Welcome Inspire Pilots!
Join our free DJI Inspire community today!
Sign up

Changes to Low Battery Return to Home in the new Firmware v1.3.0

Joined
Jan 15, 2015
Messages
33
Reaction score
32
Age
54
Anyone have a chance to play with the failsafe changes noted in firmware update v1.3.0? The release notes indicate that there is now an option in Failsafe mode to land the aircraft at the current location and altitude. In particular, I’m curious what the aircraft does when it commences the 10 second Low Battery RTH failsafe feature.

The reason why I ask? I recently crashed my Inspire because of that feature. I believed that the aircraft would give you a full 10 second warning before commencing the low battery failsafe RTH; however, I now understand that under FW v1.2.1.06 the aircraft starts to ascend while the 10 second warning is counting down. This is contrary to what the instruction manual states. This would be no big deal if one had unobstructed skies, but I was under a tree at the time, flying at about 5 feet under branches at about 10 feet. I frantically tried to cancel the RTH with my right hand on the tablet while the trying to land the craft with the left. Unfortunately, it didn’t respond to my down stick input to land and I didn’t cancel the RTH in time before it struck the tree and fell to the ground. In all, I only had about 2-3 seconds to react and so I feel that RTH was the primary cause for my crash. I could have easily landed or canceled the RTH had it given me a full 10 seconds to cancel before commencing the ascent.

So back to my question: Can anyone tell me more about the changes to the low-battery RTH failsafe, if any? I’m likely to receive news from DJI service any day now on whether they will fix my bird under the warranty. I feel I have a good argument as the aircraft did not provide the 10 second warning before commencing the flight home as the instructions indicate. I think my argument gets stronger if this is something they have changed in the latest firmware update and so I could use some help understanding what has changed, if anything.

In any case, all Inspire pilots should familiarize themselves with these settings and should practice using them. One might even consider turning them off as I now understand that is an option as well. This is the second Inspire I’ve crashed because of that setting. I take the blame for the first one, but it shouldn’t be too much to ask for them to give you the full 10 seconds before taking the craft out of your control.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Filsonian
I need to explore this feature as well. I almost crashed mine yesterday. Just as I was about to land it kicked in and took off narrowly missing an overhang and almost hit the roof. I had no option to cancel quickly. Thankfully it returned to the parking lot and I was able to safely land.
 
I have not tested this and have only had RTH initiate a few times which was purely pilot inexperience error in letting my battery get so low that it kicked in in the first place. Since I learned these lessons I am now on the ground before 1st warning. I've had no scares crashes repairs etc since I now follow this practice. Actually I've never had a crash in all the time I've been doing this. I treat these failsafe RTH features as just that, as a last resort after a series of notifications that DJI have very kindly provided us with...just the safe practice I now follow. I reckon that's the way DJI meant it to be.
 
I tested it yesterday. With 'Smart Go Home' disabled at 10% the critical low battery message appears, the landing gear is lowered and the Inspire just lands where it is. It's still possible to correct it with stick input although I found I couldn't actually cancel the auto land procedure by pressing the cancel button on the iPad.
 
I tested it yesterday. With 'Smart Go Home' disabled at 10% the critical low battery message appears, the landing gear is lowered and the Inspire just lands where it is. It's still possible to correct it with stick input although I found I couldn't actually cancel the auto land procedure by pressing the cancel button on the iPad.

You can give it enough throttle input however to counteract the auto landing feature for that last 10%, just in case you need to hover for a few more seconds to get to a clear LZ.
 
Yup, although I found that the lower the remaining power the more stick I had to give it to stay airborne, it became a battle of wills with the Inspire almost being more stubborn than me lol.
 
In the new FW v1.3.0 documentation, under "What's New", #10 states,

Added option to enable or disable Low Battery RTH feature.

Has anyone found where that can be enabled/disabled?

Thanks!
 
In the new FW v1.3.0 documentation, under "What's New", #10 states,

Added option to enable or disable Low Battery RTH feature.

Has anyone found where that can be enabled/disabled?

Thanks!
I believe this is what they now suddenly call Smart Go Home, which can be disabled in the advanced settings, if I recall correctly.
 
this isn't directed at everyone, just the forum moderator and a few other negative nannys. I TOLD YOU SO. I got so much flack saying the auto land feature was a inherently bad idea causing more crashes then it saved and now they gave us the option to turn it off. believe me this feature will probably get removed all together or be just off and people will have to actually turn it on. the auto land caused enough crashes dji got sick of having to fix all the broken inspires it caused. no if's and's or but's about it.

I think this is a big victory for us i1 owners. we get to use all 100% of our battery's instead of just 11% and at 10% the inspire stood a good chance of crashing it's self.
 
this isn't directed at everyone, just the forum moderator and a few other negative nannys. I TOLD YOU SO. I got so much flack saying the auto land feature was a inherently bad idea causing more crashes then it saved and now they gave us the option to turn it off. believe me this feature will probably get removed all together or be just off and people will have to actually turn it on. the auto land caused enough crashes dji got sick of having to fix all the broken inspires it caused. no if's and's or but's about it.

I think this is a big victory for us i1 owners. we get to use all 100% of our battery's instead of just 11% and at 10% the inspire stood a good chance of crashing it's self.

I suppose you will name call me as one of the negative nannys...anyway...In terms of feature control, choice is always good.

The fact remains that using 100% of a lipos battery in flight will inevitably lead to problems putting your battery, aircraft, property and people on the ground at unnecessay risk. Its absolutely your right to make that choice. This nanny had been doing this a while now. I cannot advocate as to how you fly, you got to come to your own level of comfort and experience. I am just offering you a shortcut to safer flying. If you don't want to take it that's absolutely fine with me. Honestly not a problem. I had to learn too. Both my aircraft are still intact, never even a hard landing and I will still be on the ground long before 1st warning and shots in the bag.

Nans live long and are more fun :) Mine was anyway.

Edit: Aircraft rarely crash 'themselves,' pilots however do often.
 
  • Like
Reactions: PB30X
I tested it yesterday. With 'Smart Go Home' disabled at 10% the critical low battery message appears, the landing gear is lowered and the Inspire just lands where it is. It's still possible to correct it with stick input although I found I couldn't actually cancel the auto land procedure by pressing the cancel button on the iPad.
A red X appears on the left side of the screen which you can press. Also 2 buttons appear in the middle of screen for a choice of cancel RTH or proceed.
 
Hi all, done my batteries today, all went well until the 4th battery, when it got down to about 16% it started to wander around, it was in GPS mode
I made sure , It started to spin round slowly and at the same time to drift around .
I brought it back still in GPS and off it went again by this time the power suddenly dropped 2%, I landed .
I also noticed that the other batteries went from about 12% down to 2% in one jump! be ready for it!
Dave
 
Hi all, done my batteries today, all went well until the 4th battery, when it got down to about 16% it started to wander around, it was in GPS mode
I made sure , It started to spin round slowly and at the same time to drift around .
I brought it back still in GPS and off it went again by this time the power suddenly dropped 2%, I landed .
I also noticed that the other batteries went from about 12% down to 2% in one jump! be ready for it!
Dave
Hi Dave
You need to do a FULL charge followed by a FULL DISCHARGE (5% or less) without stopping! on each battery to overcome this sudden battery drop error.
 
I crashed mine while trying to fly my 30% battery down to 20% for the health of the battery. I was extremely conscious of the RTH while doing this. But to the point of my original question, does the aircraft start flying home during the 10 second warning or does it wait until after the 10 seconds have expired?

I'm trying to build a good case for my warranty claim and so if they changed this behavior with this latest update I feel it will strengthen my argument.

Thanks.
 
Hi Avaitor, Yes I did that, charged to 100% flew each battery non stop until it got down to about 12% then it suddenly dropped to 2% then I landed each time
I have now recharged back up to 100% they seem ok, may try again! don't know.
Dave
 
Hi Fab72, How high were you when you were doing your battery run down? I was about 6in off the ground on my last 30%!
just in case, I not sure about the 10 second warning, I cancelled mine straight away and carried on flying.
Dave
 
  • Like
Reactions: fab72
I crashed mine while trying to fly my 30% battery down to 20% for the health of the battery. I was extremely conscious of the RTH while doing this. But to the point of my original question, does the aircraft start flying home during the 10 second warning or does it wait until after the 10 seconds have expired?

I'm trying to build a good case for my warranty claim and so if they changed this behavior with this latest update I feel it will strengthen my argument.

Thanks.
I flew down 4 batteries on Friday & every 10 second warning I got had the bird stable. It did NOT start flying home. It was about the 5 sec mark I would cancel RTH. One point to remember though, I noticed the countdown had started at the moment the first words of the warning were uttered. In other words, I had 7 sec left to react at the end of the audible warning.
 
  • Like
Reactions: fab72
i think this is pretty relevant to this topic. this was the thread i started a few months ago about this subject. it got so fed up with people arguing with me i finally had the forum mod lock the topic. if you take the time to read some of the reply's it's kinda comical.

http://www.inspirepilots.com/threads/50-batt-life-to-3-instantly-experiment.3555/
The only comical thing about that thread was you asking to close it. There was lots of good advice in there and at times good discussion too. If you ask to close a thread because the argument was not going your way then that says a lot. As does your shout 'I told you so' earlier.

I suggest a step back. Battery warnings are given at different levels in order to for the operator to take action as there is danger approaching. That's why they are are called warnings. If 1st warning is ignored its the operators decision along with the consequence. 2nd warning causes an auto land because the operator did not take action. It keeps coming down to the the operators decision and consequences for ignoring warnings.

Like while driving a car and a red light comes on on the dash and the driver ignores it. Soon after it flashes fast, driver ignores it, soon after the car grinds to a halt, possibly in a location you do not want to be in. Driver jumps out of the car and beats the car with a branch. An episode of Fawlty Towers comes to mind. Lesson here is, heed warnings.

However, There are always improvements that can be made., which is what DJI have done. As reported 7 seconds is not long enough I feel. Also hovering low over the ground to drain batteries is a ludicrous way to get batteries below or to 5%. DJI should have a clearly defined procedure for this, unless I missed it, which is entirely possible!

Bottom line here is heed the warnings otherwise don't blame the hardware or logic. If one flys to the edge you will most likely fall over the edge.
 

Members online

No members online now.

Forum statistics

Threads
22,277
Messages
210,655
Members
34,323
Latest member
klrshopfitters