Flying off balcony

[Bubby]

I live on the sea, so often I like to fly off my balcony and capture what is in front of me.

I have done this so many time without any problems, but recently my drone freaks out when it goes over the edge and loses VPS (drifts right). It does this even if it has a GPS lock.

I am reluctant to turnoff downward VPS because that might make the take off from the balcony dangerous and I don’t have much room to play with.

Any suggestions or thoughts why this should only be occurring now?

 

[musicjeremy]

Turn off VPS for takeoff, turn it on for flying around, then turn it off for landing. When I fly off balconies that is how I do it.

 

[Bubby]

Turn off VPS for takeoff, turn it on for flying around, then turn it off for landing. When I fly off balconies that is how I do it.

Thanks, I will try this but, don’t you find that the Mavic battles to keep steady without the VPS when taking off?

 

[Bubby]

So turning off the downward VPS is a bad idea, luckily it only cost me two props.

 

[musicjeremy]

Not at all in my experience.

Thanks, I will try this but, don’t you find that the Mavic battles to keep steady without the VPS when taking off?

 

[SteveCA]

I always turn off vps when landing but I prefer to land manually. This is because I often fly in windy conditions and it’s much safer for me to land it as opposed to letting it slowly land itself in gusty conditions.

 

[DanMan32]

VPS is OK for solid ground, but over water it can cause unusual drift as it picks up moving currents as stationary patterns.
Even on land I am suspecting it may cause sideways drift. At least that seems to happen flying sraight up and down my driveway. I'll have to see if I get different drift or none at all with VPS off.
Now that I think about it, I wonder if VPS is what gives me a hard time pinpointing onto my landing pad. Seems I get a good shot if I aim as it descends but not hovering a few feet up.

 

[Lonjsnyder]

Erratic flight behavior = time for IMU calibration.... at least it’s worth a try.

 

[Meta4]

have done this so many time without any problems, but recently my drone freaks out when it goes over the edge and loses VPS (drifts right). It does this even if it has a GPS lock.

I am reluctant to turnoff downward VPS because that might make the take off from the balcony dangerous and I don’t have much room to play with.

How high is your balcony?
VPS only works to about 10 metres, and then only if there is a detectable pattern or texture and good lighting.

The common problem with launching from balconies is all the reinforcing steel in the structure causes problems for the compass that result in serious flight issues.

 

[Lonjsnyder]

I live on the sea, so often I like to fly off my balcony and capture what is in front of me.

I have done this so many time without any problems, but recently my drone freaks out when it goes over the edge and loses VPS (drifts right). It does this even if it has a GPS lock.

I am reluctant to turnoff downward VPS because that might make the take off from the balcony dangerous and I don’t have much room to play with.

Any suggestions or thoughts why this should only be occurring now?

In addition to my recommendation that you perform an IMU calibration, I have found the following procedure to be optimal for flying from an indoor balcony (where gps is compromised) to outdoors.
1. I change return to home to hover
2. Turn on the aircraft and let it initialize its imu & gimbal.
3. Since the aircraft takes a long time to get initial gps lock (but once gps is acquired, it regains gps lock quickly after a temporary gps blockage), hold the aircraft outside the balcony until you acquire gps lock.
4. Bring the aircraft back inside, set it down, and then launch. You'll then find that it acquires gps lock within 1 - 2 seconds of flying outside.
Here's an example result: