Disconnect from incoming phone call

deutschmavic · Feb 19, 2017

Hey guys,
Day two with the Mavic and absolutely fantastic. I did the firmware upgrades yesterday after my maiden flight and so far haven't seen any issues (or upgrades for that matter).

However, I was flying in my backyard today and got an incoming phone call which seems to have cause the controller to disconnect.

The drone did as it should and returned to home, although I guess I was a little too close to the house as it started to descend onto the roof. At the last second the controller reconnected (app was still disco'd) and I saved it. WHEW! Scary moment. Anyways, there is a lesson here:

Make sure your home point has AT LEAST a 3 meter(9 feet) diameter clearing due to GPS inaccuracies!

As for the app, I'm on a Samsung S7 so I expect it to be a little quirky. But would the app issues cause the controller to disconnect from the aircraft?

SteelFlyer · Feb 19, 2017

I don't have an Android phone so I can't answer specifically, but I have made it a practice to turn on my iPhone's "Do Not Disturb" mode to prevent calls and texts coming in while flying. Not sure if Android has something similar.....

Logger · Feb 19, 2017

Wouldn't have thought so. S7 edge here and I don't recall any Controller Aircraft disconnects in hundreds of flights. Apart from intentional flight beyong signal range with Litchi. Have at various times had numerous apps crashes in Litchi and DJIGo. Odd about the phone calls as mine is solid and takes them just fine, never effecting a thing apart from my concentration.

Good point about having home point in a clear area.This can be overcome by using precision landing and doing the ~10m up thing to record the visual map. But its not guaranteed, so a clear space and a solid RTH height is the best insurance.

deutschmavic · Feb 19, 2017

Logger said:
Good point about having home point in a clear area.This can be overcome by using precision landing and doing the ~10m up thing to record the visual map. But its not guaranteed, so a clear space and a solid RTH height is the best insurance.

Is this automatic if I rise to 10M right away? I've been taking off and hovering until home point is recorded. I thought this was the same?

msinger · Feb 19, 2017

Per the Mavic manual:

halley · Feb 19, 2017

As @msinger describes, the manual does not describe any requirement to take off quickly or super-slowly, nor to hover around 10 meters at all. My understanding is that the drone takes a series of photos downward, as it goes up the first ten meters. When it returns, it wants to align itself to match the photos as much as possible.

So I just take off at not-ludicrous speed and avoid maneuvering until I'm past 11 meters. I don't pause there unless I want to adjust focus or gimbal angle before continuing.

Have SOME kind of details close to the landing site for it to lock onto. I have used a couple stones, a large stick, the corner of a walking path, etc., but they also make nice convenient fabric landing pads with bright (H) helipad graphics on them.

Logger · Feb 19, 2017

deutschmavic said:
Is this automatic if I rise to 10M right away? I've been taking off and hovering until home point is recorded. I thought this was the same?

No that is a different process. The home point gets updated shortly after getting airborne at maybe 2 or 3 m, you need to continue a near vertical climb segment up toward 10m for the precision LDG to work. You can spin the drone while it climbs but don't move laterally. Even though the manual says "Take Off altitude must be greater than 10m " it definitely still precision lands with an initial climb of around half that. But is still good to use this as a guide.

Here is an example of it working with a climb to 6.4 metres (21 feet) only before flying off laterally.