Flying the Phantom 3 for a couple weeks, being fairly conservative with a 1000 ft range. Question is, what with all the uncertainty in range with terrain, radio tower interference, buildings etc., take care with wires and obstacles, what's a good way to explore the range flight envelope?

I've read the forum tips which are very helpful, you ensure your Home altitude is set higher than highest obstacle, make sure the Home location is correct, satellite count high, not too windy, obviously battery good, in GPS mode, etc.

But when it comes right down to it, you're flying your machine near the envelope and there's fear for me at least. I've flown at the 1000 ft or so, tried descening in that area, encoutered choppy video yet with good signal bars for control and video, panicked, and returned home manually each time, have not had an automatic return to home.

So, just go for it and have faith that it returns if you exceed the range?

Mitch

That depends.  How much money ya got?

When I got my first Phantom 1 I was very careful about what I was doing for a number of reasons; 1) I didn't want to destroy a very pricey toy on my first few flights! 2) I was new to RC flying 3) there was a LOT of new material to learn with a steep learning curve 4) I hadn't developed any "muscle memory" so I would intuitively know how to fly out of any hazardous condition!
You can be as aggressive as you feel comfortable but ask yourself this question.  Am I gonna have to buy another one if this goes bad?

Me?  I have had one catastrophic P2V+ crash and fortunately I had another Phantom 2 to fly while my crashed one was off in the RMA twilight zone.  I went ahead and bought another P2V+ one as a spare anyway.  Maybe I've got more money than sense because I now own five different Phantom's but hey, I still don't fly them with reckless abandon!

Welcome to the forum, you can pick up a lot of good useful information here (but please be able to recognize the difference between people's opinion and their experience!)

At least for me on the P3P I start getting weak rc signal warnings well before it actually loses signal. The few times that I've actually lost video i just raise altitude up toward the ceiling until it comes back., I've used RTH once because my video never did come back (turns out it was a bad usb cable). It did exactly what i expected it to do.

Barring catastrophic failure (check regularly for cracked or loose parts, props, antenna, etc ), there are only a few things that will screw with a successful RTH and if you can manage those you'll be in pretty good shape.

It goes beyond if you're willing to risk losing or crashing your Phantom 3 - you also need to consider what you are flying over, and think about the consequences to people, stuff, etc, where your bird may come down, in the event you were to lose control and crash.

I was pretty lucky two three times... 1st bird was 2.5km away and lost link... Returned home automatically after 6 long minutes with cold sweat...  Few flights later at 2km with sun on my android phone I realized that I was to low on battery at the same time with the bird decision to go home (H on battery level went on the right of remaining charge)  and again I was able to get my bird back letting it to return to home on its own and controlling it only in the final phase of landing.. @ 28 % of battery...

And another time always the sun didn't let me see the main mast of a boat @ 27 meters.. I've avoided it for a very little  

I have to ask, why?
What is the attraction of flying way, way out of sight, and maybe out of control, and risk loss of your P3?
Surely if you want to photograph a certain location, or film somewhere of particular interest, then it is far safer and much easier to drive to that location and film within a few hundred meters of your take off point.

I have flown about 1.2Km away from take off point to get photographs of coast line across vast areas of sand revealed by the tide, these shots are impossible by any other method, but if anything goes wrong I am $1000 out of pocket.  Big risk.

liningiv Posted at 2015-9-21 13:29
I have to ask, why?
What is the attraction of flying way, way out of sight, and maybe out of control ...

Definitely a good point and gets to the heart of the question. The answer to "why" is to use the technology to its fullest. One can be ultraconservative or ultra-aggressive or anything in between. Specific situation that raised this in my mind was flying over an area, and I unexpectedly noticed an interesting landmark I know (church and candy store in La Crosse, WI), but to get the shot I wanted from about 500' away would have required descending to about 20 feet amongst buildings and trees so I was afraid. So I descended to what seemed reasonable and planned to return someday to get the desired shot. Not to mention that fact that it was already out of line of sight, an uneasy situation I know all agree it's best to avoid in part to assure good signal.

Here's the video when I got cold feet and went home.

Good candy there, by the way.

Yes perfectly, for me was using the technology to its fullest. I have done this on the coast and flying the bird far from people and hovering on the sea

Anyway it's easy for me during flight to reach points blos 'cause sometimes best take off places are far from points of interest and I chose them with no obstacles and clear horizon,things that you cannot find often in the surroundings of POIs

I know, not everyone cares.  However, the fact remains that, as delivered, the P3 gives you more than enough range to fly legally (maintaining VLOS).  Doning my armor now.  I flew to the end of the box-stock limit, and could not see the bird anymore in a clear field with no obstruction.

mvgossman Posted at 2015-9-21 15:21
Definitely a good point and gets to the heart of the question. The answer to "why" is to use the t ...

You have really bad vibration in that video ! i hope you did not put all four gimble retainers on.

regarding range :

1500 feet in urban setting.
3500 - 4500 feet on the beach.
8000 feet from on top of a mountain.

Willie Wonka Posted at 2015-9-21 16:01
You have really bad vibration in that video ! i hope you did not put all four gimble retainers on. ...

Thanks for the tips on range!

Regarding the vibration, no just the two retainers it came with, would one be enough?

But the real reason there's excess vibration probably has to do with the fact that at a subsequent flight I found a piece of foam cushioning the camera against the gimbal mount, not talking the solid plastic stabilizer, but pure white packing foam!   Will see how smooth the next ones are!

Mitch

I live out on the edge of town. If I climb on top of my zip line tower about 20 feet high and sit down I can get close to 20,000 feet at an altitude of 400.  I've lost signal a few times before and it's always returned home automatically. It'll usually reestablish signal after a bit and I can cancel the rth. You're taking a big risk and you have to be prepared to loose your drone if you're flying that far. Luckily there's nothing but desert for miles around here.

mvgossman Posted at 2015-9-21 18:10
Thanks for the tips on range!

Regarding the vibration, no just the two retainers it came with, wo ...

Your welcome, regarding the foam yeah that could do it, and only two retainers on opposite corners.

These are my maximums in range close to the edge of no signal, back off a little and you are good to go and fly safe and enjoy

Willie Wonka Posted at 2015-9-21 18:03
Your welcome, regarding the foam yeah that could do it, and only two retainers on opposite corners ...

About that max range, despite being set to Imperial measurements, the "Set Maximum Distance" is entered as meters. At any rate, that's way less than those suggestions so they are conservative at DJI.

Previous poster makes a good point that you are beginning to take your chances out at those ranges.

Any ideas on how risky it is to make a landing, or low hover, out there around 1000 feet away, well out of line of sight, with houses? To annoy my friend and neighbor.

Anytime there's an object such as a building/tree/mountain. Your range will be reduced to small fraction of it's max range.

mvgossman Posted at 2015-9-21 19:24
About that max range, despite being set to Imperial measurements, the "Set Maximum Distance" is en ...

You must follow Line of sight, i am not talking about if you can see it or not, the most important thing is line of sight OF the signal, as 2.4 Ghz signals do not bend and do not penetrate objects, so if your remote sees your phantom then you are good.

If at 1000 feet you can not see your phantom with a spotting scope then you WILL loose signal and be in great deal of danger of not being in control.

Any time I have flown out of range, RTH comes on and it comes right home.  I have never had a problem with this.  Just my 2 cents.

Barney

Barney Rubbel Posted at 2015-9-21 20:31
Any time I have flown out of range, RTH comes on and it comes right home.  I have never had a proble ...

Barney, this is fred in disguise, you got to let the RTH be the last resort not the first line of defense.

Willie Wonka Posted at 2015-9-21 19:36
Barney, this is fred in disguise, you got to let the RTH be the last resort not the first line of  ...

Hi Fred! I'm not saying you should use it every time you want it to come home (although I found that to be fairly easy when I first started this hobby). I'm just saying that I have flown out of range many times and not had a problem. Doesn't mean someone else won't, just that I haven't. Knock on wood.
All I do is dunk them into lakes. They don't RTH then.

Barney Rubbel Posted at 2015-9-21 20:39
Hi Fred! I'm not saying you should use it every time you want it to come home (although I found th ...

Barney barney barney......  i fly mine next to my job where i lift rocks and there is no water there.

Did you take a video of bedrock yet ? orbit one of the dinos LOL

mvgossman Posted at 2015-9-21 18:24
About that max range, despite being set to Imperial measurements, the "Set Maximum Distance" is en ...

If you try to make a landing 1000' away and there is a building between you with the RC and the P3 then you will almost assuredly get a signal loss as it descends past the LOS.  Your screen would probably go blank and your RC will start beeping as it goes into the RTH sequence unless you have yours set to Hover on Signal loss.  This is when your heart will be pounding as you are  wondering whether or not it will make its way back.

That darn piece of foam!  I still have mine in the box the P3 came in.  

After Mr. Wonka commented on the shaky video (I don't know any better really since it's my first) I predicted that the piece of foam wedged in between the camera and gimbal in addition to limiting movement of the camera and accounting for intermittent "Gimbal overheating" or some such, that the next videos would be better. Boy are they ever. And the foam also limited completely the left/right freedom of the gimbal. What it boils down to is a perfectly smooth, Hollywood-style smooth video:

Before attempting a long range mission practice RTH and be comfortable with it as in you don't just press the RTH button but hold it for a few seconds.Practice in an open area and without looking at your bird just watch the p3's direction arrow on the map as often I find your will lose video before you lose r/c signal.Also when the bird is in RTH it will crawl along so keep your throttle up and watch your height and speed on the go app and often I'll lose video signal way out and just gain a little height or change the birds orientation and walla you get vid signal back and you wont even need to hit the RTH button.As Willie said RTH should be your last option!!!, but as they say it's best to practice an emergency situation  before actually having to do it for the first time way out.And be familiar with the map and location your flying and monitor your battery and enable multiple flight mode as flying long range atti mode is faster than p-gps.Anyway just some thoughts

it depends on your environment. just make sure your RTH altitude set higher then any other obstacles, so aircraft can get back home without crashing in the trees or buildings