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First Flight: Indoors Or Not?

CC Rider

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My Mavic Pro arrived today. I've charged the batteries, controller, unpacked everything, etc., as well as having read and viewed every word or video on this aircraft I could find - which is a lot - for weeks now. I've gone through all of the manuals thoroughly and all of DJI's info on it and have been watching this forum since I ordered my Mavic on 1/5/17.

I don't have time to take it up outside right now (I'm self-employed and still working) and evening is fast approaching. You folks know how the Mavic actually handles. Would you endorse or recommend against me taking it up for the first time inside in Tripod mode in a relatively large room in my house with a 20 foot ceiling?

One of the reasons I wanted the Mavic was because of how well it handles indoors, so should I take it on its maiden voyage indoors tonight or be patient and wait until tomorrow for an outdoor first flight?
 
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NO.
I personally would not recommend flying the Mavic indoor ever unless we one day get manually selectable ATTI mode.
 
This could turn into a very expensive mistake. I'd personally wait until an outdoor flight is possible.
 
I hear you both, loud and clear. And I will follow the advice from both of you gentlemen.

I've finally learned - sometimes the hard way - that haste usually DOES make waste. And I sure would hate to waste such a marvelous flying machine. My Father taught me many things before he passed, and one was to never be too proud to reach out to others who know more about a subject than I do to avoid unexpected surprises. In essence, be smart enough to surround yourself with good people. So I'll just re-read the manuals tonight, check to see if there any videos out there on the Mavic Pro that I've missed, and be patient to fly it until tomorrow when the pressure is off of me.

Thanks to both of you for helping me avoid what probably would have been a costly, possibly dangerous, lesson. You cooled my jets just when I needed it.
 
Same again - no is the advice. I had the same dilemma about wanting to fly it straight away and took the advice of others not to do it indoors as a first flight. It seems that 90% of all crashes happen in doors..... that's not a real statistic!


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I gotcha. 'No' is the way to go. And I'll bet your stats have some merit at least. I do know that based upon everything I've seen and read about drone crashes, fly aways, etc., that even though most people are real quick to blame the drone (which they may not have studied very well), I'd say at least 90% of the time its easily operator error or unfamiliarity with the the aircraft and its systems. For the most part, these machines do exactly what they were designed and engineered to do. It's people who are the unknown variable in the mix that lead to most drone accidents.
 
**** NO! Patience young grasshopper.

LOL! Yes, master san. That old wise one would probably have said, "Grab the Mavic from my hand, grasshopper. When you can, it will be time for you to fly!"
 
Can you fly indoors safely and carefully if you turn off the bottom sensors and front sensors? Wouldn't that essentially put the craft into ATTI mode? Or is there concern that if a GPS lock suddenly takes hold while indoors, the craft will move uncontrollably?
 
My first several flights were in my basement. It is no big deal, as long as you are careful and know all the controls. Just make sure your area is well lit and you have a patterned rug or floor. Then take off to about 2 - 3 feet and wait until you see OPTI on the screen. If you see OPTI, you're good to go and can start maneuvering . No need for beginner or tripod mode. If no OPTI, land immediately and wait to go outside. Or turn on more lights.
 
Winter + Temptations + Youtube of people flying indoors = crashes.

Find a park free of trees, people and pets. You want to learn the basics in an open field free of obstructions and distractions.

Can you fly indoors safely and carefully if you turn off the bottom sensors and front sensors? Wouldn't that essentially put the craft into ATTI mode? Or is there concern that if a GPS lock suddenly takes hold while indoors, the craft will move uncontrollably?
Due to lack of GPS, Indoors requires the bottom sensors (VPS - vision positioning sensors) for positioning. The belly of the mavic has sonar to control height and a vision system to control positioning. If you have poor light/lack of pattern or areas that do no reflect sound, then the VPS will not work properly and your Mavic will be in FULL ATTI. This means a draft from an open window can cause the mavic to drift into the wall. If your craft picks up GPS then it will switch to GPS only if the VPS becomes unreliable (poor lighting etc). The issue with GPS locking indoors is when a failsafe is triggered for RTH. If the craft thinks its further than 5m away from the 'new and possibly falsely established home point' and a failsafe is triggered (loss of connection, dead battery in controller etc), then the craft may shoot into the ceiling to attempt to RTH.
The other danger of GPS locking in the house is that signal reliability will be poor. Sats dropping in and out will drop will cause the mavic to switch between ATTI and GPS modes and if the user, doesn't notice, he/she will go ATTI into the wall.
 
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None of those scenarios sounds appealing to me. They all sound about as appealing as a root canal. Although I do believe the Mavic is an exceptional flying machine capable of many things, it only makes sense to take it up for the first time where I have room for error or the unexpected to happen, including the possibility of even having purchased a faulty unit (although I doubt it!) However, it would be bad to find that out confined indoors with it! Tomorrow will be here in a few hours. An early morning flight is in my forecast, definitely before the rain hits my area in the early afternoon.

Thanks for all of the feedback. I really appreciate it.
 
I did exactly this and did end up damaging back set of props....lesson learnt (the hard way) the Mavic decided it was going to drift into a whiteboard and I wasn't used to the controls...lucky not more damage occurred..
 
I am so glad I listened to everyone's advice yesterday and was patient to fly my new Mavic today outside instead of indoors last night as I asked you good people about (and was wisely advised against doing). I got up this morning, waited to go out in between an untimely bout of rain showers, and finally got a flight in before worse weather came in.

Simply put, the Mavic Pro is a dream to fly. It is a nimble, ultra-responsive, pleasurable aircraft to pilot, as most of you know better than me. I started out today in beginner mode just in case my setup was flawed or my new machine was. However, in no time I was ready to push beyond that meager 98 foot distance limit and shifted into full-tilt flying mode.

I was flying on my family's very flat, totally unobstructed corn/soybean fields that are a mile long and nearly as wide. The fields are surrounded by woodlands and end at a river's edge, so I had plenty of territory to roam around in and explore for a first flight run through. In no time the drone was nearly a mile away from me and I was easily hovering above my sister's and nephew's houses in the far distance with no troubles. I quickly realized that the relatively small size of the Mavic meant easily losing it - at least for me - in the expansive sky and needing to trust and rely on my transmitted telemetry data, video feed, and bearings to pilot the craft at that distance, make it go where I wanted it to, and more importantly to be able to bring it back in.

I know I was used to the much larger, more obvious shape of my Typhoon H flying through the sky as compared to the Mavic's more subtle profile. The Typhoon H has 6 rotors on fairly long, extendable arms, each with a colorful pulsating light; it stands quite high, is considerably larger than the Mavic, and is hard to miss in the sky even at a distance, especially with the retractable landing gear down. The Mavic Pro is a bird of a completely different feather.

DJI provided everything one needs in their controller for the Mavic to fly this little marvel appropriately. However - and this may be a false first impression - I do think one has to be a better drone pilot to fly the Mavic Pro as opposed to the Typhoon H, in part due to its relatively diminutive size, but also because of the power and "attitude" the Mavic has, both of which I like very much.

In short, I had a great first day's flight with my new Mavic Pro and can't wait to take it up again. I can see how it will fit in well in my arsenal to help suit my needs with all of its unique abilities, qualities and design. I'm VERY glad I acquired one. Now it's time to get inside of it, tweak the controls/camera to my liking, and really learn how to fly it and utilize all it has to offer.

Thanks, again, for the advice I received on my question posted here. I still have a Mavic because of it.
 
Winter + Temptations + Youtube of people flying indoors = crashes.

Find a park free of trees, people and pets. You want to learn the basics in an open field free of obstructions and distractions.


Due to lack of GPS, Indoors requires the bottom sensors (VPS - vision positioning sensors) for positioning. The belly of the mavic has sonar to control height and a vision system to control positioning. If you have poor light/lack of pattern or areas that do no reflect sound, then the VPS will not work properly and your Mavic will be in FULL ATTI. This means a draft from an open window can cause the mavic to drift into the wall. If your craft picks up GPS then it will switch to GPS only if the VPS becomes unreliable (poor lighting etc). The issue with GPS locking indoors is when a failsafe is triggered for RTH. If the craft thinks its further than 5m away from the 'new and possibly falsely established home point' and a failsafe is triggered (loss of connection, dead battery in controller etc), then the craft may shoot into the ceiling to attempt to RTH.
The other danger of GPS locking in the house is that signal reliability will be poor. Sats dropping in and out will drop will cause the mavic to switch between ATTI and GPS modes and if the user, doesn't notice, he/she will go ATTI into the wall.

I truly think I would break down and cry if that happened to my on order yet to arrive Mavic Pro. This is all great advice!


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I have had my mavic for a month and flew it inside for the first time on the weekend. And my first crash!! I'm not sure why (probably no GPS signal) but almost immediately after I elevated from the floor it slowly went backwards, and hit the wall before I was able to move it forward. During the crash it came down and cut my foot while the props were still spinning. Luckily no damage other than a destroyed prop, and I have a couple of spare sets. This was the crash experience I had to have to realise that I should NEVER fly indoors again. There's enough space outside, and the scenery looks a lot better.
 
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Sounds like a real bad scene to have pop up on you out of the blue. I so wanted to fly my Mavic indoors, but was advised against it in this thread I started so I didn't do it. But the temptation is still there.

Sorry for your luck and for the accident, but happily your craft was not seriously damaged and neither were you. Your tale should be heard by others, too, who think the Mavic HAS to be flown indoors!

Good luck to you, hope the foot heals soon (ouch!), and enjoy the skies!
 
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I have had my mavic for a month and flew it inside for the first time on the weekend. And my first crash!! I'm not sure why (probably no GPS signal) but almost immediately after I elevated from the floor it slowly went backwards, and hit the wall before I was able to move it forward. During the crash it came down and cut my foot while the props were still spinning. Luckily no damage other than a destroyed prop, and I have a couple of spare sets. This was the crash experience I had to have to realise that I should NEVER fly indoors again. There's enough space outside, and the scenery looks a lot better.
Yep. Same here. This has happened twice (I know, time to stop flying indoors -- but it's dark out!!).

In both cases, the Mavic switched to ATTI mode and once in that mode it would NOT respond to my inputs. I saw it drifting backwards into the wall and so I did full pitch forward and the drone did not respond to my inputs. After banging rear rotors against the wall for a few seconds it regained OPTI mode and I was able to land it. One lesson specific to this drone right now is not to fly without GPS fix. Besides that, I think DJI could do better to address the issues of loosing control of the drone during this mode switches ending up in ATTI.
 
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