot through a neighborhood that overlooks a river, well, I been saying this for a while but DJI really needs to update how WiFi system on the Mavic Air work, very very laggy when it nails a WiFi bubble it’s like it stops transmitting almost.  On my screen it locked up for 1/4 second just long enough for me to narrowly miss a tree but instead hit a lamp post which only popped up on my screen when I nailed it square on at 25MPH (bit of tail wind too)  only damage it sustained is that broken WiFi landing leg thing, which I’m going to be fixing myself.   I ordered the part (entire left arm that I’m going to pull part from only $25 shipped!) and it be here within 2 weeks from China.  It still flies straight and true and doesn’t report any errors looks like antenna wire hidden in the folding antenna arm is still connected not pinched or broken, and has no issue other than broken WiFi antenna leg so I’m pretty confident that it’s a easy fix!

I normally fly out of an area with my eyes off the screen and on the drone so I don’t hit anything and then go live view after I clear everything.  . but this time I was framing a shot and making my initial run before recording anything and dailing in my settings and being in a highly WiFi congested neighborhood it really struggled being in the bubbles even with my controller antenna mods.  Really hope DJI would fix this WiFi issue and upgrade how WiFi radios and connections work in firmware update maybe adding channel hopping and  simultaneous dual band connections and even reducing image quality to potato level a lot more (much lower quality faster) for sake of keeping frames coming, because seems how its implelmented right now it prefering higher quality frames and massively dropping frames before lossening up quality and we as mavic air owners cannot pick the quality eitther so stuck..     I predicted something like this would happen and it did..just happened to be me this time!  


so im requesting again, dji updates the mavic air a bit more:

1. channel hopping in auto mode, so it can change channels on the fly with the controller to aviod interferance

2. simultaneous dual band connection so doesnt hiccup or drop connection as hard or as often and increases reliability.

3. let us pick the quality/bitrate of live view, not all of us need highest quality live view all the time at the sake of dropping frames and crashing into something....

Sorry to hear about your crash, but at least it is still a fix you can do on your own.  I agree with you about DJI needing to pay more attention to the Mavic Air.

Sorry to know that mate

thanks im mostly concerned about less experienced pilots having to deal with this, possibly destroying or seriously damaging their $800- $1000 drone or worse, damaging something else more expensive like a car, or someone's home window or running into someone's face even, which given how easily the mavic air drops frames moment touches a wifi bubble its a potential safety risk. im faierly exoperianced and all it took was 1/4 second frame lock and i slammed square into a light pole.  

   i'm more experienced pilot with plenty of time, and limit pushing, and flight distance under my belt...and i done goofed thanks to the Wifi and transmission/encoder issues, trusting my live view too much when i was in all those wifi bubbles.  so i can imagine the risk being much much higher for lesser experienced

dji needs to fix how wifi and transmittion/live view is handled on mavic air as how it is implemtned right now is a safety risk, the hardware is compatable with such changes, and 802.11 standards allow such changes:

1. channel hopping/multi channel casting in some predetermined method/pattern, or in real time communicating channel changes (most wifi modules are capable of doing this on hardware level)

2. connecting to both 2.4GH and 5.8Ghz at same time, either splitting load across both or running on both then dropping weaker one in favor of stronger one. (again most can do this on a hardware level)

3.  quality slider for live view + better encoder/decoder system so dont drop as many frames before quality drops. as right now it seems to demand 720P live view far too long before it drops resolution..allowing far too many frames to drop...

4. add in a controller vs drone signal quality meter, instead of just 1 signal meter which is fairly useless thing only tells you if signal is weak, not which end is causing issues and make it easier for us to diagnose issues, like no signal RTH failure. i seen my drone sit a mile away not doing much of anything in no signal RTH mode, as if drone didnt know it was in RTH mode for a solid minute, i assume, but dont know,  it was still getting signal from the RC so it didnt trip its internal RTH routine until RTH was communicated,  but the RC wasnt getting signal from the drone properly so was a big gap in the information...  (again, hardware can do this)

all fixed..seriously though it would take alot longer for those parts to arrive!  i just left a message in the note tab to get it here asap..    in terms of fixing it, wasn't as easy as i hoped, but i managed to get it done.

Do you have the link where you bought the parts?

Albermen Posted at 1-4 07:08
Do you have the link where you bought the parts?

just search ebay from mavic air front arm replacement.  they all costing around the same $20-$30, which includes every little bit of the arm usually including screws, shims, arm, motor, wires, even the spring tensions for the arms.  

as for replacing/fixing a broken antenna, unfortunately the official way is to replace the entire arm and solder wires back in.  depending on the damage, maybe your only option.  

if however your damage is similar to mine and only the cap not the arm or antenna itself got destroyed...

1. take the cap out of the arm of the broken one, and gently snip a gap large enough to get wire out of that cap.

2.  pull the pin and pull wire out gently,  

3. on new arm un screw that cap and cut a slit barely large enough to slip the wire from center hole out then slip the wire,

4. remove the pin from the antenna foot and cap on the new one..

5. swap over the new cap to the old arm, and gently slip the wire back into the cap so in center hole.

6. slip the pin in on the side has bigger hole, thats side the pin goes in through and should sit flush..make sure wire isn't in the way,

7. gently snap the cap down into the arm, it should go in slightly off angle not straight like a few degrees left or right depending on which side of the drone.   then twist it gently to line it up.. be mindful the wire sometimes like pinching near the screw point where torx screw goes.   if its not wanting to go flush near screw point with the arm, gently keep retrying and wiggling.. dont screw it in if the wire maybe  in the way.

notes:

never pull the wire unless you want to open the drone up entirely and tighten the wire inside again while reworking it, dont want to put any hard bends into the wire or pinch it in the antenna folding foot..

.the snips i used are $5 pair of  Hako branded little wire snips for soldering stations.. these work amazingly for making small as possible cuts in that plastic so dont weaken it.

HereForTheBeer Posted at 1-4 08:20
just search ebay from mavic air front arm replacement.  they all costing around the same $20-$30, which includes every little bit of the arm usually including screws, shims, arm, motor, wires, even the spring tensions for the arms.  

as for replacing/fixing a broken antenna, unfortunately the official way is to replace the entire arm and solder wires back in.  depending on the damage, maybe your only option.  

Thanks heaps! I appreciate it!

It's cool that you fix your drone on your own. DJI probably whill charge more if you let them to repair it.

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