Did not fly away but I could've lost it and I'm not sure why...

[Airbag888]

So I was doing my usual flight to check my property about 500m away. I fly from a rooftop, never a signal issue at about 40-50m above ground level. I'm not in an urban location.
I've done that tons of times since I got the mini.

Today I'm headed out, line of sight straight line to the drone and as it's going (S mode, battery 96% at take off) I just lose all signal (Galaxy S7 edge exynos phone, 1.5.0 latest DJI fly installed)
For about 6 mins I get no connection back at all.. I can see the drone still (it's about 120m away) but it's just hovering in place no change. Panicking a bit I end up double pressing the RTH button at which point I get the RTH annoying beep over and over but now I lost sight of it completely.

As I go downstairs to take my car and go to where it was last seen on the map I hear it above my head about to land at which point I swerve it to me at ground level BUT my RC was STILL saying it had no connection at all.. ?

SOOOOOO a few things:

1. There's a chance the control was still working even though the display was basically what you see when the drone is off
2. Looking at the logs it didn't pop anything about signal issues but it did say I had 10 GPS then 11 which is when it stopped. I realise that's low now, usually I get ~15 GPS sats where I fly so I definitely will keep an eye on that next time

But at the end of the day what's the deal??

Usually when I lose signal within 11 secs the drone turns around to RTH
Did it RTH because it got the remote's RTH signal or because I was in the house definitely out of connection for 25secs
But most of all why did it happen at all? Low GPS sats? I can understand if it would make the drone drift but lose all signal.. nope

Anyway a bit scared now to fly and would love to hear opinions/theories on what happened. Thanks!



If you guys want any logs let me know.

I saw mention that it could be an issue between RC and phone.. In fact after I got the mini back I still had nothing on screen until I turned off the RC and turned it back on..
Would anyone advise I disconnect the USB cable and reconnect if that happens again??

 

[slup]

All this sounds as if your phone disconnected from the RC or the app crashed ... not a disconnect between RC & Mini. That should be possible to see on the RC by means of the RC battery leds (they will flash if a disconnect between RC & Mini if I'm remembering correctly)

The failsafe action should step in if the RC loses connection with the Mini during 11sec ... so your detour through the house was probably the reason for the RTH.

The logs will only show something during the time the app were up & running & the phone connected to the RC & the RC to the Mini ... so will most probably not show anything during that period I'm afraid.

 

[Airbag888]

All this sounds as if your phone disconnected from the RC or the app crashed ... not a disconnect between RC & Mini. That should be possible to see on the RC by means of the RC battery leds (they will flash if a disconnect between RC & Mini if I'm remembering correctly)

The failsafe action should step in if the RC loses connection with the Mini during 11sec ... so your detour through the house was probably the reason for the RTH.

The logs will only show something during the time the app were up & running & the phone connected to the RC & the RC to the Mini ... so will most probably not show anything during that period I'm afraid.

You're likely right. I ran the logs through airdata and it showed perfect connection throughout and in fact since I pressed the RTH button well before going in the house it was on its way back already at that stage.

The blinking lights are a good check thank you for that tip

And yes I do think something went awry with the app. I wonder though, it's my first 2-3 flights with the new 1.5.0 DJI Fly app, if the new version has some problem or a 'freak out owner' mode.

I know the Exynos S7E has an issue where if you go in flight mode after opening the app the flight mode cannot be changed (it is stuck at whatever it is at or shows N/A) I wonder if that's another one of those issues linked to the S7E

I also wonder if I could rollback to the previous version ??


Anyway TLDR: If your FPV goes black and it says you're disconnected but your lights on the RC are solid:
Try to close and reopen the APP or push back on your stick after getting to the right altitude or trigger a RTH

 

[bigswifty]

I just lose all signal (Galaxy S7 edge exynos phone, 1.5.0 latest DJI fly installed)

And this is why (to me) the money spent on something in the M2 platform is so worth it. App-only telemetry is a major potential fail point IMO.

 

[big9erfan]

This sounds like something that happened to me and my Mini. I was flying in a new location, but not something I was concerned about the surroundings. 100' away or so the visuals go dark and I get a message saying that it had lost connection. At first I thought it lost connection with the drone, but moving the sticks, the drone was responding as expected. I flew it back and landed. Unplugged the controller & plugged back in, restarted the app and everything was fine and I haven't had that issue again and I've flown for about an hour since.

 

[Airbag888]

This sounds like something that happened to me and my Mini. I was flying in a new location, but not something I was concerned about the surroundings. 100' away or so the visuals go dark and I get a message saying that it had lost connection. At first I thought it lost connection with the drone, but moving the sticks, the drone was responding as expected. I flew it back and landed. Unplugged the controller & plugged back in, restarted the app and everything was fine and I haven't had that issue again and I've flown for about an hour since.

Yep.. usually when I get RC lost it's very short (couple seconds) so I keep pushing my sticks in the direction I want to go. This time lost connection and saw that the drone was still going so I thought it'll come back.

If that happens again I'll
1. check the lights on the RC (fixed means still connected)
2. close and reopen the app
3. disconnect and reconnect the cable
4. if the above fails I know I can double press the RTH button

 

[Airbag888]

And this is why (to me) the money spent on something in the M2 platform is so worth it. App-only telemetry is a major potential fail point IMO.

Well I realised after the fact that I had 1 telemetry: the battery indicator on the RC were solid But yeah more would've been good too. On the flip side you feel 1 way about losing a USD 400 drone and another for a USD 1500+ Although tbf my wife would've killed me either way and dead is dead ?