Crash with mini 2 after firmware update v1.04.0000

[Fil007]

I was flying a few days ago after the update and the drone lost contact with the satellites and just went crazy. As a result, it deviated from me and the battery ran out and fell into a swamp about 170-180 meters from me. Sometimes I had no control over him. I took it to the store where it was bought 2 months ago and they will send it for replacement. I wanted to use the guarantee, not the insurance. I'm not sure if they will respect my warranty and apply a flight record if there are specialists to review this record and explain to me if I can request a replacement warranty or if I have to use DJI insurance?

 

[Fil007]

Here is another flight on the same route for comparison. This flight was at v01.03.0000 before the update. You can see the difference in behavior after the update ...

 

[vindibona1]

Ето още един полет по същия маршрут за сравнение. Този полет беше с v01.03.0000 преди актуализацията. Можете да видите разликата в поведението след актуализацията...

I understand the words, but don't understand what you're trying to get across, exactly.

Я понимаю слова, но не понимаю, что именно вы пытаетесь донести.

 

[Yorkshire_Pud]

The log of the crash flight on PH's logviewer DJI Flight Log Viewer - PhantomHelp.com
Google translate

post #1 ) Pedry took off a few days after the update and the drone lost contact with the satellites and just went crazy. As a result, it deviated from me and the battery ran out and fell into a swamp about 170-180 meters from me. Sometimes I had no control over him. I took it to the store where it was bought 2 months ago and it will be sent for replacement. I wanted to use the guarantee, not the insurance. I'm not sure if they will respect my warranty and apply a flight record if there are specialists to review this record and explain to me if I can request a replacement warranty or if I have to use DJI insurance?

Post #2) Here is another flight on the same route for comparison. This flight was at v01.03.0000 before the update. You can see the difference in behavior after the update ...

 

[Fil007]

Разбирам думите, но не разбирам какво точно се опитваш да предадеш.

Разбирам слова, но не разбирам, че именно вие се опитвате да донесете.

I trying to show that flying the same route with two different firmware, the drone's behavior is very different, which makes me think it's because of the new firmware.

 

[DoomMeister]

I trying to show that flying the same route with two different firmware, the drone's behavior is very different, which makes me think it's because of the new firmware.

That could be, but the recorded telemetry from the flight tells its own story too. We have some very talented FlightLog analyzers here on the forum. They have helped many figure out what actually took place in a flight, and they are not paid employees of DJI.

 

[slup]

I trying to show that flying the same route with two different firmware, the drone's behavior is very different, which makes me think it's because of the new firmware.

One thing is quite clear no matter if this is due to the firmware or a hardware failure ... this is a valid warranty claim (if you're within that period), you shouldn't need to use your DJI Care for this.

Your drone just managed to record a HP before you took off ... there with 12 satellites locked & with a GPSLevel of 4 out of the best of 5 (HP only recorded when GPSLevel reaches 4)

But already 71sec into the flight the GPS related problem started ... there your drone was up on approx. 140ft height (so no way that something shielded the sky for the GPS chip ... & you went higher later with the same problem).

The GPS problems then escalated with several shorter drops to 0 in GPSLevel & longer periods where the drone went to full ATTI mode (no horizontal hold at all, drifts freely with the wind & no auto braking when releasing the sticks)

You ended up pretty far out with a couple disconnects which initiated failsafe RTH ... but the GPS problems continued, and in the end you ran out of battery and your drone lowbattery auto landed.

Blue graph=GPSLevel (0 worst, 5 best ... anything below 4 considered to be sketchy)
Red graph=Number of satellites locked
Black graph=Height above HP
Purple=Battery percent
Blue background=Ordinary GPS mode
Yellow background=ATTI mode
Pink background in the end (to the right)=Forced low battery auto landing
White stripes where no graphs are drawn=drone-RC disconnects

(Click on the chart to make it larger)


And this is what's seen in the log message stream, "GPS Position Mismatch" just goes on & on ...

 

[Yorkshire_Pud]

If you look at the phantomhelp page and slowly drag the slider across the screen and as best you can watch the artificial horizon thing it is quite informative. The artificial horizon seems to me to correspond fairly well to the stick inputs with, I think, an gusty wind that tended to be east to west.

Ignoring the projections around 15:28 and 19:00 do you think any of the rest of the track or any parts of the track are reasonably accurate? Presumably the end was.

With the crazy GPS I would certainly go with Slup's idea that this is a warranty issue and not a care refresh issue.
However I am curious, and this is not saying or implying you did anything wrong, how were you flying this? Meaning line of sight or using the video on the screen or the indicated position on the map?

 

[slup]

...The artificial horizon seems to me to correspond fairly well to the stick inputs with, I think, an gusty wind that tended to be east to west.

The drone obeyed the commanded stick inputs quite well... but the bad & intermittent horizontal position hold confused the OP ... for instance, during the yellow marked path below the drone mostly drifted with the wind while the OP occasionally made some confused yaw & elevator inputs. Eventually that lead to that he lost the connection & the failsafe RTH kicked in for the first time.

 

[Fil007]

One thing is quite clear no matter if this is due to the firmware or a hardware failure ... this is a valid warranty claim (if you're within that period), you shouldn't need to use your DJI Care for this.

Your drone just managed to record a HP before you took off ... there with 12 satellites locked & with a GPSLevel of 4 out of the best of 5 (HP only recorded when GPSLevel reaches 4)

But already 71sec into the flight the GPS related problem started ... there your drone was up on approx. 140ft height (so no way that something shielded the sky for the GPS chip ... & you went higher later with the same problem).

The GPS problems then escalated with several shorter drops to 0 in GPSLevel & longer periods where the drone went to full ATTI mode (no horizontal hold at all, drifts freely with the wind & no auto braking when releasing the sticks)

You ended up pretty far out with a couple disconnects which initiated failsafe RTH ... but the GPS problems continued, and in the end you ran out of battery and your drone lowbattery auto landed.

Blue graph=GPSLevel (0 worst, 5 best ... anything below 4 considered to be sketchy)
Red graph=Number of satellites locked
Black graph=Height above HP
Purple=Battery percent
Blue background=Ordinary GPS mode
Yellow background=ATTI mode
Pink background in the end (to the right)=Forced low battery auto landing
White stripes where no graphs are drawn=drone-RC disconnects

(Click on the chart to make it larger)
View attachment 146379

And this is what's seen in the log message stream, "GPS Position Mismatch" just goes on & on ...

View attachment 146380

Thanks for the comprehensive analysis. So to understand that in your opinion I should claim the guarantee and not the DJI care?

 

[slup]

Thanks for the comprehensive analysis. So to understand that in your opinion I should claim the guarantee and not the DJI care?

Correct...

 

[Fil007]

правилно...

I am interested and I would very much like to know what all this may be due to. Because if no one can explain the reason to me, I still remain convinced
1) That is due to the new firmware v1.04.0000 or
2) That it is a drone defect, but which one is defective? Any hardware or software?

 

[slup]

No one here will be able to explain the root cause for the lousy GPS performance ... that info isn't in the log.
But if it would be a firmware issue a lot of other Mini 2's would be affected by now, so... that points towards a hardware issue.

Make contact with DJI & take it from there...

 

[eEridani]

Thursday, March 31, 2022 19:34 UTC An M9.6 flare (R2 - Moderate Radio Blackout) occurred at 2:35 pm EDT (1835 UTC) March 31st, 2022. Geoelectric Field ...

Loss of radio contact (GPS or otherwise) is a good reason to always keep a drone where you can see it.

It'd be interesting to know if any stickers or films were applied to the drone, if a strobe was attached, etc.

 

[Fil007]

Thursday, March 31, 2022 19:34 UTC An M9.6 flare (R2 - Moderate Radio Blackout) occurred at 2:35 pm EDT (1835 UTC) March 31st, 2022. Geoelectric Field ...

Loss of radio contact (GPS or otherwise) is a good reason to always keep a drone where you can see it.

It'd be interesting to know if any stickers or films were applied to the drone, if a strobe was attached, etc.

The eruption largely explains things, and I tend to accept it. Regarding additional equipment or any other extras - I have absolutely nothing on the drone. I even peeled off the foot patches.

 

[slup]

The eruption largely explains things...

There's never been a single incident that have been attributed to flying in a high KP index event.

If it caused anything you probably wouldn't notice it.

KP's of 1-4 are completely safe. At a KP of 5, you might have a slightly larger positional error perhaps 1% of the time. At a KP of 6, you maybe lose an average of 5% of your locked satellites, at 7 & above you could start to notice disturbances.

Furthermore the effect of higher KP's are more prounanced at high latitudes and during night... neither fits this flight.

 

[eEridani]

There's never been a single incident that have been attributed to flying in a high KP index event.

If it caused anything you probably wouldn't notice it.

KP's of 1-4 are completely safe. At a KP of 5, you might have a slightly larger positional error perhaps 1% of the time. At a KP of 6, you maybe lose an average of 5% of your locked satellites, at 7 & above you could start to notice disturbances.

Furthermore the effect of higher KP's are more prounanced at high latitudes and during night... neither fits this flight.

Global estimate was 5, mid latitude estimates were 5 and 6 ... no estimates specifically for Greece. This was one of the strongest flares this solar cycle. Since the CME caused by flares are rarely homogenous, local variation is expected, some regions get hit harder.

ps: also worth noting the past few solar cycles have been rather negligible. This cycle is expected to be more active, and past history is not a great prognosticator of future events.

 

[Wild Drone Pilot]

I was flying a few days ago after the update and the drone lost contact with the satellites and just went crazy. As a result, it deviated from me and the battery ran out and fell into a swamp about 170-180 meters from me. Sometimes I had no control over him. I took it to the store where it was bought 2 months ago and they will send it for replacement. I wanted to use the guarantee, not the insurance. I'm not sure if they will respect my warranty and apply a flight record if there are specialists to review this record and explain to me if I can request a replacement warranty or if I have to use DJI insurance?

Sorry about your crash
I get a bad connection at around 800-900 feet

 

[Camino Ken]

Here is a good technical article on Geomagnetic storms effect on GPS position accuracy. Bottom line is it is not much unless you are flying at a very high latitude, I.e. close to the poles.

Assessing the Performance of GPS Precise Point Positioning Under Different Geomagnetic Storm Conditions during Solar Cycle 24 - PMC

The geomagnetic storm, which is an abnormal space weather phenomenon, can sometimes severely affect GPS signal propagation, thereby impacting the performance of GPS precise point positioning (PPP). However, the investigation of GPS PPP accuracy over ...

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

 

[eEridani]

My point above is that GPS becomes unreliable; could be accuracy doesn't suffer much IF you can maintain a stable connection to the satellites. The paper is clear and confirms my main point. During these events increased ionospheric noise is problematic and leads to higher levels of receiver phase lock error, thus they can play havoc: 56% loss of lock is not insignificant.

To quote the paper:

The ionospheric disturbances can not only lead to the deteriorated ionospheric correction but also to frequent cycle-slip occurrence. Statistical results show that the increased cycle-slip occurrence percentages are 13.04%, 56.52%, and 69.57% under moderate, intense, and super storms conditions, respectively, compared with those of quiet day.

The intense storm the paper discusses was G2; the March 31 storm was G3, a result of multiple ejections.