redline870
lvl.2
United States
Offline
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I am more or less putting this here to see if anyone has any advice for how to handle this.
First to give a little history, I own many DJI products and have spent A LOT of money with them. F450 Flamewheel, Inspire 1, Inspire 1 Pro, S900 w/ A2, S1000 w/A3, Light Bridge 2, Zenmuse XT Thermal Camera. I also fly freestyle with an Impluse RC Alien and have logged TONS of hours flying with all these aircrafts. I also work at a University and manage a drone research lab. We do a lot of testing with an assortment of different aircrafts, many that are DJI and we have a designated indoor flying area with a grid pattern on the floor made of painters tape (for optical flow to reference). I mention this to illustrate that I am not a novice pilot, I have been flying since before multirotors even existed.
I bought a Mavic Pro about a month ago and brought it to work to show some of the students. I unpacked it and noticed the right rear arm did not tuck tight in to the body when folded and had a fair amount of play in it when it was unfolded. I immediately took pictures and sent an e-mail to DJI. While waiting for a response, the next day I figured I would give it a short test flight indoors to see if the loose arm effected flight. I placed the drone in the test area with the grid on the floor, armed it, and took off about 1.5-2ft off the ground. The Mavic was drifting very bad to the left and started heading towards a wall, one of the students even asked "Why is it drifting like that?". I tried to quickly land it as to not hit the wall, but the way the controls are, it doesn't immediately land upon giving it down stick, there is a couple second delay before it lands. To keep from impacting the wall I physically pushed the drone down towards the carpet. I must have got a little too close to the props because the left rear prop struck my pinkey finger and resulted in a slightly rough landing. It was only a few inches off the ground when it struck my finger though so it wasn't bad at all. I looked up and said to the student "Well looks like that loose arm does effect the flight!". I couldn't believe that small bit of play in the arm caused the drone to drift that bad and started to suspect the VPS system had a problem as well. I gave it another shot and this time it flew fine. Hovered for about 5 minutes with no issues. I received the shipping label and boxed it up and sent it to DJI. About a week later I get an e-mail from them that says "User error FLY001 1. Unit was in Atti mode and was responsive to RC input. Unit had no GPS lock under Atti mode. User flying indoors. 2. At t=187s, relative height=0.5m, unit recorded external impact. 3. Unit was drifting and collided with obstruction. User flying over surface without pattern for VPS and without GPS lock. Conclusion: User error. Impact in air. [Non warranty Repair]" and a quote to replace the right rear arm for $149. Even though the repair cost is only $149 this upset me very much because I have spent a ton of money with DJI, they don't seem to acknowledge that the impact was with my finger and the LEFT REAR prop, and I feel as if they're trying to screw me. I know the surface has a pattern sufficient for the VPS because we purposefully put a grid on the ground for the VPS on the Inspire 1. I called DJI and tried to explain the situation but the woman didn't seem to care or listen. She just said "So basically you just want to dispute the repair charges?" I responded with "YES!, I have pictures of the defective arm that pre-date the first flight, and the impact with my finger occured with the left rear prop, not the right rear that is on the quote, you should be able to compare this with the black box data on the drone". She said someone would call me back. About a week later I get another e-mail from them that says "I requested the invoice be updated to show the correct arm that needs repair, but the invoice wasn't changed. Just looked at the picture and the arm with the issue is the back right arm, so the invoice has been correct the whole time. The gimbal/camera is the "front" of the aircraft, battery is the back. As far as reassessing the warranty decision, damage incurred from an indoor flight with insufficient GPS signal will not be covered under warranty. You have the option to not pay the invoice and have this sent back without repair, let anyone in support know if that is what you would rather do."
After reading this return e-mail, I don't think they even understand what I'm telling them because I didn't request that the invoice be changed to show a different arm. Every time I call, I can't talk with anyone directly (other than an operator who has no technical knowledge) about it, and I can't get this resolved! This is very frustrating and annoying! I don't know what they don't understand about "I have pictures of the defective arm that pre-date any flying". Has anyone else ever dealt with a problem like this? How was it resolved? At this point I'm wondering if I should continue using DJI products because if they are going to be this much of a hassle, I don't want to deal with it. Anyone have any advice on how to handle this? I know it's only $149 but I'd rather take a $1000 loss than hand over $149 for something I'm not responsible for, simply as a matter of principle. Maybe I'll have them return it without repairs and give it to the guys at Rotor Riot to destroy in some sort of epic way!
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