Drifting

[B Dog]

I had a problem today while flying a demo indoors. The unit was fully calibrated and flew well for the first 5 minutes at about 4 feet off the floor. I raised it up beyond 6 ft to show what it would respond like when it was out of ground proximity range. (there was no GPS signal in this building). The unit started to drift in Atti mode as you would expect so after flying it for a minute I dropped it back down to about 2 feet off the floor but the unit would not stabilize and kept drifting at a fair rate. I tried to control it and then did a forced landing by dropping the throttle. I took off after a short period and it did the same thing so I dropped it to the ground again. It skidded to a stop and was ok. I'm not sure if it started to pick up some GPS signal and that confused it but it would not use the visual/sonic sensors to properly stabilize even though it was in close proximity to the floor and was working just fine during the first 5 minutes. I have not reported this to DJI yet but I plan to.

B

 

[Tahoejmfc]

If you are having a problem with drift or any issue, and you landed, the first thing you should do is restart your system. You should not be flying again on the same power cycle.

 

[B Dog]

What type of floor where you flying over? The more contrast in the floor, the better the optical position hold will work. Some floor types (like carpet) can mess with the sensor.

It was a smooth wood grain gym floor. It worked perfectly for the first flight. I have now played back the flight log and it shows sudden jumps in position which are not correct. It jumps like 120 feet when in reality I moved 20 ft. So it's not like it just couldn't lock on the visual pattern, it thought it was moving drastically.

 

[damoncooper]

Optical sensors aren't used higher than a 4 feet I believe?

 

[blade strike]

If you are having a problem with drift or any issue, and you landed, the first thing you should do is restart your system. You should not be flying again on the same power cycle.

I would agree.. If you feel anything wrong with the craft land her and reboot and see if the problem goes away.

 

[blade strike]

Optical sensors aren't used higher than a 4 feet I believe?

Spec say 2.5m, I have seen it active all the way up to 9ft under certain conditions. You will know when the little sonar icon goes grey, that it's no longer being used.

 

[lrwskyfilms]

little sonar icon goes grey, that it's no longer being used.

Great info thanks.