Fly inside a cave?

[Eric]

Can the Mavic fly inside a cave? I know it will lose GPS signal quickly but as long as the drone doesn't act crazy I can fly it manually. I don't plan on flying it in far, may 100' from the opening where the light basically ends.

 

[Egika]

Let's say: the Mavic surely can fly inside a cave.
If you can fly it there? Dunno

 

[msinger]

It would be technically possible to do it. Without GPS, you'll be flying in ATTI mode and the sensors will most likely be disabled due to the low lighting conditions.

 

[DerekG]

^^^^Yup - plus if the rocks are high in metallic content you might get a compass error.

Once you get into the low light of the cave you'll have the IMU keeping it level and the barometer keeping the altitude roughly - Otherwise you will be flying fully manual... If you have experience flying other quads / aircraft you should be fine as long as you are mindful of drifting

 

[BudWalker]

Too bad the Mavic can't be switched to ATTI mode by the pilot. I would be worried that there will be an interval before the Mavic switches to ATTI and the compass is compromised. Maybe a piece of aluminum foil over the top of the Mavic to keep it in ATTI mode.

 

[Andrew F]

I too would be mindful of the transition period from GPS to ATTI and perhaps the loss of compass. Also when the light dims to being useless, the downward facing camera may cause a sudden movent. I would turn that off before. My drone has made "darting" moves when that happens. You won't want to be close to any rock outcroppings if you can avoid it. I'd recommend using prop guards for sure!

 

[Andrew F]

Keep us updated. I'd love to see the video.

 

[Andrew F]

Too bad the Mavic can't be switched to ATTI mode by the pilot. I would be worried that there will be an interval before the Mavic switches to ATTI and the compass is compromised. Maybe a piece of aluminum foil over the top of the Mavic to keep it in ATTI mode.

I've never tried the foil trick but I agree manually being able to engage ATTI is a needed feature.

 

[Brewsky666]

Maybe you can attach a small and real powerful led light om the top of de Mavic? Otherwise it will be much of a grainy footage.

Please keep us updated. I have been reading a lot about indoor problems so beware of the sensors kicking in. Try to close them down as much as possible is my humble advice.

Happy Flying
Brewsky

 

[Eric]

Thanks for the thoughts, I'll take that into consideration and figure out the smartest way to go about it. I think it's going to be baby steps, go slow and in a large enough cave I can fly full manual w/o crashing.

My Mavic arrives tomorrow but I don't think I should make the first flight inside a cave

 

[DerekG]

^^Agreed - Way better to start in a nice open area and get a feel for how everything responds / where all the controls are. I too agree being able to switch manually into Atti mode (like you could do on the P3 for example) would be really nice. I could switch into atti to easily roughly measure wind speed (though drift) to know what I was up against at 300ft for example.

 

[GerdS]

If you will disable the downlooking sensors within a cave the Mavic will automatically switch to Atti mode and never try changing to Opti mode. In Atti mode the compass is ignored. In any case I would attach prop savers before flying within a cave.

 

[Eric]

Ugh, it seems FedEx lost my drone. So it may be longer than I thought.

 

[ohhdannyboy]

I tried to fly in a tunnel recently and almost crashed the thing, maybe it didnt like losing gps (i took off in the open) all of a sudden the drone went AWOL and there is a great video of me chasing after it as it flew past my head. Managed to land the thing in the nick of time. Its always better to be out in the open to operate these things, so unless totally necessary, or its a cave of spectacular beauty (and space) then I would give this a miss. Film it on an osmo, should be smooth enough

 

[Pablo]

Ugh, it seems FedEx lost my drone. So it may be longer than I thought.

Check all local caves in case they dropped it off there.

 

[Chase R]

If it will stay in ATTI mode the entire flight then I might consider it but if it is switching between GPS and ATTI then its likely to act erratically.

 

[tonyb]

Can the Mavic fly inside a cave? I know it will lose GPS signal quickly but as long as the drone doesn't act crazy I can fly it manually. I don't plan on flying it in far, may 100' from the opening where the light basically ends.

I flew my typhone H approx. 200 ft into a train tunnel. Had to fly very cautiously, not much room for mistake. I do believe flying mavic in same environment will be easier.

 

[Mdepaula]

I flew in a cave.. a rather large one (Hang En in Vietnam), so my situation may not be what you are doing.

I had no GPS, vision sensor was in and out (mostly out), and I had to manually compensate for air currents that were circulating. Even though I was in the third largest cave in the world, I was worried about being blown into into a side ( you can look closely at the tents and see them blowing in the wind).

Good luck!

Some of my footage here:

 

[NOLA-J]

I flew in a cave.. a rather large one (Hang En in Vietnam), so my situation may not be what you are doing.

I had no GPS, vision sensor was in and out (mostly out), and I had to manually compensate for air currents that were circulating. Even though I was in the third largest cave in the world, I was worried about being blown into into a side ( you can look closely at the tents and see them blowing in the wind).

Good luck!

Some of my footage here:

Wow! Great shots!

 

[Eric]

I flew in a cave.. a rather large one (Hang En in Vietnam), so my situation may not be what you are doing.

I had no GPS, vision sensor was in and out (mostly out), and I had to manually compensate for air currents that were circulating. Even though I was in the third largest cave in the world, I was worried about being blown into into a side ( you can look closely at the tents and see them blowing in the wind).

Good luck!

That looks like an awesome place to fly! How was the trip there? I was recently in Vietnam. We didn't go to that cave but went to several in the area.