walrus123 Posted at 2016-4-28 02:01
Great words of wisdom.

Honestly, you cannot go wrong by purchasing DJI Care. it really is a great add on.
http://www.dji.com/support/djicare

How was the Phantom able to attain 36+ mph in Beginner's mode?  And why would it accelerate on its own in that spiral direction?
Glad it worked out for the walrus.     
js

DJI-Ken Posted at 2016-4-28 04:12
Honestly, you cannot go wrong by purchasing DJI Care. it really is a great add on.
http://www.dji. ...

You still haven't told us what happened, when the logs were reviewed what error did DJI see?

Stealthy Posted at 2016-4-28 06:59
You still haven't told us what happened, when the logs were reviewed what error did DJI see?

It was a compass error, always calibrate the compass in a metal free environment.

R&L Aerial  Posted at 2016-4-26 06:06
I don't know about your drone but I do know the moderators do take to kindly to you using the f-word ...

He DID at least TRY to self-censor...  Last time I checked, funk was NOT the F-word.  Definitely NOT the word I think of when I hear that term...  

Just my $0.02 worth...

Geebax Posted at 2016-4-26 07:09
The dual compass does not protect against that sort of thing. If the calibration is influenced by  ...

Still, I would have thought that you should have gotten SOME SORT of compass calibration error or something...  Maybe I'm just not thinking clearly, but I would think the only time you should get an acceptable compass calibration message should be...well... when you get an acceptable compass calibration.  
That being said, I have read that you should remove watches, cell-phones, key's loose change, ANYTHING metallic that might interfere with the compass.  

walrus123 Posted at 2016-4-26 20:18
Here are the photos after recovering my Phantom 4. Not sure there's much for DJI to salvage here. Th ...

OUCH!!!

My SINCERE condolences!!!

david.p.mann@ea Posted at 2016-4-25 23:24
Justin,

First - I'm very sorry that you had such a bad first flight experience. I feel for you. I c ...

I totally agree with Dave and sorry for your experience bro.

There are a couple of reasons.

First of all, you have Bridge which is continuously under strong monitoring. The same issue happens when you fly near GWB.

3 days ago me and 3 of my friends, we went flying our birds in Hoboken. This was our second trip but this time, it was unusual.

So I fly p4, my friends have p3 (standard, advanced and pro). All 4 birds gave us same problems I listed below.

First, Compass error. after take off. we changed our location.
Second try, all of us have a problem in the air with interference and aircraft is finally disconnected.
The reason? Looks like a military anti-terror equipment protecting bridges and national parks.

About the roofs never fly from the roofs because of antennas and especially air conditioners which have a huge magnetic field.

DJI-Ken Posted at 2016-4-27 14:12
Honestly, you cannot go wrong by purchasing DJI Care. it really is a great add on.
http://www.dji. ...

Hi Ken, wrapping up everything here and about to ship to y'all. I've received conflicting information from Support about what I should be sending back to DJI. Should I be sending everything including RC, Battery, Drone, Blades, etc? Or should I just be sending back the Drone itself?

Thanks friend!

Justin

walrus123 Posted at 2016-4-29 21:48
Hi Ken, wrapping up everything here and about to ship to y'all. I've received conflicting informat ...

If the battery is not damaged then send just the drone itself in its box wrapped in a outer box.
If you want the RC linked then send that as well.
If the battery is damaged, then call them back as I don't think it's safe to send a battery that obviously looks damaged.

DJI-Ken Posted at 2016-4-29 10:04
If the battery is not damaged then send just the drone itself in its box wrapped in a outer box.
I ...

Awesome. Thanks for clarifying!

Have a great day!

Justin

walrus123 Posted at 2016-4-29 22:11
Awesome. Thanks for clarifying!

Have a great day!

No problem, have a great trip in Iceland.
Take care and glad DJi took care of you.

DJI-Ken, Can you PM me if you see this post?  I realize this post has run its course.
I have a very important specific question for you regarding compass calibration.
Thank you,
Chris F.

justin.schwingh Posted at 2016-4-25 23:25
Appreciate everyone's help. Anything discernible from the logs?

Hi Justin
Sorry to hear of your loss,it's very difficult to know what exactly happened, but proceed as you are gathering all the info you can, the guys at DJI will be sympathetic to your cause, it maybe a case where there is blame on both sides but best not to get annoyed with DJI as this will not help your case,
Hopefully you will get it resolved soon and you can take to the sky's soon , good luck in your endeavour .

Sorry for your loss and I am very happy for you since DJI replaced it.

I guess one thing I took out of this is that if I ever see my P4 start making loops, or not following the stick command, I switch it to A mode.
This should eliminate the GPS issue.

I am a bit confused though because we all calibrate having our cell phones, or on concrete parking lots and even on top of roof tops.  So even if we get calibration complete and the home point is correct, we are not good to go? Future interference can occur as it flies, (Air Condition interference is a major issue) but do you think the initial calibration, even though was recorded as complete,  was it bad due to the altitude it was performed at?

So if calibration is successful, and the aircraft goes bonkers and crashes due to compass error, sorry for your luck?

Shouldn't compass calibration not have given the thumbs up and told the user ready to fly?

To a new pilot in beginner mode, I can see how this would be confusing.

st pauli Posted at 2016-8-7 04:20
So if calibration is successful, and the aircraft goes bonkers and crashes due to compass error, sor ...

'Shouldn't compass calibration not have given the thumbs up and told the user ready to fly?'

I will give you th3e same answer as I gave back at the start of this thread: No, because that is what the compass calibration is designed to do, take care magnetic anomalies in the region you are flying. It would have made adjustments for all the metal around it, then when it got in the air, it would have discovered that the magnetic properties were quite different.

And the aircraft does not make any check on the compass when it is on the ground, because if it did, most aircraft would not get off the ground because people fly from all sorts of stange take-off points. Once it gets in the air, then it can check for magnetic problems.

DJI-Ken Posted at 2016-4-26 14:04
Good news buddy, I've told them how pleasant you were through the entire experience and they are go ...

Hi DJI-Ken, I had something nearly identical to walrus123's experience happen to me in NYC yesterday while using a newly purchased DJI P4 drone.  I calibrated the P4 successfully from a rooftop, and launched.  After some basic increases in elevation, I began to return the drone to land.  As I approached the rooftop I took off from, I received the compass calibration error and the drone began moving in the sharp toilet bowl spiral into an apartment building, and crashed several stories to the ground.  

After the accident, I ensured there were no injuries during the crash, recovered the drone components, and began a search on the internet to understand why the drone acted as it had without my control.

That's when I stumbled upon walrus123's nearly identical experience.  I followed your instructions in this thread to sync my records.  If I give you my email address, can you please take a look and opine on if you think it was the same metal interference that could have caused the drone to spiral out of control?  Moreover, do you think you can help get me through the RMA process?  I saw the 818.235.0789 number you posted online, but would appreciate ANY help you can provide in having the root cause figured out and hopefully issue a replacement drone.

(also similar to walrus123, I purchased two weeks ago ahead of a vacation later this month in Hawaii, and was just practicing)

Cmfishie@yahoo. Posted at 2016-8-6 16:16
DJI-Ken, Can you PM me if you see this post?  I realize this post has run its course.
I have a very  ...

Sorry I didn't see this. You need to reply to one of my posts then I will get a notification. Hopefully your questions have already been answered.

Phillapittsyork Posted at 2016-9-9 21:12
Hi DJI-Ken, I had something nearly identical to walrus123's experience happen to me in NYC yesterd ...

I'm sorry for your crash.
Call the number and start an RMA, they will walk you through the process. With your email they will analyze the crash.
Also, with a ton of metal around a building rooftop, you really should calibrate the compass on the ground in a park then goto the building.
What is your email and I will look at the flight.

DJI-Ken Posted at 2016-9-9 09:40
I'm sorry for your crash.
Call the number and start an RMA, they will walk you through the process ...

done -- can you please delete it after you have in hand for my privacy?

I am so sick of my 3 PRO, can't fly the damn thing without it either flying away or falling out of the sky. Today I finally decided to overcome my fears of loosing or crashing it and took a small run. Sure as hell it starts beeping, says it is returning home, goes strait up to about 100' and shuts down. Crashes so bad the camera goes one way and the drone another. I would never recommend DJI to anyone, I would tell them to stay away, anything has to be better than $1000 junk. When it works it works great, but when it messes up, it messes up big time.

Sorry, but I am very pissed off right now, I need to step back and cry.
edit: I really hate the fact that he software takes control away from me, if it crashes and it's my fault then it is on me ad I could live and learn. But when the thing takes control away from me and goes and does whatever the software thinks is best, it always flys away or falls out of the shy, how can they sell this stuff? Not cool. To make things worse, this was a gift from my wife for my birthday, a very expensive gift. I got it March 7th, I have had so many problems with it I have been to damn scared to fly it, today I get brave and BAM, this really sucks.

wkinne Posted at 2016-9-9 22:12
I am so sick of my 3 PRO, can't fly the damn thing without it either flying away or falling out of t ...

I'm sorry for your crash and frustrations. What is your email and I will look at your flight.
Also, call support at 818-235-0789 and they will send you a shipping label and send it in.
IF, after analyzing the flight data recorder and it shows some kind of malfunction and not user error then they will repair/replace it under warranty. So if you are 100% sure that you did EVERYTHING correctly then there's nothing to worry about and it will be covered under warranty.

Phillapittsyork Posted at 2016-9-9 21:58
done -- can you please delete it after you have in hand for my privacy?

it is not seeing your flight records. Either they are not synced to the cloud, the email you provided is not the one you log into the GO app with, or my device is not reading it and the data analysis team will have to read the flight records after you start the RM process.

I have no idea if I did everything correctly or not, when it started beeping and going up I may have panicked and done something stupid, I have no idea. I have a small 250 I hand built and have never had any problems with it. I love the concept of the 3 PRO but using it is just too expensive.  After my first fly off it came back 10 minutes later and 1/8 mile east and crashed into trees, cost me $50 and 6 hours to replace the shell, that is not a job I ever want to do again. My email is kinneplastics@yahoo.com but you will have to explane how to get the files you need, I have never downloaded a flight record before.

Thank you,
Wayne
The battery only lights up 1 green light, so I suspect it was low, but I just charged it and only flew for a 9 minute video. The battery has always lasted at least 20 minutes. I am not sure why it shut down at 50 to 100 feet in the air, I may have moved the sticks to shut down, I really don't know. If so, why does programming alow it to shut down while up so high? I have done some programming and can't imagine that would be a hard thing to include and can't imagine why it has not been done.

just a thought

DJI-Ken Posted at 2016-9-9 11:43
it is not seeing your flight records. Either they are not synced to the cloud, the email you provi ...

I uploaded/synced to the cloud.  I only use that email address, but do you know how I could double check the email address is connected to the account.  Would it help to have the RMA case number?

Phillapittsyork Posted at 2016-9-10 01:07
I uploaded/synced to the cloud.  I only use that email address, but do you know how I could double ...

I don't need the RMA# just your email and I should be able to read it. If I still cannot, then it is my device and the data team will have to do it.

DJI-Ken Posted at 2016-9-9 13:11
I don't need the RMA# just your email and I should be able to read it. If I still cannot, then it  ...

thanks again for all your help.  is there a way i can send the file to you manually?  I see there is an export CSV button.  i submitted the RMA a few hours ago and still have not received an email from them.

wkinne Posted at 2016-9-9 23:47
I have no idea if I did everything correctly or not, when it started beeping and going up I may have ...

Even if the battery was low (1 led) the aircraft will not shut down, it would auto land.
I believe in panic, you preformed a CSC midair and that's the only way you can shut off the motors.
I want you to playback the flight for yourself to see if that's what you really did.

From the homepage, the upper left icon (paper airplane) is the flight records tab. Tap that and from there you will see all your flights. Tap on the first one which is probably the last flight since there's no flights after the crash. From there tap on the RC icon and it will bring up the sticks. Push play and watch your flight, towards the end of the flight pay attention to your stick movements and see if you did a CSC and then the aircraft came down.
And to sync, the riight icon (cloud) syncs the flight records to the DJI servers.

Also, you went from a small quad to the P3 Pro which is extremely easy to fly BUT it is a aircraft with a ton of technology built into it. You need to understand everything about the aircraft you fly including the features and functions and also the limitations.
From the home page, on the top right icon (graduation hat) is the Academy section and in there is the full PDF manual, tutorial videos, and flight simulator. I'd suggest reading the entire manual and watching the tutorial videos and that will greatly increase your knowledge about your aircraft.

Phillapittsyork Posted at 2016-9-10 01:15
thanks again for all your help.  is there a way i can send the file to you manually?  I see there  ...

You need to probably wait a lot more than a few hours, give it a day.
I still cannot read your flight.

DJI-Ken Posted at 2016-9-9 13:21
Even if the battery was low (1 led) the aircraft will not shut down, it would auto land.
I believe ...

Yup, that is exactly what happened, it went low battery, went up to 89.3 feet and I must have panicked and shut it down. The fear of it flying off again makes me get very excited when it starts to fly were I do not intend it to. I have read the manuals and do understand its flight, I just do not agree with being able to shut it off when it knows it is 89.3 feet in the air. I get an email every week about the most popular forum posts for the week and they are always full of fly offs so I think my freaking out when it starts flying without my telling it to do so is reasonable. To help fix this for me I will repair my drone but not fly it until I have a tracker on it, so at least if it starts to fly off again, instead of freaking out I will be excited to to see how well my tracker works. So another $300 or $400 and I'll be back up and flying. I am sorry but I could never recommend to a friend to buy a DJI Drone. Perhaps if you included tracking that went beyond controller range and/or not allowing it to shut down in flight I would change my opinion.

wkinne Posted at 2016-9-10 02:45
Yup, that is exactly what happened, it went low battery, went up to 89.3 feet and I must have panic ...

I'm sorry about that, the CSC feature is listed in the manual as to make sure not to to in in air. It's there for emergency purposes in case you need the aircraft to come down ASAP.
And saying you would not recommend anyone buying DJI is not really a fair statement. Just because you have fears of flying it, there's hundreds of thousands of DJI aircraft out there flying all the time with no issues.
For the money, I can promise you that you will never get anything close to DJI technology.
DJI has new products coming out all the time, they are the largest drone manufacture in the world and hold the majority of market share in a big way.
You crashed due to pilot error because of all the things you read on the internet and was worried all the time.
If you would concentrate on your aircraft and no be so worried about all the other stories (which almost allof those are pilot error too) You may not have crashed.
It's a wonderful hobby, enjoy it and have confidence in your aircraft and have fun. That's what these Phantoms are for, have fun and take amazing photos/videos.

DJI-Ken Posted at 2016-9-9 14:56
I'm sorry about that, the CSC feature is listed in the manual as to make sure not to to in in air. ...

No. I panicked because of MY drone flying off several times, and hours of hunting for it. The thought of losing $1000 may not mean much to you, but to me it would be a big lose. I live in Northern Michigan, there are forest all around me, I have spent too many hours searching them for my drone. Most times the controller has lead me right to it, which I thank DJI for, but the times it fly's out of controller range it is very scary and only because of shear luck have I found it several times. I will gladly admit that only two of the fly offs do I believe were not my fault, other times were most likely me, like the time I flew it with a chipped prop and it went crazy and flew off. But two times is two times too many. If someone asked me if I ever had problems, I would not lie. Your claim that because you are the biggest means little to me, I am the largest manufacturer of a Dept. of Ag. N25 pesticide, ( means it is totally harmless and can even be eaten ) but that does not mean mine is the best insect repellent that meets such a standard. Although I like to think it is.

DJI-Ken Posted at 2016-9-9 14:56
I'm sorry about that, the CSC feature is listed in the manual as to make sure not to to in in air. ...

You could help me perhaps, can you direct me to where I can order new landing gear and the camera came off and I can see the winding's on its mount, the little ribbon that goes to it also broke. I don't seem to be able to locate replacement parts on your web site.

Thanks again,
Wayne

wkinne Posted at 2016-9-10 04:03
You could help me perhaps, can you direct me to where I can order new landing gear and the camera  ...

I'd suggest calling 818-235-0789 and sending the aircraft in for repair.
Or look at Amazon or other dealers for parts.

wkinne Posted at 2016-9-10 03:51
No. I panicked because of MY drone flying off several times, and hours of hunting for it. The thoug ...

I most always fly within LOS because I do value the dollar and these are not cheap aircraft. I fly mellow and within my ability limits.
I have hundreds of hours flying DJi aircraft and have never lost an aircraft.
You are flying in dense trees and your signal is going to be greatly reduced by that. As long as your RTH is set properly, the aircraft should always come back overhead. You can also reset the home point to whatever the aircraft's position is. It's possible that the few times it didn't return that could be why.

Also, if you ever even have the slightest prop strike, discard those props and use new ones. Even if they look fine. They are very inexpensive and having a prop break from an internal crack or being weakened can make your aircraft come tumbling down.

Since you are the the largest pesticide manufacture, you certainly know about our new aircraft, the AGRAS.
WOW, is that thing an incredible beast or what. It's pending US certification, it's a total workhorse and built like a truck.  http://www.dji.com/mg-1

DJI-Ken Posted at 2016-9-9 16:07
I'd suggest calling 818-235-0789 and sending the aircraft in for repair.
Or look at Amazon or othe ...

You don't sell them?

wkinne Posted at 2016-9-10 04:23
You don't sell them?

Cameras used to be on the parts page and are not anymore. You would have to send it in or purchase online from a dealer.

DJI-Ken Posted at 2016-9-9 13:54
You need to probably wait a lot more than a few hours, give it a day.
I still cannot read your flig ...

DJI-Ken, any luck in being able to read my file yet by chance?  All I have to do is sync it to the flight records in the DJI go app, correct?

Phillapittsyork Posted at 2016-9-10 06:19
DJI-Ken, any luck in being able to read my file yet by chance?  All I have to do is sync it to the ...

No I was unable to. I can try Monday when I'm in the office or the data analysis department will read it.