Landing your precious Phantom is always a challenging task for lots of users. Infact most of the crashes happen when you are landing your Phantom. Personally, I prefer to grab the Phantom while it is hovering close to me using one hand, as soon as I grab one of the landing gear then I will kill the motors.

By doing so, it can aviod bumpy landings, which occurs when you push down the thorttle stick while the Phantom is still realivetly too high to the landing surface. Secondly, if you are going to land the Phantom onto the grassland, then chance are, you will end up with landing the Phantom on a uneven surface which results in flipping the Phantom backwards or forwards. That could potentially brings excessive shocks to the delicated on-board gimbal.  Hence, I will
prefer to grab the Phantom from the midair and kill the motors to ensure a shocks-free land.

I catch land the P2V+ (and the P2V before it).
Even tall grass becomes rough terrain when you have an under-slung cam/gimbal!

Yep, same here. Preferred method is a catch landing. If I have very flat ground and calm conditions I may land then use throttle down to turn off motors. One thing I never do is use CSC to turn off motors. This ALWAYS ends in a tip over and damage to the props. But Throttle down usually does fine. I also NEVER land in grass. So, catch land 95% of the time and ground landing only in rare occasions.

100% Hand catch here as well, I know the "expert" pilots will say its easy to land and learn to fly, but the way I see it take off and landing are the main risks, so eliminating the second is a good thing. Still on the original props and no damage suffered.

Hand catch is the preferred method, unless you want to chance a roll over.  I have had several close calls landing and realized its not worth causing any damage.  However, use caution and make sure the quad is in control before having it hover close to you.

Hand catch for me.  The down side of this is that I sometimes forget to shut off the video before I turn off the battery!

Ground effect turbulence is always a random affair, so unless you come in fast and steep and then flare just before touching down, pro-style, I reckon hand-catching is the preferred method. That said, caution is obviously required.

I don't necessarily prefer one method over another. While catch landing is the safest way, I do like the challenge of landing it on other surfaces though.

I know how to land on the ground without tip overs and I know how to hand catch therefore I use whichever method suits me bests under the conditions I need to land in.

I am a lucky guy. My wife is my copilot / spotter she has taking a liking to catching my Phantom when I come in for a landing. At times I do the catch myself. Other than that I land on a landing pad. Here is how my wife and I do hand catch landings as a team: http://youtu.be/chil_QSohSk?list=UUw6tAWNGTLhN01jCDeYx0cw If the wind kicked up I would never put my wife at risk to execute the hand catch. I would either do it myself or simply land on the ground. At this point 95% of my landings are hand catch landings.

I land it on my case. It's a good test of maneuverability. Hones the skills.

I also hand catch as well being the safest for the Phantom 2 lol not so much for myself - no injuries yet - but it seems that dji phantom 2 has a hard and rather rapid auto land that scares the brakes of me so I choose to hand catch. By the way also looks a lot more professional and cooler

So how do you kill the motors if one hand is holding the copter? I thought the proper way to shut the motors down was to hold both control knobs to the down-inside position. Newb here with too many tipovers on landing. Thanks,

You kill the motors by holding the throttle down for 3 seconds. (phantom in one hand, transmitter in the other, neck strap on.)
You should do it that way even if you land on the ground as it will save any tip-overs during shutdown.

Back of my voyager, in the trunk, mostly, or hand, or on the roof of my car, doesnt realy mather, any where as long as its flat enough

For those who are getting a lot of tip-overs on take-off, try throttling up for a few seconds without actually reaching take-off prop-speed. If you stay under take-off prop-speed for a few seconds or so, you'll create a slightly more orderly wind flow created by the prop-wash, which can then blow down and outward from the copter, rather than bounce back up and cause a tip-over. The initial rush of the down-draft tends to be particularly turbulent the first second throttling up for take off, especially if you're too conservative. So don't take off in this turbulence.

Alternatively, just gun the throttle for a moment and throttle back the second the copter is in the air a few feet off the ground. It won't topple this way either.

just land the phantom on the grass :3 then even the phantom fall, there;s no scratch

ianwood Posted at 2014-10-12 07:57
I land it on my case. It's a good test of maneuverability. Hones the skills.

+1 ..........................

My p3 standard nearly tipped over today when landed it on the ground because a gust of wind hit it, i'm probably going to switch to hand catching.  Although i'm concerned about the landing legs because when you hand catch they bend slightly.

Never tried a hand catch.   I always try to land on pavement or flat gravel area, or sometimes on a table top.  I've never had a tipover, but have come close if its windy.

Okay....I'll bite on a thread that's almost two years old. I prefer to land my Phantoms in one piece.

josephbobowicz@ Posted at 2014-10-12 07:43
I am a lucky guy. My wife is my copilot / spotter she has taking a liking to catching my Phantom whe ...

that's wonderful.  That should go over real good in divorce court when the time comes for her to catch it and an ESC failure occurs, slicing her face wide open.... "seriously officer, it was an accident"

I always land on the ground.

I've never tried a hand catch, could someone explain how it works ?

I have only done landings on the ground. If the need arises I would hand grab land it.

Don't do much hand catching landing, but I always try to do auto landing once I have the drone in position.  I never use the CSC because most of the times it would tip over, use the 3 seconds down for shut off.

I used to do both with the P2.
The P3P has never landed on the ground, l always hand catch. l think the word "catch" isn't entirely accurate, it's not like it's dropping out of the air and you have to catch it.
lt hovers in place in front of me and facing sideways about 6 1/2 or 7 feet up, then l just hold it there while l shut it down.
< like in the picture only higher.

after seeing pics of a guys hand and arn cut wide open I land mine now , slow and easy no problem

Hentaimo Posted at 2016-4-14 13:06
I've never tried a hand catch, could someone explain how it works ?

Here is an example of my wife who is my spotter as well as copilot executing a a hand catch landing.