Buy Mavic Without Controller?

[kenwae]

I purchased a Mavic only from Advexure. Quite satisfied with them....

 

[jmitteco]

How did you lose it?

In a nutshell, I was flying over coral reefs a few hundred feet offshore.
I was at the turnaround point of my flight plan, which was about 900 feet from the Home Point. Not far.
I turned the Mavic around & was heading back in the direction of the Home Point at about 30% battery.
Filming on the way back home.
At 19% battery, the RTH warning came up.
I was 550 from the Home Point & headed in the Home direction. I knew I had enough battery to finish & get home so I cancelled the RTH.
At about 14% battery, I was directly in front of my Home Point where I intended to turn, come home & land. I was about 550 feet from the Home Point.
I tried to turn the Mavic (yaw) with the left joy Stick & no result. It was not responding.
That’s about when the screen went black on my iPhone.
It all went very fast from this point.
I immediately hit the Return To Home button on the controller & again no response from the Mavic.
The Joy Sticks didn’t appear to be working, no screen & no maps.
I tried to yaw again but no response.
I lost visual on the drone at this point & had no maps.
According to the Flight Record, it looked like the drone paused when I hit the RTH button.
I kept trying to turn the drone but was only able to go forward. You can see it would not turn, from the flight record. It would only go forward.
I hit the RTH button several times & it didn't respond.
It was not responding to the controller at all.
It started to descend on it's own at that point with 12% battery left. It was about 650 feet from shore.

The next thing I knew, my Mavic landed in about 30 feet of water with 7% battery left & there was nothing I could do about it.

We did dive searches & scanned the area shoreline & even flyered the local fishermen with a reward & couldn't recover the drone.

Is this partially my fault? I'd say probably but I don't understand why the drone quit responding to the remote. I consider that to be DJI issue. Is the remote faulty?

I paid for the DJI Care Refresh which is supposed to cover this if I recover the drone with no questions asked.
If you don't recover the drone you have to open up a case & if DJI deems it "pilot error" they won't replace it.
I don't see what the difference is. DJI knows from the flight record that it went down in salt water & is not good again.
What kills me is knowing that for $30. a year I could've had the State Farm insurance that would pay out the total cost of the drone. But I didn't know about that until after the fact.

I would never buy the DJI Care Refresh again. I feel like it was a rip-off.

 

[Advexure]

I'm dealing with this situation right now & totally angry with DJI.
I lost my drone to the Caribbean sea in July. I paid for Care Refresh but couldn't recover the drone.
So they wouldn't honor the Care Refresh.
Everyone keeps telling me DJI would at least offer me a discount to replace the drone, even the DJI customer service person who opened my case told me they would but they haven't.
Not only that but DJI said it would take 3 days to analyze the flight records & logs & it took them more than 3 weeks. Now it's been 1 1/2 moths & still no offer.
I'd buy a new Mavic tomorrow if they would offer me a 15% discount as incentive.
I've been a big supporter of DJI products but they're losing me quickly.

Sorry to hear about your situation. Hopefully DJI will resolve your situation soon. If you purchased through an Authorized Dealer I would advise them of the situation so that they can work with DJI from their end to assist you in this case. Hopeful you will see a proper outcome soon.

 

[jmitteco]

Sorry to hear about your situation. Hopefully DJI will resolve your situation soon. If you purchased through an Authorized Dealer I would advise them of the situation so that they can work with DJI from their end to assist you in this case. Hopeful you will see a proper outcome soon.

Thanks. I bought from B & H & have had fantastic experience with them for decades.

The problem is I live in the Caribbean & it's not easy to get things here.
I'm going up to the states next week & was hoping to have this resolved by now so I can buy a new drone & have it delivered while I'm there & carry it back with me. But DJI has dinked around so long with this, for 1 1/2 months now & they've left me hanging & inconvenienced.
I'm pissed off at the way they've dealt with me. I've been a supportive customer but they're turning me.
My window of buying a drone from them is closing.

 

[Ian in London]

In a nutshell, I was flying over coral reefs a few hundred feet offshore.
I was at the turnaround point of my flight plan, which was about 900 feet from the Home Point. Not far.
I turned the Mavic around & was heading back in the direction of the Home Point at about 30% battery.
Filming on the way back home.
At 19% battery, the RTH warning came up.
I was 550 from the Home Point & headed in the Home direction. I knew I had enough battery to finish & get home so I cancelled the RTH.
At about 14% battery, I was directly in front of my Home Point where I intended to turn, come home & land. I was about 550 feet from the Home Point.
I tried to turn the Mavic (yaw) with the left joy Stick & no result. It was not responding.
That’s about when the screen went black on my iPhone.
It all went very fast from this point.
I immediately hit the Return To Home button on the controller & again no response from the Mavic.
The Joy Sticks didn’t appear to be working, no screen & no maps.
I tried to yaw again but no response.
I lost visual on the drone at this point & had no maps.
According to the Flight Record, it looked like the drone paused when I hit the RTH button.
I kept trying to turn the drone but was only able to go forward. You can see it would not turn, from the flight record. It would only go forward.
I hit the RTH button several times & it didn't respond.
It was not responding to the controller at all.
It started to descend on it's own at that point with 12% battery left. It was about 650 feet from shore.

The next thing I knew, my Mavic landed in about 30 feet of water with 7% battery left & there was nothing I could do about it.

We did dive searches & scanned the area shoreline & even flyered the local fishermen with a reward & couldn't recover the drone.

Is this partially my fault? I'd say probably but I don't understand why the drone quit responding to the remote. I consider that to be DJI issue. Is the remote faulty?

I paid for the DJI Care Refresh which is supposed to cover this if I recover the drone with no questions asked.
If you don't recover the drone you have to open up a case & if DJI deems it "pilot error" they won't replace it.
I don't see what the difference is. DJI knows from the flight record that it went down in salt water & is not good again.
What kills me is knowing that for $30. a year I could've had the State Farm insurance that would pay out the total cost of the drone. But I didn't know about that until after the fact.

I would never buy the DJI Care Refresh again. I feel like it was a rip-off.

I feel really sorry for you mate. This happened to me too when I lost my drone down near Dover. If you can't produce the drone body, DJI will rarely honour the Care Refresh. It looks to me like you lost contact with your Mavic just as it was hitting its Critical Battery point when it goes into Auto-Land.

I made two videos on youtube about my loss; not to generate money (you only get around $1 per 1,000 views! ) but A, to truly work out what went wrong and how the Mavic reposinds as the battery wears down, and B, to warn others so they don't make the same mistakes I did.... The positive comments cheered me up, I did buy another Mavic, and I moved on. I hope you will too fella; losing such an expensive toy is a prety nasty experience. Trying to get meangingful care out of DJI can be like pushing water up hill...

Cheers,

Ian
YouTube / Ian in London