I am a concerned Mavic preorder holder and with all of the possible issues being mentioned, I am looking for the best way to keep my new Mavic and others safe when it arrives.

Calibration has been noted as a possible concern and changes flight control system data with new information from the calibration itself.

So is there a way to simply observe/test a configured drone preflight, on the ground?

Examples:
IMU check
  Is it possible to "see" what the attitude the Mavic thinks it is in by simply holding it in various positions?  Perhaps via the app?
GPS check
  I would imagine this would simply be the GPS indicator along with location on map in App.   Would not protect against loss of GPS, but enter than nothing.
Compass check
  Is it possible to compare Mavic's heading to another source, such as an iPhone compass before taking off?
Controller stick check
  Is it possible to observe stick activity before flight?   If stick magnetic glitches are happening, they should show up regardless of actual flight.
VPS check
Hold drone at various known heights and compare what sensors show onscreen for measured height?

From the forum posts, I get the impression the only way the validate many of these is to recalibrate.or fly the drone and look at log data after via healthy drones.

I would like to have the most robust preflight checklist possible.

I



Thank you

Much of this it does on it's own. When you turn it on, it is important that it is on a flat surface. It checks the compass, and tells you to calibrate if needed. The same is true for the IMU, as it will tell you when it needs calibrating. The gimbal dos a self check. Many systems do a self check. The sticks do not, but those are not on the Mavic, they are on the controller. I am not sure, but I assume it's like many game controllers, where you want to be sure that the sticks are centered when you turn it on, so it sets zero/zero correctly. If the sticks are moved during power up, who knows what could happen. In a sense, the controller auto calibrates on power up as well. As to GPS, the Mavic will not report "Ready for Flight" to the controller until it has a GPS lock. The downward sensors are calibrated via DJI Assistant 2 on your computer monitor (I am assuming it is the same as on the P4).

dana5 Posted at 2016-11-8 22:55
Much of this it does on it's own. When you turn it on, it is important that it is on a flat surface. ...

Understood that the Mavic does it's own self checks, but clearly from the problem reports thus far, those self checks are unable to spot issues.

For example, I see many advising that perhaps there are environmental reasons for issues (Apple Watch, distance from last calibration, etc) that could be resulting in strange behavior.    Shouldn't such things be picked up in the self check and halt or advise against flight?   A manual visual checkout procedure would likely help isolate issues before they are found in flight.   Feedback could be fed to DJI if manual checkout shows a problem that onboard self checks might be missing.

If compass self check passes, and things are ready for flight, can you point the Mavic north and see that it is facing north via the display.     Again, some of these things might be possible, I don't have mine yet, but curious if a detailed preflight checklist exists that confirms all is well.

Thank you for the feedback!

fans21a12db3 Posted at 2016-11-8 16:22
Understood that the Mavic does it's own self checks, but clearly from the problem reports thus far ...

Below you can check pre and flight checks for phantom, one thing is wrong in your list don't do IMU on the ground unless it is perfectly level, do it indoors on a perfectly level surface,
Also gimbal calibration is something I would advise if your going to film something that's important to you, tilted horizon is very common  among dji gimbal cameras.

Regardless of what people tell you pre flight and flight checks can help avoid crashes.

http://forum.dji.com/forum.php?m ... yNjAwMDh8NjQxODI%3D