This morning I was flying the P3 and Inspire.  After about 90 minutes of success, the app lost contact with the P3 for about 30 seconds.

The bird was about 200 meters away and 30 meters in the air, not a place you want to fall out of the sky from.

I kept perfectly calm and tested the sticks.  Still had control so started bringing it in slowly.   Then the app contact was then restored and I continued without further incident.

Just a reminder that the app and the remote are separate things, and just because you lose the picture doesn't mean you have lost control.

Be ready for anything.   You could be thrown into ATTI mode without warning, the app can lose contact, basically assume you are flying manually without a video signal or GPS at all times and you'll never be caught off guard.

Note - please don't misinterpret this post as me dismissing the VERY REAL problems a few users are having when the have NO stick control and their bird flies off into the sunset.   I just have a feeling the majority of instances people refer to as "fly-aways" are nothing of the sort, and more like the experience I had this morning, or bouncing out of GPS for a moment.   If this happens, keep your wits about you and work through it!

Jim

That RTF button is your friend. Today I ran my battery down pretty low and even though I had turned my RTF auto-off (the 30% one), apparently it wants to REALLY go home when it hits 15% or so. So it started to execute RTH where I didn't want it too (I had walked a couple hundred meters from the home point and was also near trees)......
I kept my wits and hit the RTF button once which seemed to have turned off the auto-RTH....and I landed.

I never use RTH so I really should turn it off totally...

Good advice. Don' t Panic.  Hitch hikers Guide to Universe.

I had similar situation.  Lost app connection. I used home button. Eventually I  got app back after moving usb cable around. Nonless it was a little scary. Right after I went and bought new cable

What kind of cables did you guys get?  I just had the same disconnect as well.

I think DJI may have a problem with the USB connector or cables they ship.  I have not had any issue thus far.  But many people seem to be having connection issues when they wiggle cables.

Fulgerite Posted at 2015-5-21 05:20
I think DJI may have a problem with the USB connector or cables they ship.  I have not had any issue ...

They don't provide "lightning cables" so all of us on IOS provided our own.

So if it is physical it's either the port itself or we are all just buying cheap cables.   I put a $2 cable on it and it's always worked great other than this one 30 second event.

droneflyers.com Posted at 2015-5-19 09:06
That RTF button is your friend. Today I ran my battery down pretty low and even though I had turned  ...

Can you actually disable the RTH function?

Fulgerite Posted at 2015-5-21 05:20
I think DJI may have a problem with the USB connector or cables they ship.  I have not had any issue ...

DJI didn't provide me with any kind of cable. The USB cable I'm using is moderately unique. One of my Passport drives has the same kind of cable as the Samsung charging/data cable for the Galaxy S5. The Passport cable is much shorter so I use it more often.

In either case, i.e., with both, I've yet to lose connectivity.

Thanks for the posting.  I read it just before I went out for my  38th flight yesterday.

I was 3,300 feet from home at an altitude of  80 feet and the app went black and my iPad Air2 started a reboot (the DJI app crashed the iPad).

After a very loud scream of  *uck, I pressed the RTH on the RC and it worked a charm.  By the time the bird was about 1/2 back, the iPad came back on line and I cancelled the RTH.

This is the only time I've had a disconnect/crash behaviour.  

Although I was still in line of site, and probably could have flown home on my own, It was very comforting to have that little button on the RC . . . .

aburkefl@gmail. Posted at 2015-5-21 09:05
Can you actually disable the RTH function?

I also think you can tell it to land instead of RTH. This setting is in MC Settings --> Advanced Settings

I think you can disable it happening at 30%...
I have to check further - but I think it tries to RTH at 10% no matter what.
Ok, so here is the story as I read it.....

There are two types of failsafe - out of range and low battery.
1. Out of range failsafe will automatically kick in the return to home....or land- depending on YOUR setting in the MC Settings --> Advanced Settings
2. Low Battery failsafes - this works differently and depends on YOUR settings in the Aircraft Battery Screen of the DJI Pilot App settings.
There are two settings there - Low Battery Warning and Critical Battery Warning. At the low battery warning the DJI pilot app will give you a warning and the option to cancel out the RTH - but if you do not cancel it, it will initiate.
At the Critical warning level the Phantom will not RTH - but just decend and land.
With either you can still control the quad to a degree with the sticks in order to avoid obstacles.

I assume that the RTH button on the Remote will always initiate RTH - hitting it again seems to then turn RTH off again.

If you are an experienced pilot and flying mostly over open land and close-in, you can probably set the low battery at 20% and critical at 10%.

If I messed up any of this...please, someone fill in the blanks or correct me!

droneflyers.com Posted at 2015-5-21 22:09
I also think you can tell it to land instead of RTH. This setting is in MC Settings --> Advanced Se ...

Yeah, I remember seeing that's a toggle in the latest firmware - RTH or LAND.

droneflyers.com Posted at 2015-5-21 22:09
I also think you can tell it to land instead of RTH. This setting is in MC Settings --> Advanced Se ...

I do remember flying one day and hearing the audio alert for low battery. That was apparently the warning when the battery level reached 30%. I honestly don't remember exactly what transpired from there. The P3 wasn't very far up in the air and wasn't very far away, so I just landed it. Probably should have left it alone to see what it might have done on its own.

I do remember now seeing some of the settings mentioned and acknowledged the fact that you do have some options in regards to landing, returning, etc. Need to investigate all that a bit closer.

Still a lot to learn.

I had a similar problem yesterday when flying with a P2 V+. I noticed that many of the channels for the P3P camera became unusable when the vision controller was nearby. I lost signal intermittently and at time lost it entirely for periods of 10+ seconds. At first, I thought that the controller had lost a connection entirely, but it turned out that I was still able to fly. Just keep in mind that the channels overlap on P3 and P2.

Scottd825 Posted at 2015-5-22 02:55
I had a similar problem yesterday when flying with a P2 V+. I noticed that many of the channels for  ...

Wow - this is interesting and starts to make some sense of why there are some reports of WiFi causing lost connections on the P3.......