I'm through taking chances

[Meta4]

When it gets too dark you cannot fly below 3 meters.

That's above 3 metres

 

[rscheff]

That' actually above 10 meters according to the manual. But what I was saying is that if there is insufficient light it could cause erratic behavior of the aircraft so flying at dusk into shadows can cause this erratic behavior, according to the manual.
The Vision System cannot work properly over surfaces that do not have clear pattern variations. The
Vision System cannot work properly in any of the following situations. Operate the aircraft cautiously.
a. Flying over monochrome surfaces (e.g., pure black, pure white, pure green).
b. Flying over highly reflective surfaces.
c. Flying over water or transparent surfaces.
d. Flying over moving surfaces or objects.
e. Flying in an area where the lighting changes frequently or drastically.
f. Flying over extremely dark (< 10 lux) or bright (> 40,000 lux) surfaces.
g. Flying over surfaces that strongly reflect or absorb infrared waves (e.g., mirrors).
h. Flying over surfaces without clear patterns or texture.
i. Flying over surfaces with repeating identical patterns or textures (e.g., tiles with the same design).
j. Flying over obstacles with small surface areas (e.g., tree branches).
Keep the sensors clean at all times. DO NOT tamper with the sensors. DO NOT use the aircraft in
environment with dust and humidity. DO NOT obstruct the Infrared Sensing System.
DO NOT fly on days that are rainy, smoggy, or if there is limited visibility.

Flying with no GPS could also cause problems but I have launched with no GPS and I had no problems because the GPS usually engages as soon as the A/C is in the air.

The vision system works between .5m and 30m but what I was saying is that during dusk being low with shadows can affect the vision system because it is too dark. As the aircraft goes higher there is more light available to it, but of course that varies in every location. If you were in the city surrounded by skyscrapers you might not even be able to get high enough to get out of the darkness of the shadows.

I just know, from experience, that if it is too dark the vision system does not work well, or not at all. And if flying over monochrome surfaces (snow) it does not work well.

I was just trying to give cameraz another possibility, I was not saying anyone was right or wrong, and I was not guessing because it did happen to me.

 

[Meta4]

That' actually above 10 meters according to the manual.

It's actually 5 metres in the manual (p37):
Height is restricted to 16 ft (5 m) when the GPS signal is weak and Downward Vision System is activated.

But what I was saying is that if there is insufficient light it could cause erratic behavior of the aircraft so flying at dusk into shadows can cause this erratic behavior

It doesn't cause erratic behaviour.
It simply means that the VPS system cannot provide horizontal position holding.
The drone won't have brakes, it could drift on any wind, but it won't fly off on its own.

Flying with no GPS could also cause problems but I have launched with no GPS and I had no problems because the GPS usually engages as soon as the A/C is in the air.

Flying without GPS doesn't cause problems.
The issue is the same as I described for flying without the air of VPS.

The vision system works between .5m and 30m but what I was saying is that during dusk being low with shadows can affect the vision system because it is too dark. As the aircraft goes higher there is more light available to it, but of course that varies in every location.

If the ground isn't lit well enough for VPS, flying higher isn't going to improve that.

I was just trying to give cameraz another possibility, I was not saying anyone was right or wrong, and I was not guessing because it did happen to me.

The incident has been explained, working from the recorded flight data and what actually happened.
What happened to you was quite different and not related.

 

[cameraz]

I got my new replacement Mini from DJI a couple of minutes ago. The UPS driver was too lazy to take an extra step and reached out and tossed the package onto my concrete steps (I have a video of this.) Luckily, the drone is well packaged.

 

[JanH]

Yes, I have that file. I had unzipped it and pasted it to a text file. But here is the original (zipped) file. Thanks.

 

[MS Coast]

I echo spsphotos - if you have grabbed it without losing any fingers flip it upside down and it will immediately shut off. Trying to press the off button twice on the bottom of a drone which is still trying to escape your grasp is scary and dangerous, not to mention that pushing the button to shut it off essentially makes you have to hold on tighter.

If your hand is not moving as you grasp the drone, the drone will not try to continue flying. Use the left stick to shut the motors down, as is done when landing.

 

[cameraz]

If your hand is not moving as you grasp the drone, the drone will not try to continue flying. Use the left stick to shut the motors down, as is done when landing.

Normally, that is probably the case. But my drone malfunctioned, and when I grabbed it the motors sped up to maximum speed (see flight log). This startled me, because I didn't have my thumbs on the control stick, and all I could think of was I gotta shut this **** thing off!

 

[MS Coast]

Normally, that is probably the case. But my drone malfunctioned, and when I grabbed it the motors sped up to maximum speed (see flight log). This startled me, because I didn't have my thumbs on the control stick, and all I could think of was I gotta shut this **** thing off!

It doesn't sound like a malfunction. If the drone is in landing mode and thinks it's descending too fast, it will add power to counter that. Grabbing it and moving it downward will trigger that reaction.

If you just gently grasp the drone as it descends to your hand and hold it steady, without lowering your hand, and hold the throttle down, it will think it's landed and shut down.