Hi all
A while ago i crashed my drone, Doh.

There was not much pysical injury but the motors didnt start and the vps was not transmitting
I had tried nearly everything software updates ect

Then i put it in the fridge for 15 minuets and it worked!!!!!!!

Jusr thought id share this as it could be useful for you

Ha ha ha ha. Rolfwl this is the funniest thread I've seen yet ;)

I put my P3P in the oven and turned it in to a meat lovers pizza. I thought you all should know. You're welcome.{:3_63:}

Bhujang Posted at 2016-2-11 17:32
Ha ha ha ha. Rolfwl this is the funniest thread I've seen yet ;)

Actually, his 'unintended fix' may have been just what his quad needed.  The cold would allow components to contract and this would release contacts on certain devices in the electronics.  Not unlike the thread (can't find it now) where tapping on the component fixes a problem due to contact release.

As an electronics person/geek/engineer the cold is a good thing.  I cannot tell you how many hard drives that have crashed/failed that I have been able to retrieve data from after putting them in the freezer for a few hours/overnight or how many sensor units I have saved by putting them in the freezer for a few hours.

nrgwise Posted at 2016-2-11 16:49
Actually, his 'unintended fix' may have been just what his quad needed.  The cold would allow comp ...

Exactly, I used to use "freeze it" spray on PCB's to track down bad solder joints that Cow-J'ed  (Cuts Out With Jar) sure saved a lot of time!

Sometimes it goes the other way, bought a few xboxs back from the dead with a heat gun.

Either way, glad you have a working drone again, I'd be a bit skeptical about flying it, might warm up and the reverse happen.

The question is if cold temperatures did help fix a problem, what will happen when it warms up?

I've put dead hard drives into the freezer(wrapped in plastic) nad they have come to life long enough to retrieve data from them!

multiple things could have made your drone work. Perhaps a small piece of conductive material is floating around in the drone and it dislodged from its place of rest when you put it in the fridge. I had one of the screw threads break off inside my drone once and had to tap it around to get it to fall out of battery compartment.  Does it have a slight rattle when you shake it?

One of the drones motors may  have seized as a result of the crash but I am sure you manually spun them to try and get it to work before sticking it in the fridge so this would have freed it up so not sure that was the case.. The hard drive freezer trick was usually a cure for the drives that did not spin up this was usually the result of the heads stuck to the platter or seized bearings.  Cold in the freezer contracted the bearings and or  lifted the heads off the platter so if it was seized or stuck it would free them.  A quick flick of the wrist often worked as well.    There are a few moving parts like the motors and gimbal but I am not sure there is any mechanical relays on board (I could be wrong). You usually get an error when the gimbal etc is stuck though (were you getting errors or just nothing at all)

It could have been the result of an open circuit that only works when it is contracted with the cold (dry or cracked solder joint etc) . unfortunately if this is the case your drone may not be fixed, just temporarily working.  As soon as it heats up again the circuit, component, solder joint etc will expand and  may cause the problem to reoccur.

A good way to find heat related problems is with a hair dryer and a can of spray freeze.  You heat sections up for a minute or 2 until it stops working and then spray sections with spray freeze until it starts again.  

I used to be a  field tech back in the 80's doing component level repairs on computers and my toolkit included lots of things that impress the secretaries. Hair dryer, Nail Polish (I used as lock tight), nail file (clean contacts), eyebrow tweezers etc

The only thing a cold Phantom will do for you is make your "aircraft Warming Up" period shorter by doing an IMU calibration with it cold.
If you crashed your aircraft and somehow the cold made it now work I would DEFINITELY NOT fly that thing. It's pretty much a guarantee it's going to crash again and when it does just pray that there's no property damage or no one gets injured.
You should send it in for repair.
That's my opinion.

DJI-Ken Posted at 2016-2-12 07:03
The only thing a cold Phantom will do for you is make your "aircraft Warming Up" period shorter by d ...

The other thing that refrigerators do is dehydrate things.  If there was some moisture somewhere, a bought in the fridge might dry it out.

But I agree, I would be very, very leery of flying that thing.

You could, however, send it to one of us who live in cold climates.  We'd be sure to keep it safely stored in the garage until it was cold enough to fly.

Could be the one of the battery... or one of the props engines.
By putting it in the fridge, you're just fooling the non so intelligent battery, or the defect sensor.
Once started and fly, everything 'could' have come back in order, the defect heat sensor, after powering up, could have been reset.
- don't know what are the lines of code, but it could be an explanation. -
Remember that humidity from your fridge and condensation from the reheating process, could cause more damages than it just fixed
But with a bit of luck...

missed my first 2 lines, it's annoying, you can't edit your post after 2 mins, so here it is again...

TBH, I'm not very surprised.
It could be one of ( the very numerous) heat sensors being uncalibrated, and by having an 'overheat' status, preventing to takeoff.
Could be the one of the battery... or one of the props engines. Most likely one of the props since you could switch on but not take off.
By putting it in the fridge, you're just fooling the non-so intelligent battery, or the defect sensor.
Once started and fly, everything 'could' have come back in order, the defect heat sensor, after powering up, could have been reset.
- don't know what are the lines of code, but it could be an explanation. -
Remember that humidity from your fridge and condensation from the reheating process, could cause more damages than it just fixed
But with a bit of luck...

I had some perfectly good (but small and old) hard drives which I fixed with repeated bludgeoning from sledge hammer and an axe.

Frezouille Posted at 2018-4-21 17:07
Could be the one of the battery... or one of the props engines.
By putting it in the fridge, you're just fooling the non so intelligent battery, or the defect sensor.
Once started and fly, everything 'could' have come back in order, the defect heat sensor, after powering up, could have been reset.

Are you bored? Bringing back an old thread from the dead files.

Start a new thread, don't be shy. Haha


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DJI-Ken Posted at 2016-2-12 08:03
The only thing a cold Phantom will do for you is make your "aircraft Warming Up" period shorter by doing an IMU calibration with it cold.
If you crashed your aircraft and somehow the cold made it now work I would DEFINITELY NOT fly that thing. It's pretty much a guarantee it's going to crash again and when it does just pray that there's no property damage or no one gets injured.
You should send it in for repair.

Ken Are you still amongst us? ;-)



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