do I need to recalabriate if I move to another area and the compass status says normal? Or do I just recalibrate when the app tells me?

Safe practice is to recalibrate every time you move....

Alterastro Posted at 2015-5-8 17:58
Safe practice is to recalibrate every time you move....

I do not agree. Even if the manual says to do compass calibration every time, imho if you don't move far far away from where you calibrated last time, it's not necessary and also could be worse than better.

I do not recalibrate every time I move... Only if I "move" long distances. Different areas of the world have different magnetic declinations, and these can affect a electronic compass' calibration. However, these differences are marginal with say a 50mi radius. If I flew from WA, USA to China, I'd certainly re-calibrate me compass. If I went from NY to California, I'd also re-calibrate... To be safe, if I went from WA or oregon (4-6hrs away) I'd still recalibrate... but if I'm driving within an hour of my hour, I don't necessarily recalibrate... In fact, when I fly only near my home, I tend to only re-calibrate every two weeks, and even then, it's just out of habit and good practice.

Perhaps I'm doing it wrong, but so far no issue. If you fly within the same 20-50mi radius, I don't really thing you need to do it... unless you crash, or your P3 gets near a strong magnetic source that messes up its calibration.

When starting a flight, hover say 10 feet above the ground with your hands off the controls for a short while. If the drone stays put and stays facing the same direction, then there is no need to calibrate anything.

"If it ain't broke, don't fix it."

Check out the following thread for reasons when you should recalibrate the compass:
http://www.phantompilots.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=32829

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mike@singerscre Posted at 2015-5-8 18:27
Check out the following thread for reasons when you should recalibrate the compass:
http://www.phant ...

Thanks for this!

mike@singerscre Posted at 2015-5-8 18:27
Check out the following thread for reasons when you should recalibrate the compass:
http://www.phant ...

Perfect
Thanks for the responses guys. I guess I'll just calibrate when it asks me to or if I have travelled a long distance.

How do you manually recalibrate when you move locations?  When I power ever thing on say for the first time that day, it has me do calibration.  But when I move 30 feet from original start point it does not have me recalibrate and I am unable to figure out how to do this manually.  

harderna@yahoo. Posted at 2015-5-9 12:53
How do you manually recalibrate when you move locations?  When I power ever thing on say for the fir ...

When you're connected to the p3. Press the status button in the top middle of the screen. It shows your compass status. Then you can press recalibrate from there

If I am more then a few miles away from where I last flew it I usually recalibrate.

Thanks for the help!