This is with my Phantom 4, I haven't had a single crash, I've never powered on the drone while the gimbal was still in the cover, nothing like that.

But I've been noticing little glitches in the gimbal from time to time, which can truly suck if I'm shooting a great 30 second clip flying in the same direction, and then all of a sudden a little twitch, ruining the steady shot.

And then this happened last night, first flight of the evening.  I was out half a mile, about 900 feet in the air above me, but only a few hundred feet above the mountains I was climbing above.  I'm getting some shots of the fall colors in this canyon and then suddenly the gimbal flops.  At first my heart almost explodes, thinking the drone is falling down on to this ridge half mile away, but I look at my altitude and it's steady.  I can see the propellers turning so that brought me some much needed relief.  

You can see me trying to tilt the drone back and forth, maybe something will reconnect with the gimbal and at least help me fly back and land.  No luck, I'm using tilt, I'm twisting the drone back and forth, the gimbal just flops in the wind.  Fortunately I had it in my line of sight the whole time, because I'm up in the mountains without internet service, and I have no maps.  Not even the maps I loaded in preparation would appear (mentioned in another thread, a big pet peeve of mine).

As you'll see, I brought it back safe and sound, but not without wasting half a battery, near sunset in the golden hour, shooting fall colors!  What a waste!!!!

You'll see the gimbal die on the 18 second mark.  Fortunately, I power cycled and the gimbal came back online.  But when will it happen next?  What can I do about this?  No loose cables or connections from what I could see.  Would this be a warranty issue after 3 years?  I have never crashed, I'm still using the stock propellers after all this time, the drone itself is still in factory condition.

This is from my cache, hence the ground audio.  Watch at 18 seconds, and listen to my frustrations trying to set it right as I have to come back all that way to land it.

These are the shots I was getting last night, but obviously trying for video

Is your P4 on latest firmware ? There was an issue with July 2017 release v02.00.0106 where the gimbal & video were resetting when in 4k mode. This was resolved with a couple of Beta releases and the latestv02.00.0700 release last January.

Could also be bad contact on ribbon cable connections, or a dodgy ribbon.

Edit:- Wasn't too windy ?

Aardvark Posted at 2018-10-2 08:55
Is your P4 on latest firmware ? There was an issue with July 2017 release v02.00.0106 where the gimbal & video were resetting when in 4k mode. This was resolved with a couple of Beta releases and the latestv02.00.0700 release last January.

Could also be bad contact on ribbon cable connections, or a dodgy ribbon.

It was windy but not enough for the warnings.

Earlier this year, I saw once an alert, something about "gimbal overload", and it flopped.  But I didn't see it this time.  There was no warning, just a flop and it wouldn't straighten out again until after I landed, powered off and back on, and it leveled like nothing happened.

Yes I've got the latest firmware, I try to be on top of that also since I'm flying every week, mostly in the mountains with no connections, so I try to do all of my updates before I leave.

Thanks for the suggestions though

justin_mcvideo Posted at 2018-10-2 09:06
It was windy but not enough for the warnings.

Earlier this year, I saw once an alert, something about "gimbal overload", and it flopped.  But I didn't see it this time.  There was no warning, just a flop and it wouldn't straighten out again until after I landed, powered off and back on, and it leveled like nothing happened.

Hi Justin, may I know if you are using the original SD card that came with the drone, you may try a different SD card and try again. If the issue appears frequently and can't be resolved by repowering the drone, I may suggest sending the drone in for diagnosis and repair. Just to clarify, warranty can be applied within the warranty period, if the drone is 3 years old, I am afraid that you need to pay for the repair. Thank you for your understanding.

When flying anywhere near a mountain, especially towards the top of, there's going to be wind bursts and gusts depending on the terrain and which side you're flying, etc. Are you sure what you were experiencing was not attributed to this possibility? Curious, do you use AirData for review of the drone's onboard flight logs?  AirData has a fantastic feature where they can provide insight into the wind speed during flights, etc. Also keep in mind that even if/when you feel no wind on the ground surface, you would amazed what winds occur 100, 200, 300 feet above.

Commodon Posted at 2018-10-3 06:49
When flying anywhere near a mountain, especially towards the top of, there's going to be wind bursts and gusts depending on the terrain, which side you're flying, etc. Are you sure what you were experiencing was not attributed to this possibility? Curious, do you use AirData for review of the drone's onboard flight logs?  AirData has a fantastic feature where they can provide insight into the wind speed during flights, etc.

The other day I was installing a gimble guard and had it positioned to far forward. I started the AC, the camera hit the guard and just flopped, as yours did. I shut down and restarted  the AC and was back in business. I would say Commodon is on the right track.

I wonder where these moderators come up with these answers?

ATJ Posted at 2018-10-3 08:26
The other day I was installing a gimble guard and had it positioned to far forward. I started the AC, the camera hit the guard and just flopped, as yours did. I shut down and restarted  the AC and was back in business. I would say Commodon is on the right track.

I wonder where these moderators come up with these answers?

Good point.

Also the gimble and camera are quite sensitive. Even when sitting on a grassy surface, the tickle of grass if it's high enough to touch the camera can cause it to flip up and down repeatedly. Simply moving the drone to a surface where the grass doesn't tickle the camera is enough to remedy this.

Good points about wind shear in the mountains, but I'm certain this was not it.  I usually see the high wind warnings, but on this day I did not.  There is the red warning, and then the "land ASAP" yellow warning.  Neither of these came up, the gimbal just flopped.

As mentioned earlier, this summer for the first time I saw an error message about gimbal motor overload, something like that, and it flopped.  But I didn't see that warning now either.

DJI Thor, interesting question about the SD card.  I purchased my own card, so it didn't arrive with the drone.  What would the SD card involve with the gimbal?

Thanks