Crashed Mavic - Gimbal no longer stable, but, can I fly with clamp on to still get stable shot?

[TravisD]

Hey All,

I flew this badboy into a tree (like a fool), had it reversing for an awesome shot but was a bit careless in my surroundings. Lesson learnt, wallet burnt.

I plan to send it in for repair, but in the interim, I am curious if there is much danger to keeping the gimbal clamp on during flight?

Essentially, everything on the Drone seems totally fine other than the Gimbal. Upon start up, it just doesn't move at all, and you can see the image is super shakey on the phone. Having the clamp on keeps it pointing straight, so I was wondering if this is okay?

Would love for some advice - I'm totally aware it's not ideal, I'm just wondering if it'd cause any further damage prior to getting it repaired.

Also, do you know if post-repair if the drones work just like brand new, or is it sort of like an old car, snowball effect, eventually more problems will occur ect? Just wondering if it's worth just buying a new one later once the idea of the $$ has left my brain versus repairing.

Apologies in advance if this information is located somewhere else on this forum - I was unable to find it.

Thanks in advance!

 

[Advexure]

Hi Travis - Sorry to hear about your incident. I would be careful keeping the gimbal clamp on if the gimbal motors are working. Keeping the clamp on while the unit is powered on and the motors active could burn out the motors on the gimbal. If the gimbal is limp that I'd say keeping the lock on is perfectly fine.

Did you have DJI Care Refresh on this unit? Typically you'll see them completely swap out your aircraft with a new or refurbished unit. You really should not worry a snowball effect if you're sending that in for an authorized repair. If you were to have any issues after the repair it would still be covered under warranty but again, most likely you'd be receiving a completely different unit.

Hope this information helps and I hope your repair process is quick and smooth.

Mike

 

[TravisD]

Thank you a lot for your response. The gimbal did seem limp, you know how normally on start-up, the props move a bit, and the gimbal centres? On start-up after the crash, the props do their thing, but the gimbal just does nothing.

Unfortunately, no. Funny thing is, I was JUST about to purchase it prior to flight, but figured it was a fairly open area out at the farm --- WRONG. Haha. I plan to go via EE Hobbies out of Melbourne, Australia. They seem to be the only Authorised Repair spot in Australia, based off the DJI site.

 

[Former Member]

You said the image on the phone is super shaky, is that during flight after your crash? If you can see a "super shaky" image on the phone after it starts up but before you fly it, it means that there is life in the gimbal and flying with the gimbal clamp on can overload your gimbal and gimbal board. You will probably get gimbal overload messages, the motors or gimbal board could overheat, and then you could have a whole new set of problems.

Try starting it up, let it sit for a minute or two, then feel the motors on your gimbal and try moving it around a little bit with your fingers. If any of them are twitching, buzzing or getting hot, its time to send it in. Probably just needs a ribbon flat cable.

 

[Kilrah]

Flying with the clamp will not give you a "stable" shot at all, you'll see all airframe movements, it's jsut as useless as with a broken gimbal.

 

[bill1992]

Someone else might be able to confirm this but IF you decide to fly with the clamp on, maybe put the gimble mode (dji go 4 app) to be fpv rather than follow. Obviously probably better off to just not use it but I feel like this would be the better option as the gimble in fpv mode is fixed to the aircrafts motion rather than smooth in follow mode.