DJI Mavic, Air and Mini Drones
Friendly, Helpful & Knowledgeable Community
Join Us Now

Flight mode Vs battery drain.

I use Sport mode all the time with the wide range of performance on the Spark...crawling in normal and really zipping in sport but..I think distance is the only question..you might be able to cover a distance of ground in sport mode and cover no distance in normal mode. Common sense tells you that you are limited in time while in Sport mode. You just don't get something for nothing as the saying goes. If you start thinking you can use Sport mode to maximize battery life..make sure you also get refresh and don't fly over water.
Maybe the 107 should include performance charts...but then..you have to take some of those with a grain of salt as well.
 
The faster you fly, more wind resistance, more heat for your batteries, wear for the motors and electronics. Normal mode is the most efficient way to fly. I just use Sport as needed for weather factors or following a vehicle that require that extra speed.

All that is true. But. But lets say you have a 1500ma hour battery, and it take 2amps just to hover. So you can hover for 3/4 hour. Total distance covered is zero. At 300m/min you use 2.5 amps (2 for lift, 0.5 for thrust). so you have 36mins flying time you can cover 10.8KM. Drag goes up as a square law so at At 600m/min you'd expect to use 4 amps (2 for lift, 2 for thrust) so get 22.5 mins flying time but you can cover 13.5 KM.. At 12000m/min it might be 10 amps (2 for lift and 8 for thrust) Only 9 minutes and time to cover 10.8KM.

THOSE NUMBERS ARE MADE UP FOR ILLUSTRATION. The question is what are the real numbers and what is the optimum speed. It turns out that that the something * speed_Squared + constant_for_lift isn't how things work in reality.
Did DJI set full speed in normal mode for maximum range ? Or does range still improve all the way to full speed in sport, what I've read suggests full speed in normal is close to optimum but you might go a little further in sport mode if you don't fly at top speed. If you fly too slowly all your battery power is used to keep the drone up and not enough to pull it along.
 
  • Like
Reactions: zeusfl
For those keen on testing, this was what I did for my testing a couple of years ago.
For lower speed, I use point of interest mode, and let it fly at constant speed (10kph, 20kph, 30kph) in a circle with 1 km circumference. 2 or 3 circles to average it. Then calculate %battery/km. I used automated mode so I don’t have to keep my fingers on the throttle all the time to maintain constant speed. Higher speed, fly straight 1km out and back a couple of times and calculate average. Do that on a still day. And you’ll need a few batteries. And do on a still day. Circle is easy and can be done in open field at lower altitude to minimize wind effects.
 
I will be pending on this topic because I am want to know the most efficient speed.
 
I will be pending on this topic because I am want to know the most efficient speed.
The best speed for maximum distance is going to be just slightly below max speed in P-GPS mode just like all the other DJI drones.
It will be so close to full speed and you'll rarely have totally still conditions so that the small difference doesn't matter.
 

DJI Drone Deals

New Threads

Members online

Forum statistics

Threads
131,005
Messages
1,558,779
Members
159,985
Latest member
kclarke2929