Hi.

I'm about to upgrade from Spark to Mini 2 for the extra range and for the lighter weight, which makes it easier to comply w/ the law.


But Spark has Precision Landing that takes a picture at launch and adjusts course while landing to match what it sees to the launch picture. Mini 2 doesn't have Precision Landing. From user videos, it looks like RTH is sometimes right on and sometimes off by 5 feet or more.

My question is whether the downward sensors used for Landing Protection also act as downward obstacle avoidance.

All I see in the documentation is that Landing Protection uses the downward sensors to check for a "suitable" landing spot, but I see nothing about how "suitable" is defined.

I usually launch from a patio that's right in front of a house. When the aircraft is landing from RTH altitude do I need to worry about it hitting the gutter or side of the house or will Landing Protection prevent that? It's hard to tell by eye how close it'll get to the house when coming down from 40 or 50 meters.

Thanks for any thoughts or advice!

interesting postulation, i imagine if it sees a flat surface it would continue to land as normal, if its slanted maybe it wouldnt.

MiniManiac Posted at 11-12 09:59
interesting postulation, i imagine if it sees a flat surface it would continue to land as normal, if its slanted maybe it wouldnt.

My Mini 2 will not land if it sense that it’s unsafe…

It's not obstacle avoidance in the way obstacle avoidance on the likes of the Mavic 2 Pro works but .........it does detect, if it can, how low it is over an object and it will maintain, if it can, a clearance of around 50cm until commanded to land.

So, fly it low AND SLOW at a slope and it will climb the slope. Ditto fly it low over the floor etc. and direct it over a low table etc. and it will climb as soon as it detects the table. Put you hand under the drone ( with in 50cm af the bottom of the drone and in the field of view of the sensors ) and the drone will climb away from your hand.
It also means that, in good light, you can descend vertically, from height, with the throttle fully closed and the drone will slow its descent as the ground comes within range of the sensors. DO NOT get used to the latter and then switch back to a drone that DOES NOT do this unless you remember the difference. I nearly 'descended' a Phantom 3  into the ground on the first 'refresher flight' after having been flying a Mavic Mini for a while.

Great advice - thanks. Experimentation is the smart way to do this. I’ll use a table or a box or something to simulate the house, descend slowly from directly over it, almost directly over it, and close to sideswiping it, and see how it behaves. Then I can answer the question here instead of asking it…

50 cm is plenty of room to take evasive action if it’s not doing it on its own. That’s a much better plan than risking having it break a propellor on the side of the house and falling 40 feet! lol

With regards to "When the aircraft is landing from RTH altitude do I need to worry about it hitting the gutter or side of the house or will Landing Protection prevent that?" I think the answer would be, it would be risky to rely on it seeing the gutter and halting the decent. One reason being, the sensors are at the back of the drone and the RTH would have the nose of the drone facing the house. To be honest in your circumstances I would  let the RTH bring it over head but manually control the landing phase and I would not be inclined to descend from height close to a wall. If possible stay maybe 10 to 12 ft out from the wall until at eye level then either bring it in and down on a slope or bring it in horizontally and the down the last 5ish ft vertically.