Ciesnik, did you received and see or hear any warning on dji go?

Dji go make a warning to you about compass error at 23s of flight, before you decided to climb to 100m altitude.

If you see the warning, why the hell you decided to continue and flight to that high altitude?

Again, warnings are not meant to be ignored, are meant to help.

( maybe you dont see the warning, or hear, or it dont appear)

STech - Hathder Posted at 2017-7-30 13:12
Ciesnik, did you received and see or hear any warning on dji go?

Dji go make a warning to you about compass error at 23s of flight, before you decided to climb to 100m altitude.

Because it appeared just for a split of a second and after that it showed that everything was fine. It had GPS locked and was flashing green. You can see in the video, that I was hovering at 5m altitude when the warning appeared and I stopped going up to see if it clears out or not. But, it cleared out immediately. The app told me that it was safe going up.

Ciesnik, did you received and see or hear any warning on dji go?

Dji go make a warning to you about compass error at 23s of flight, before you decided to climb to 100m altitude.

If you see the warning, why the hell you decided to continue and flight to that high altitude?

Again, warnings are not meant to be ignored, are meant to help.

( maybe you dont see the warning, or hear, or it dont appear)

Sorry, my bad internet double post.

I agree orientation will be hard at that height but did you have a clear video signal at least you could have used that for reference either way it sucks when this happens good luck

I watch the video all you did was try to Throttle Down you should have tried to at least use the live view or the lights on the Drone since it was dark to gain orientation you did not even touch the right stick...sucks man

yes, the live preview was working. however, together with ATTI mode the app showed "Aircraft disconnected", although I could see the preview. And analyzing the video and the flight record, the commands from the control have been received by the Spark. But, at the moment I was not even sure if I had any control over the Spark as the "Aircraft disconnected" and the overall situation was totally confusing.

Why did the app show "Aircraft disconnected", when in fact it was not disconnected? This clearly is a buggy behaviour including the switch to atti mode, at this height, despite the fact that it was seeing 15 satellites at that time.

Latest update. DJI have recognised I had a fault and have agreed to provide a new drone under warranty! Result!

Thanks DJI!!

Hello Everyone . I lost my Spark on July 7th on a mountain village in Italy . It was my 5th flight with the Spark in total  , takeoff and flying were perfect and stable . I always take off carefully making sure everything feels perfect.
I also have a P3 and P4 and Mavic and am very experienced , even flying manually but this time the drone at 100 feet of elevation and within the first minute began giving me many warning messages including IMU error , lost GPS , Weak GPS IMU failure . Then it appeared to fly away and I pushed hard on the stick in many directions with no proper or logical response from the Spark . It continued to fly away from me and gain altitude . It was a horrible feeling .  
   I contacted DJI immediately and sent in my log . (July 7th)  , I have also looked at my log and there were so many IMU and GPS failures throughout the flyaway it seems like there was a radio failure in the GPS signal since it indicated weak GPS signal many times until it was lost.

I have received confirmations a week later that they were looking at my log but then received another question another week later to upload my log again , specifically the TXT file only of the flyaway . I have no videos since the flyaway happened so early on I was busy watching the copter visually and fighting to try to take back control but sadly it had a mind of its own.
      
I have a long email trail from DJI but no result and today is August 6th , 30 days without any replacement and very poor and frustrating communications with DJI . My summer is almost over and naturally I am back at my home in Canada so I missed my vacation of pictures and selfies in Italy . I have never experienced such frustrating customer support in my life .,30 days and very uncomfortable feeling from DJI . Yesterday again they asked me for videos and I already wrote that there were no videos . They asked for my log a second time again . It's frustrating . I can clearly see by the log that the Spark was defective and they always acknowledge my email , however I'm totally frustrated .  If DJI is reading these messages can DJI please help me . A very frustrated and upset DJI Customer of 66 years of age holding 80 USA Patents!

Thank you

Howard Rosen / Montreal Canada

Howard, I had a similar experience with DJI's email customer service, after receiving a defective Spark. I called them which worked far better. However, this whole experience is connected with so many bad feelings for me that I will not buy a Dji product again.

Thank you for sharing your thoughts. I agree I'm wondering what other companies exist.. This incident has raised my blood pressure. It's primarily because it's not run on this continent. I did phone them twice but forgot to write that, each time I ended up speaking to someone in Manila

ciesnik Posted at 2017-7-30 13:40
yes, the live preview was working. however, together with ATTI mode the app showed "Aircraft disconnected", although I could see the preview. And analyzing the video and the flight record, the commands from the control have been received by the Spark. But, at the moment I was not even sure if I had any control over the Spark as the "Aircraft disconnected" and the overall situation was totally confusing.

Why did the app show "Aircraft disconnected", when in fact it was not disconnected? This clearly is a buggy behaviour including the switch to atti mode, at this height, despite the fact that it was seeing 15 satellites at that time.

Your not looking at that video properly, yes it says 15 sats, but if you look where it matters your bar graph they are completely empty, this is the indication of how much gps you have, not the number you were looking at.

hallmark007 Posted at 2017-8-6 06:08
Your not looking at that video properly, yes it says 15 sats, but if you look where it matters your bar graph they are completely empty, this is the indication of how much gps you have, not the number you were looking at.

The bars vanish from one second to the next which is rather impossible 100m above ground mid-air with no buildings around that may obstruct the sight of satellites. Therefore, my conclusion is correct: Spark had 15 sats in sight - but, there was either an issue with the GPS receiver, or an algorithm decided to turn GPS off.

ciesnik Posted at 2017-8-6 09:35
The bars vanish from one second to the next which is rather impossible 100m above ground mid-air with no buildings around that may obstruct the sight of satellites. Therefore, my conclusion is correct: Spark had 15 sats in sight - but, there was either an issue with the GPS receiver, or an algorithm decided to turn GPS off.

You should really look at your video again when bars disappeared they didn't come back, I explained in another post why gps is cut off when you have compass problem. This is just the way this AC is set up, it isn't a problem with any other algorithm as you think, you will see this behaviour in all similar incidents, some manage to control their AC some don't.
As to why you got compass problems that might be where you should be looking for answers.

ciesnik Posted at 2017-8-6 09:35
The bars vanish from one second to the next which is rather impossible 100m above ground mid-air with no buildings around that may obstruct the sight of satellites. Therefore, my conclusion is correct: Spark had 15 sats in sight - but, there was either an issue with the GPS receiver, or an algorithm decided to turn GPS off.

I'll give it to you again.

Why would a compass error disable GPS?
Orientation (compass data) and position (GPS data) are different but related.
When the Spark is moving and getting position information from the GPS that tells the Spark that it is travelling in a different direction from what it's getting from compass data, The Sparks programming can't work with the data conflict.
The solution is to drop data from one source and since the Spark can't fly without a compass but can without GPS, it's the GPS data that gets dropped.

hallmark007 Posted at 2017-8-6 09:51
You should really look at your video again when bars disappeared they didn't come back, I explained in another post why gps is cut off when you have compass problem. This is just the way this AC is set up, it isn't a problem with any other algorithm as you think, you will see this behaviour in all similar incidents, some manage to control their AC some don't.
As to why you got compass problems that might be where you should be looking for answers.

I do not know what video you are looking at, but in my video the bars disappear at 3:44 . At 3:43 it sees 16 sats with full signal strength, the next second it says "weak GPS signal" => no bars, but still 16 sats and at 3:48 it even jumps up to 17 sats and then drops back to 16, and little bit later to 15 sats.

I do not need to investigate any further as DJI support told me that there was a GPS signal problem and I am getting a new Spark as replacement.

ciesnik Posted at 2017-8-6 09:59
I do not know what video you are looking at, but in my video the bars disappear at 3:44 . At 3:43 it sees 16 sats with full signal strength, the next second it says "weak GPS signal" => no bars, but still 16 sats and at 3:48 it even jumps up to 17 sats and then drops back to 16, and little bit later to 15 sats.

I do not need to investigate any further as DJI support told me that there was a GPS signal problem and I am getting a new Spark as replacement.

It doesn't matter how many sats it says you have, your bars empty at 3.44 until end of your video you will also notice top left corner Atti that also stayed on until end of video.
I understand you got warranty that's great.

fans9fb836df Posted at 2017-8-5 22:43
Hello Everyone . I lost my Spark on July 7th on a mountain village in Italy . It was my 5th flight with the Spark in total  , takeoff and flying were perfect and stable . I always take off carefully making sure everything feels perfect.
I also have a P3 and P4 and Mavic and am very experienced , even flying manually but this time the drone at 100 feet of elevation and within the first minute began giving me many warning messages including IMU error , lost GPS , Weak GPS IMU failure . Then it appeared to fly away and I pushed hard on the stick in many directions with no proper or logical response from the Spark . It continued to fly away from me and gain altitude . It was a horrible feeling .  
   I contacted DJI immediately and sent in my log . (July 7th)  , I have also looked at my log and there were so many IMU and GPS failures throughout the flyaway it seems like there was a radio failure in the GPS signal since it indicated weak GPS signal many times until it was lost.

Howard,

I had to wait a lengthy period of time too until I got a decision and was also asked for exactly the same info as you have. I suspect they must be busy.

Thanks

Jazzflask yes I know that you waited I read that your flyaway was on July 9th mine was on July 7th. I wrote to you on Gmail. It's torturous being treated like this. Did you buy the dji care policy? I did but I do understand that it wouldn't be fair anyway if I had to use the policy because the flyaway wasn't my fault. I'm reading about these incidents everywhere.. Hopefully the firmware update will fix this and hopefully I'll see a new spark soon. Thanks

I just lost mine tonight.  Ive had it for 3 days and pretty much have done the same route with it, but tonight, it went up about 100ft and just took off.  My controller didnt have any effect on its flight path.  Attached at my logs:

http://www.phantomhelp.com/LogViewer/SLGGPEO1NWA5N49S9TXK/


https://app.airdata.com/main?fli ... f3ae0a1ade305a991ed

MarcoJesus Posted at 2017-8-12 19:39
I just lost mine tonight.  Ive had it for 3 days and pretty much have done the same route with it, but tonight, it went up about 100ft and just took off.  My controller didnt have any effect on its flight path.  Attached at my logs:

http://www.phantomhelp.com/LogViewer/SLGGPEO1NWA5N49S9TXK/

it turned off when it was flying?

MarcoJesus Posted at 2017-8-12 19:39
I just lost mine tonight.  Ive had it for 3 days and pretty much have done the same route with it, but tonight, it went up about 100ft and just took off.  My controller didnt have any effect on its flight path.  Attached at my logs:

http://www.phantomhelp.com/LogViewer/SLGGPEO1NWA5N49S9TXK/

whoa, your log is crazy.  .. few things stand out to me with your fly away.  first and foremost, with hardware errors like Compass, IMU, GPS errors any combination of them, never click return to home button! your spark is completely confused and will get lost the spark only has a single IMU and Compass stack, no references once it gets mixed up.   land it ASAP or manually bring it somewhere safe ASAP and figure it out.  

you stated you flew up 100 feet with controller then spark disobeyed you.. this point where you should click land or bring it back down best you can, reaim controller.. to face it..  dont fly again until you use OTG from RC to the phone or tablet you are using.. and turn off wifi/BT on the device..  and reset/recalibrated the wifi on the spark and RC together with a "relinking"

you started flying before a complete GPS lock, this is a no no unless you are highly experienced or are willing to take a complete loss.

then you quickly got compass errors..  at this point you should have manually turned it around and landed it asap and figure that out.. compass errors are pretty much your spark telling you..no shouting at you that it is confused.. it uses the compass to determine direction, not the GPS. with no sense of direction, can't expect much..

then you got a bunch of gps nomatch errors, this isn't entirely clear at what it means, but when this occurs, do not keep flying.. bring it down...manually..


again, not to shout at you, this is to everyone may not understand it that it is important to understand..  any hardware level errors on the spark or other drones.. like GPS, Compass, IMU, Battery, ETC.  never click RTH buttons.. manually fly it to nearest safe landing spot, land it..and meet it up or have someone pick it up...  with any errors it means your spark is confused about some aspect.  even a simple compass error is fairly RIP if you leave it up to your spark to try to figure out how to get back to you.  

I faced the same problem on 16 Aug 2017. The drone was taken off with strong GPS 11 satellites. At the height of 13 metres, it showed compass error which happen before in my previous flight. Suddenly, it flew away without reason. I have played this drone for more than 80 flights and not found this issue. Luckily I still keep pushing down the altitude, so it flew only less than 50 metres away and hit tree top seriously. I got it back and still wondered what's going on. When checking my flight record, it was flying away without any press on the controller. DJI should consider this as serious malfunction and immediately patch the error. I start to lose confident in this product too.

I still can see all positions in my flight record match with the real position in the field. Jazzflask, you should be able to find your drone. My one was hung on the tree top for long till I can find.

Jazzflask Posted at 2017-7-9 22:38
I calibrated the drone before take off to assure the compass and gps were all good. I have practiced flying the drone quite a lot using line of sight rather than relying on GPS and was able to control it.

What happened on Saturday, the drone would not respond to me as I was commanding and it flew off unfortunately.

Probably a place where you did a calibration had a magnetic interferences, or a compass got them during calibration.

When you started then interferences disappeared and you got a compass error because gps heading was different than compass heading.

Do not calibrate compass everytime. Do it only when it is needed. Compass error before start may not mean you need a calibration. It may mean there are magnetic interferences and you should go to other place.

Calibrate a compass only in interference free location, double check heading, and think twice befeore recalibration, because new place may  have interferences and new calibration may be the last.

Hi

Same thing as for everyone else happend to my Spark yesterday.   It was only 2 days old  :-(     I´ve opened a case with dji and sent in my flight record and last movie.   My drone did probebly i nice crash om the freeway or a deep dive in the lake :-(     

Hopefully I get the same answer as Jazzflask ( I will use this thread in my corrensponding in my case)

Hey everyone,
I have my fly more combo under my desk right now, arrived today. But after reading this thread I'm slightly terrified of taking off now. Do you think the latest FW (21/08) fixed these flyaway issues?

Andy

Don't be terrified, fly in beginner mode until you are more confident, make sure you understand the meaning of ATTI mode and how your craft will react in the slightest of wind in this situation (basically what happens when a drone loses GPS).

How can you prepare for atti mode?

Montfrooij Posted at 2017-8-23 13:57
How can you prepare for atti mode?

Buy cheap drone with no GPS and sensors. Fly and make your skill on level. That practicing help me to avoid loose spark when I had "GPS error" and Atti mode wasn't so scary. If the drone reacting on your commands and it's not disconnected you should be able to bring him home.

ImHereToCrash Posted at 2017-7-29 15:27
i spoke with a guy lives nearby who has years, of flying quadcopters, mentioned about my spark issues, said sounds like either the spark has onboard software crashing in a thread making it unable to respond at least until that thread closes or restarts.. if that is the case and it certainly is possible but not likely he hopes, it's probably nothing we can do right now.. DJi has to fix that stalled or crashed software thread..  or if any luck its not actually software onboard crashing and getting stuck in thread but rather general lack of redundancies causing it to get confused..

i asked why is that a good thing..or would be of any luck..  he said if it isn't a crashed software thread, and the spark is getting confused, considering it lacks general redundancies its likely.., having the ability to force Atti mode is definitely needed..but oddly missing.    Atti should disable GPS and compass and maybe even disable  the VPS..basically you're in full manual control... if it isn't software/firmware related, Atti mode is a simple cure.  would allow you to tell it which way to face and fly even if it feels like its going completely backwards it wont stop you like it may in GPS mode.  RTH would also misbehave in its confusion..thinks its pointing somewhere else..

I feel your post is the best illustration as to why there should be a way to manually go into atti mode. Great information and great common sense also.

Lack of manual atti mode is the single biggest oversight I made when buying the spark. Was also quite surprised to learn Mavic also has no such feature. Amazing to me....I understand catering to the masses but honestly a way to manually go into atti mode with a stern warning about such madness should suffice rather to make atti none selectable at all.

Seems to me rigging the drone in such a way that virtually guarantees the new pilot with no atti mode experience will lose control when it eventually does happen is a sure way to crash a lot of drones. I mean if that's what the goal is. to crash drones, then fine, DJI nailed it. If the goal is to provide a quality product and the tools the new pilot will require if he is to advance as a flyer (and quite possibly a return customer looking to upgrade down the road) then allowing atti mode seems like a no brainer.

DJI? Why no atti mode?  Is there an official stance?

ThirdEyeFlyin' Posted at 2017-8-23 17:58
I feel your post is the best illustration as to why there should be a way to manually go into atti mode. Great information and great common sense also.

Lack of manual atti mode is the single biggest oversight I made when buying the spark. Was also quite surprised to learn Mavic also has no such feature. Amazing to me....I understand catering to the masses but honestly a way to manually go into atti mode with a stern warning about such madness should suffice rather to make atti none selectable at all.

ya, and mavic pro also does not have atii mode witch without mods.. both spark and mavic pro support remotely triggering atti mode via a modded DJi go 4.1.5 app on android however, so just matter of DJi allowing us the user to trigger it on either system.  

having flown the mavic pro and now own one and compared it to a fairly well behaved spark, i can honestly say that the spark is like a little cut down mavic pro with unfortunate pricing and oddly missing software features that it would be good at like POI and Orbit, follow me...  it also has unfortinately and intentionally broken camera software issue, i set same center weighted mtering on my mavic pro and some tinkering with mnaul setitngs to match the spark and its obvious DJi are intentionally trying to seperate the spark and the mavic pro artifically a bit too much..

Ardenno Posted at 2017-8-23 17:16
Buy cheap drone with no GPS and sensors. Fly and make your skill on level. That practicing help me to avoid loose spark when I had "GPS error" and Atti mode wasn't so scary. If the drone reacting on your commands and it's not disconnected you should be able to bring him home.

I have a very cheap drone so that must feel like flying ATTI mode..
Really hard indeed.

happened today, very frustrating, drone is lost in forest. Was thinking it was wind issue, but when seeing the log it was alway the same, just when it started getting the atti / gps errors it went bananas at 20 km/h...


hope dji will solve this..

app.airdata.com/main?share=saTEHu

I made a flight yesterday with my Spark, I took a direct line of sight. With 2:12 of flight and at 730 m of distance there was a momentary loss of signal and I activated the RTH. With 3:40 the following errors occurred:

Compass ERROR, EXIT P-GPS MODE, Current RTH route will pass  a NO - FLY ZONE, pay attention to the aircraft's position to avoid RTH failure.

Someone could help me, I would like to contact DJI to send my flight details, and if this is covered by the warranty.

PS: I lost my new Spark!

Sorry for your loss, you can provide flight record to the support and we will have someone analyze for you and find out the reason of the accident. Please refer to the link below to contact the Support. http://www.dji.com/support.

DJI Elektra Posted at 2017-8-27 23:23
Sorry for your loss, you can provide flight record to the support and we will have someone analyze for you and find out the reason of the accident. Please refer to the link below to contact the Support. http://www.dji.com/support.

I talked to DJI through a chat. After providing some data, I was informed that an email will be sent requesting more information! I really hope that if Spark's error is verified to DJI send me another one.

fans5afbcfcb Posted at 2017-8-27 15:23
Compass ERROR, EXIT P-GPS MODE, Current RTH route will pass  a NO - FLY ZONE, pay attention to the aircraft's position to avoid RTH failure.

Exact same thing as me - it's ridiculous how often this is occurring. Clearly there is a fault.