Hello all,

Wanted to quickly drop a line on the forum for those with questions regarding the extent of DJI's product warranty.
Keep in mind that DJI will not honor the product warranty in case something happens while flying without GPS lock.

I received a new drone and while flying for the first time without GPS lock at an altitude of 3.9 ft. the craft lost power and dropped to the ground. The last log entry was at an altitude of 3.9 ft. without any control input. There must have been a catastrophic failure and the drone shut down while in flight.
After sending it to DJI, their repar team diagnosed that the Core Board Module needs to be replaced which costs 264 dollars.
I was fully expecting DJI to do this repair under warranty as there was a strong indication that the faulty Core Board Module was the reason for the drone shutting down mid flight. But unfortunately they have a different viewpoint and claim user error for flying w/o GPS lock.
I have also been less than impressed about DJI's "log analysis". They don't give any information. It seems to me that they look for an excuse not to cover their product under warranty and that's the end of their assessment of what happened. They don't try to understand what happened or at least never explained to me.

Buyer/flyer beware.

You should bear in mind that a Warranty is povided by a manufacturer to protect you from faults in manufacture, and not necesarily incidents that happen while flying the aircraft. For this reason, DJI will want to see the flight log that was generated at the time of the incident. If the flight log indicates you were flying in a manner that contributed to the incident, then DJI can quite rightly reject your warranty claim. If you want a warranty coverage that covers you even if you contributed to the incident, then you should consider buying the DJI Care package, as it provides for replacement in cases like yours.

With regard to flying without GPS lock, DJI cannot claim that flying without GPS lock is not covered by the warranty, because if the aircraft will actually fly without GPS lock, then that is a valid flying mode that they have provided. If they wanted to exclude flying without GPS lock, then they should inhibit the aircraft from flying under that condition. Don't simply accept what they say, put it in the hands of you consumer advocacy group or aq solicitor. DJI try this sort of thing on all the time.

As to the 'log analysis', yes it is primarily there for DJI to be able to examine the incident in order to determine what caused the incident, and they do not really intend it to be information that they share with you.

in america, consumers have extensive warranty rights.  check it out.

I have also been less than impressed about DJI's "log analysis". They don't give any information. ...They don't try to understand what happened or at least never explained to me.
If you want to find out what actually happened or have an independent second opinion all you need to do is post your flight data here and there are members who can analyse it and usually give you an explanation.

To get to your flight data, go to: https://www.phantomhelp.com/LogViewer/Upload/
... where you'll find instructions to upload the data to that site and it will give a report
For help interpreting the data you can post a link for the report here.
Or just post the .txt file here.

Hi LoonyFlyer, we are very sorry for the crash accident and the warranty service was not provided in your case. I managed to get your case number via your Forum account, per the flight data, the unit was flying with low/no satellites, at flight time T=6:00s, Relative Height H=0m, the unit recorded an external impact, then fell.
Please be noted we do not recommend customers to fly the drone when the GPS signal is weak, the aircraft will automatically switch to ATTI mode when vision systems are unavailable and the GPS signal is weak. In ATTI mode, the drone is more easily affected by its surroundings and cannot brake itself automatically which cause flight hazard.
No malfunction was detected and the warranty service cannot be provided, hope for your understanding.

What does this mean: "unit recorded external impact, then fell"

GaryDoug Posted at 9-23 20:49
What does this mean: "unit recorded external impact, then fell"

What does this mean: "unit recorded external impact, then fell"
That suggests there was a crash with something that resulted in the drone falling.
This is quite different from what the OP said:  flying for the first time without GPS lock at an altitude of 3.9 ft. the craft lost power and dropped to the ground.

It appears that this incident is the same one as:  https://forum.dji.com/forum.php? ... 22553&extra=&page=1
In that case, the OP's data has already been seen and it didn't show any cause for the incident.

DJI may have found more in the internal data recorder than was shown in the .txt file.

Keep in mind that DJI will not honor the product warranty in case something happens while flying without GPS lock.
I doubt this is true.
Did DJI tell you this specifically or is it your interpretation of something they said?
I've not run into this before and it doesn't seem right.

Labroides Posted at 9-23 22:07
Keep in mind that DJI will not honor the product warranty in case something happens while flying without GPS lock.
I doubt this is true.
Did DJI tell you this specifically or is it your interpretation of something they said?

That is exactly what DJI said. They cannot cover under warranty because I was flying without GPS lock. I argued that this is a supported flight mode but that didn't help my case.

DJI Mindy Posted at 9-23 20:10
Hi LoonyFlyer, we are very sorry for the crash accident and the warranty service was not provided in your case. I managed to get your case number via your Forum account, per the flight data, the unit was flying with low/no satellites, at flight time T=6:00s, Relative Height H=0m, the unit recorded an external impact, then fell.
Please be noted we do not recommend customers to fly the drone when the GPS signal is weak, the aircraft will automatically switch to ATTI mode when vision systems are unavailable and the GPS signal is weak. In ATTI mode, the drone is more easily affected by its surroundings and cannot brake itself automatically which cause flight hazard.
No malfunction was detected and the warranty service cannot be provided, hope for your understanding.[view_image][Image]

Hi Mindy,

I don't understand how the craft can experience an external impact at 0 height and then fall.
All I know is what I experienced: craft was in stable hover at 3.9, suddenly lost power and fell down. As per the log file kindly examined by people on this forum the last log entry was at 3.9 ft high without control input. Corresponding with a hover at that altitude.
This points to a problem with the drone which was confirmed by the repair team stating that a control board need to be replaced which costs as much as a third of the drone. It is pretty unlikely that this crash caused an internal control board to break. Far more likely is that this board was faulty from the beginning and was the actual cause of the sudden loss of power.

My reason for this post is simply to inform users that flying w/o GPS lock is enough cause for DJI not to cover a malfunction under warranty. That is all.

Geebax Posted at 9-23 14:54
You should bear in mind that a Warranty is povided by a manufacturer to protect you from faults in manufacture, and not necesarily incidents that happen while flying the aircraft. For this reason, DJI will want to see the flight log that was generated at the time of the incident. If the flight log indicates you were flying in a manner that contributed to the incident, then DJI can quite rightly reject your warranty claim. If you want a warranty coverage that covers you even if you contributed to the incident, then you should consider buying the DJI Care package, as it provides for replacement in cases like yours.

With regard to flying without GPS lock, DJI cannot claim that flying without GPS lock is not covered by the warranty, because if the aircraft will actually fly without GPS lock, then that is a valid flying mode that they have provided. If they wanted to exclude flying without GPS lock, then they should inhibit the aircraft from flying under that condition. Don't simply accept what they say, put it in the hands of you consumer advocacy group or aq solicitor. DJI try this sort of thing on all the time.

Hi Geebax,
I have the care refresh option but I wouldn't want to use it after having the drone for only 1 day. I feel that DJI should cover the repair in the case of a faulty control board diagnosed immediately after having taken ownership of the product. It is much more likely this board was faulty from the get-go as opposed to breaking because of a fall from 4 ft high. DJI didn't give me the benefit of the doubt that my explanation as reported was true. I spent more than a month of my time on this and the result is that the drone is still there. And worse: they claim in one message that my package I sent them didn't include the battery!! Why in the world would I not send the battery when the problem appears to be a loss of power! I'm already very worried about what they're going to send me back... A beaten up product with remote and battery missing... Urgh.

LoonyFlyer Posted at 9-24 04:38
That is exactly what DJI said. They cannot cover under warranty because I was flying without GPS lock. I argued that this is a supported flight mode but that didn't help my case.

That is exactly what DJI said. They cannot cover under warranty because I was flying without GPS lock.
DJI make great drones, but they aren't noted for good communications.
What you were told sounds very sketchy and I think whoever told you has the wrong end of the facts.
It wouldn't be the first time.

... I see.

DJI should clearly define when they reject a warranty claim. That should be clearly defined beforehand ...

Moisture in the drone is also part of it ...  

Ah well... All I can say is that I will try very, very hard to buy my next drone from a different company. There absolutely should be more competition in this space.

This is starting to sound like they mixed up the packages and you are getting replies meant for another user.

GaryDoug Posted at 9-24 18:29
This is starting to sound like they mixed up the packages and you are getting replies meant for another user.

I don't know Gary... Their support systems sure seem antiquated to me. Nothing online with everything through emails with the "##- Please type your reply above this line -##" message. I didn't think anyone was still managing support cases like that.
Well.... Maybe they'll ship me someone else's Inspire 2. That'd be cool.

LoonyFlyer Posted at 9-24 04:49
Hi Mindy,

I don't understand how the craft can experience an external impact at 0 height and then fall.

Thanks for getting back, in this case, we will escalate your concern to the appropriate team to double analyze, we will have someone to contact you soon, please wait patiently, thank you.

DJI Mindy Posted at 9-25 01:56
Thanks for getting back, in this case, we will escalate your concern to the appropriate team to double analyze, we will have someone to contact you soon, please wait patiently, thank you.

Thanks Mindy. I just now received an escalation notice email.

first time flying without GPS lock and you crash? I guess I dont blame them for not covering it without GPS LOL

djiuser_g2VkrietJXul Posted at 9-25 22:22
first time flying without GPS lock and you crash? I guess I dont blame them for not covering it without GPS LOL

I've flown my Mavic Air w/o GPS lock many times Kriet. Without any issue. As many others have. They diagnosed a faulty Board Core Module of the Air 2 to be replaced. It can't be broken because of the drop. I did not crash the drone. It lost power and fell down. There's a difference.

LoonyFlyer Posted at 9-25 08:48
Thanks Mindy. I just now received an escalation notice email.

You are welcome, please keep your line open, our supervisor will contact you in working hours as soon as possible.

So at the end of this saga, DJI continues to refuse to repair under warranty.
But worse than that: They sent my drone back and now it won't even connect anymore with my controller, manual linking by pushing the power button for 4 seconds does not put the drone in connect mode either.
I originally had an unexpected power failure in flight which was the reason I sent it to them; Out of an abundance of caution as there were strong indications that there was something wrong with it. But before I sent the drone back at least it was still working. Now that isn't even the case anymore!
Be very careful sending drones to DJI to assess what could be wrong with it. They might actually make matters worse!
What an utterly disappointing purchase this has been. I have dealt with a lot of companies in my life but never received as bad a service as from DJI. They are worse than the old Time Warner Cable!

LoonyFlyer Posted at 10-9 19:30
So at the end of this saga, DJI continues to refuse to repair under warranty.
But worse than that: They sent my drone back and now it won't even connect anymore with my controller, manual linking by pushing the power button for 4 seconds does not put the drone in connect mode either.
I originally had an unexpected power failure in flight which was the reason I sent it to them; Out of an abundance of caution as there were strong indications that there was something wrong with it. But before I sent the drone back at least it was still working. Now that isn't even the case anymore!

Hi LoonyFlyer, sorry to know your case remained non-warranty in the end, upon checking the damage assessment details, the issue that RC fails to link to the aircraft existed when we received the drone, it was one of the damages of the drone and that is why we suggested replacing the aircraft's Core Board Module in the quotation. Thanks for your understanding.

DJI Mindy Posted at 10-10 01:43
Hi LoonyFlyer, sorry to know your case remained non-warranty in the end, upon checking the damage assessment details, the issue that RC fails to link to the aircraft existed when we received the drone, it was one of the damages of the drone and that is why we suggested replacing the aircraft's Core Board Module in the quotation. Thanks for your understanding.

Hi Mindy,

Believe me, I too am sorry about how this turned out. Everyone at DJI is sorry, every agent I talked to feels very sorry about the situation. That doesn't help me much now, does it? While I appreciate DJI's words of comfort, I'd much rather have those words accompanied by action.
The drone still flew when I sent it in for diagnosis and now it is bricked after getting it back. It is a KNOWN issue of the Air 2 unexplainably not pairing to the remote. It is clear to me that this was a bad unit with problems from the start and it is crazy DJI won't do the right thing and replace a faulty product yet instead blame me for flying without GPS lock. Unbelievable. Any company standing behind the quality of their products wouldn't do that. Plain and simple. I know you've been with DJI a long time and you are doing a good job posting in these forums but DJI has over the years built a bad reputation for customer service and my experience is contributing further to that reputation. Sad.

LoonyFlyer Posted at 10-10 07:03
Hi Mindy,

Believe me, I too am sorry about how this turned out. Everyone at DJI is sorry, every agent I talked to feels very sorry about the situation. That doesn't help me much now, does it? While I appreciate DJI's words of comfort, I'd much rather have those words accompanied by action.

I understand how frustrated you may feel, but the data analysis result will not change and our supervisor team has also provided the best offer they can. The drone came to the facility with RC link failure, you refused the repair, so the problem remains. If the drone still needs the repair service, please send back again or there are also some authorized repair centers where you could contact for assistance: https://www.dji.com/service/repair/centers

So here's the latest twist to my troubles with my MA2: DJI had a change of heart and replaced my drone with a new unit!

After I had it returned to me and complained to DJI that it now got worse and the drone wouldn't even connect to the R/C anymore they told me to send it back again! I was like "what?? You just had the drone!" Anyway, figured I had nothing to lose and sent it back to them. To my big surprise within a few days they confirmed today that they shipped out a new drone!

On the one hand I'm happy DJI decided to do the right thing. On the other hand I'm sad that they caused me unnecessary stress for over 2 months. This could have been handled much better had they diagnosed this as a bad unit right from the start.

Anyway. After having purchased this unit back in early August, I'm very much looking forward to finally do some flying!!

Thanks for all of your advice and support on this forum. Thanks also to Mindy for helping.

LoonyFlyer Posted at 10-23 18:26
So here's the latest twist to my troubles with my MA2: DJI had a change of heart and replaced my drone with a new unit!

After I had it returned to me and complained to DJI that it now got worse and the drone wouldn't even connect to the R/C anymore they told me to send it back again! I was like "what?? You just had the drone!" Anyway, figured I had nothing to lose and sent it back to them. To my big surprise within a few days they confirmed today that they shipped out a new drone!

That is great to know the repair center warrantied the drone in the end, hope you will get the drone back soon. Should you have any further concerns, please feel free to let us know.