Does Mavic limit its ability to hold position?

[MikeyNick]

I'm not going to make any claims since this is the first time it's happened (though I haven't been in situations that would have reproduced it very well previously), but I noticed some odd behavior the other day... I went to a forest to do a mix of filming the tree canopy as well as some tripod-mode low trail flying. The trail flying was great. A tiny bit nerve wracking as there had just been some rain and there were decent sized puddles on the trail, and it was a fairly narrow trail, but i went nice and slow and steady and watched the drone and not the camera feed so i didn't accidentally drift to the side.

However, once I got above the tree canopy, I realized just how windy it was if you weren't protected by all the trees. It was mostly fine, I got some large wind velocity warnings, took it back in when gusts were particularly bad. At one point I had it above the tree canopy and was trying to mess with some camera settings. I look back up and the mavic is no longer where I left it hovering. I look down at the map view and it has drifted several hundred feet and continuing to drift. I realize there's quite a heavy gust of wind. The Mavic seems incapable of holding it's position in the gust of wind. In fear of it floating away, I switched into sport mode and manually flew it back to where I started the hover. It was no walk in the park for the Mavic, but it was obvious that it had the capability to fight the wind when I manually flew it in sport mode.

So I'm wondering if the Mavic will not use it's full power potential to keep itself stabilized? It seemed content to just keep drifting, and wasn't until I manually engaged in sports mode and flew it back myself that it could deal with the wind. I would hope that the autonomous systems would use whatever power necessary/possible to keep it where it is. I wonder if the autonomous position hold is more aggressive while in sports mode? i.e. if I'd left it hovering in sports mode, maybe it would have been more aggressive in holding its position automatically and not drifted?

Anyway, just curious if anyone else has experienced this or what you think.

This was on .700 firmware with GO4 4.0.7 on android

 

[mark_t]

When in Sports mode, the object avoidance system is turned off and the Mavic is allowed to use more extreme pitch and roll angles to maintain position and move.

What you experienced was Mavic reaching the limits of the angles allowed while keeping object avoidance usable, so yes, you should have found position hold more able to resist the wind when in Sports mode.

 

[MikeyNick]

Ah ****, that's super obvious now that I think of it. I bet it even would have been fine in standard mode but with obstacle avoidance turned off. Thanks!

 

[waylander]

Hi Mikeynick

I have flow in very windy conditions, and I find that the warnings for high wind velocity do appear quite often, in Standard mode it is quite possible to be moving backwards when attempting to fly head on into a strong wind, even though you might have the left stick pushed hard forwards. The power available to the props in Standard flight mode is somewhat limited regardless of whether or not you have Visual Positioning and Obstacle Check turned On or Off.
But as you correctly observe Sport mode will overcome some very windy conditions and will get you back home provided you act quickly before battery power gets too low.

I flew in strong wind over the weekend in Tri-Pod mode and she did really well, I'll post some video if you would like to see how windy it was.

Regards
Waylander

 

[Big Fil]

You could have also had a bad GPS lock and been dropped into ATTI mode. The aircraft will drift in ATTI mode unless manually held in position.

 

[MikeyNick]

You could have also had a bad GPS lock and been dropped into ATTI mode. The aircraft will drift in ATTI mode unless manually held in position.

I'm convinced it was standard flight mode not being able to handle the wind. There wasn't a cloud in the sky and I was above the tallest objects (trees) for miles (it's a big forest), so there's no way I would have lost GPS after take off (and yes I ensured I had good GPS health and a home point recorded)

 

[MDSH]

I'm convinced it was standard flight mode not being able to handle the wind.

Why not upload the flight logs?

 

[waylander]

Hi All
Sorry if this has been done already, but can anyone answer this question.

With the new firmware/software upgrade DJI is threatening to lanuch soon, which will force you to register online or whatever, why can't you simply stay on the software version that you already have, and the DJI Go 4 app as it is now...?

What is to force you to upgrade....?

Waylander

 

[dwallersv]

Hi Mikeynick

I have flow in very windy conditions, and I find that the warnings for high wind velocity do appear quite often, in Standard mode it is quite possible to be moving backwards when attempting to fly head on into a strong wind, even though you might have the left stick pushed hard forwards. The power available to the props in Standard flight mode is somewhat limited regardless of whether or not you have Visual Positioning and Obstacle Check turned On or Off.

Are you sure of this -- i.e. do you have any independent information that this is actually the design of the control system?

I'm highly skeptical. It seems an exceedingly poor design. While Obviously the maximum ground speed is limited in P mode, it doesn't make sense that the stability control would similarly be limited when the aircraft has the capability in terms of power/thrust to hold position.

Shouldn't have to switch to S mode to be able to hold position in stronger winds. Also, this is contrary to my experience with my P4, which could hold position in P or S mode in very strong, gusty winds that exceeded P mode groundspeed.

 

[dwallersv]

You could have also had a bad GPS lock and been dropped into ATTI mode. The aircraft will drift in ATTI mode unless manually held in position.

I think this far more likely. Or, something wrong with the aircraft.

 

[waylander]

Are you sure of this -- i.e. do you have any independent information that this is actually the design of the control system?

I'm highly skeptical. It seems an exceedingly poor design. While Obviously the maximum ground speed is limited in P mode, it doesn't make sense that the stability control would similarly be limited when the aircraft has the capability in terms of power/thrust to hold position.

Shouldn't have to switch to S mode to be able to hold position in stronger winds. Also, this is contrary to my experience with my P4, which could hold position in P or S mode in very strong, gusty winds that exceeded P mode groundspeed.

Yep.... perhaps you have not flown into a strong enough head wind...? On occasion when it is really windy my Mavic has not been able to make head way into the wind, and slowly drifted backwards, until I selected sport mode, sceptical....? well it is real easy to prove, wait until it is really windy, say 25 Knots or more and give it a try.

And yes I had a P2 for a couple of years and still have and fly my P3P, generally the P3P could make head way into strong wind in P-mode, but I have had to go into Atti mode to bring her back on odd occasions, try it prove me wrong..
Waylander