Folks, after having my spark over the years and a few crashes and repairs I have lost a good bit of confidence when flying it. I used to flywith OTG cable but (was connected via WiFi) and controller.

I got disconnected message on the phone mid flight. Had to run after the drone, still showing disconnected and black and white frozen pic but controller still worked. I managed to bring it down.

Stupidly I did the same 10 mins later as it never happened before and yep... Disconnected again and repeat I went and found it in the sky and brought it down. Turns out pins were broken on controller so got it repaired(where OTG or charger goes)
Now I understand to use OTG cable (new) and turn off WiFi but I'm getting "signal lost" but managing to walk closer to the drone and it reconnects.

My question is what happens if I flew further and got signal lost would it just return to home if GPS if recorded home point?. Would I just have to wait until battery got to rth level and watch it come back?. Or what does anyone recommend to stop this signal lost message is there cheap extenders as there is no point having a drone in 2.4ghz channel 11 say wanting to fly over 1km but signal lost after 500yrds. If I was over water I'd be bricking it.

Hello there beegzbhoy. I am sorry to read and to know that you are having these issues with your DJI spark and thank you for reaching out. Can you please fly your DJI drone to a different location with less interference to see if the issue will still persist? The said DJI drone might have picked up magnetic interference from the area. That might be the reason why you are experiencing these issues. In addition, I will post an official DJI tutorial video on DJI Remote Controller Antenna Best Practices. Thank you.

You had to run after the drone? Doesn't RTH work on it?

A J Posted at 10-6 23:44
You had to run after the drone? Doesn't RTH work on it?

I was sending the drone to catch my kids fishing about 4-5 hundred yards away. In my excitement I could not remember if I had let the homepoint be recorded so I got a fright and ran after it over the fields. . But "disconnected" was new due to the pins on the controller.

beegzbhoy Posted at 10-7 02:21
I was sending the drone to catch my kids fishing about 4-5 hundred yards away. In my excitement I could not remember if I had let the homepoint be recorded so I got a fright and ran after it over the fields. . But "disconnected" was new due to the pins on the controller.

Ah, I see - always make sure to have the HP set before taking off mate

It still said disconnected as I was standing underneath it but could bring it down. So I'm guessing the term disconnected means video feed only and not signal to drone. As it was an unfortunate event the pins were bent in the controller and it must have been like a scenario where someone pulls the OTG cable out mid flight.

But the lost signal is no use at 500yrds I can fly away from interference but I am just scared now I lose it. Lack of confidence now and I've been flying it 2 years, mountains, lochs,  the lot.

I've never used an OTG cable with the Spark.  The controller can connect to the drone and phone through WIFI simultaneously.  I've had the video TX disconnect many times but always managed to fly the drone back VLOS.  The one time I lost complete control of the Spark it went into RTH and landed back where it started.  YMMV

My Spark always loses video transmission at 500-600 metres but is still connected with the RC. It can still be controlled and will RTH without video feed if it needs to.