Landing Pads and Return to Home Accuracy

DownandLocked · Jan 28, 2017

I want to use a dock at a lake for take offs and returns. I've seen landing pads available with high contrast markings. Would this increase RTH accuracy. My dock is 8 feet wide and I don't want my Mavic landing in the water.

m0j0 · Jan 28, 2017

I land mine on the ground and it lands within 6 inches from where I took off pretty consistently when I set it up properly.

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msinger · Jan 28, 2017

DownandLocked said:
Would this increase RTH accuracy.

It should, but I'd err on the side of caution and manually land it. It'll only take one inaccurate RTH to lose it forever in the water.

m0j0 · Jan 28, 2017

msinger said:
It should, but I'd err on the side of caution and manually land it. It'll only take one inaccurate RTH to lose it forever in the water.

Going to agree. I pretty much supervise mine on landing. Only once did I take the chance of letting it land without supervision. I was miles in the desert after three days of rain. Playing with the new Polaris Razr.. I stopped and launched in the only flat dry location in what seemed like miles. After launching I walked through the mud to a knoll so that I could get clear LOS. I fell azz over teakettle in the mud. I was covered in mud. Couldn't catch it.. controller also covered in mud. Phone covered in mud. Lol. Battery now at 35% we'll crap.. hit RTH and started cleaning the slop off my hands. I actually got a boot stuck in the mud and stepped barefoot in the slop..lol. I watched the Mavic land about 40 feet away lol. I get back to the Razer and start pouring water on my hands so I can at least wipe some of the crap off.

Ended up drenching the Razer and Mavic case in mud. Took days to clean up.

m0j0 · Jan 28, 2017

But the Mavic was clean.. not a spot on it.

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m0j0 · Jan 28, 2017

I have since bought full doors, a windshield and a top.

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mastermind · Jan 30, 2017

i was wondering if RTH meant return to where it lifted off or return to where the controller is.. I settled on returns to where it lifted off after reading the manual a couple times.. However when I was flying it over weekend. It did not return to the same place, it actually returned to about 1 ft away from where I was standing which was about 50 ft away from where it took off..

Is there a way to make it return to where the pilot is instead of lift off in case the pilot moves (walks around to follow it, on a boat (although I would manually land on a boat) just curios

Logger · Jan 30, 2017

YES have a look at p44 of the manual.
Home Point is your Take Off point by default.
However you can change it to the aircraft location or the remote controller location if you wish.

mastermind · Jan 30, 2017

where do you change this setting. is that the icon for mavic at your feet, instead of the one hovering?

Logger · Jan 30, 2017

You cannot change this setting permanently. It defaults to aircraft location each time you take off. Once you are inflight though. you can change it. https://dl.djicdn.com/downloads/mavic/20161226/Mavic+Pro+Release_Notes_en_20161226.pdf Page 44 explains how to swap home point from where it took off to where it is now or where you are.
Page 57 exaplins the Follow flight mode which has the aircraft actually follow the GPS coords of the device attached to you RC. So not RTH but ideal for your boat scenario.

younumpty · Jan 30, 2017

DownandLocked said:
I want to use a dock at a lake for take offs and returns. I've seen landing pads available with high contrast markings. Would this increase RTH accuracy. My dock is 8 feet wide and I don't want my Mavic landing in the water.

Yes.
Take of slowly hover for a moment let cameras record landing spot details, fly and if you hit return to home it should land on the mat. Or easier pilot it to your mat and just land it where you want..
more contrast and pattern the better on the landing pad

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mastermind · Jan 30, 2017

thanks.. when cameras record landing spot details upon initial hover do i have to manually hit record on camera or anything or anything or does it do it automatically. how do you know it has recorded spot.. just assume after a few seconds.

Robbyg · Jan 30, 2017

mastermind said:
thanks.. when cameras record landing spot details upon initial hover do i have to manually hit record on camera or anything or anything or does it do it automatically. how do you know it has recorded spot.. just assume after a few seconds.

No it has nothing to do with the Gimbal camera, it automatically records it using the two cameras at the bottom of the craft.

Bigpoppapump · Feb 5, 2017

I just tried to reset the return home to follow me to a new location. Mavic failed each time asking if I was 0 feet away from take off spot.

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Logger · Feb 5, 2017

Bigpoppapump said:
I just tried to reset the return home to follow me to a new location. Mavic failed each time asking if I was 0 feet away from take off spot.

You cannot "reset the return home to follow me to a new location" with DJIGo. It does not have a dynamic home point feature like Litchi does. You can only reset the home point from where the aircraft took off to either; 1) the Mavics current location (Aircraft), or 2) Your current location as reported by the GPS on your mobile device (Me).

jamesgb · Feb 5, 2017

As another poster said, if you want precision landing, you need to slowly take off straight up to a height of 10 meters (per the manual) so the downward facing cameras can take a picture of the take off location. Then when using the RTH function as it starts to descend it will actually say in the DJI go app if it is performing a precision landing or not. I wish the app would tell you when taking off once it has acquired the necessary information to perform the precision landing...

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I should also mention, the one time I used precision landing RTH, my Mavic landed within inches of where it took off...

DerekG · Feb 5, 2017

^^ Agreed - It would be nice to get a little alert in the top left "Precision Landing Data Acquired" or something like that :]

Robbyg · Feb 5, 2017

I think the reason why it will not tell you if it has all the data for a precision landing on take off is because DJI does not want to give you a false sense of security.

On your RTH it might not have the same adequate lighting or shadow angles and satellite reception as it had on take off.

I have done two RTH tests and both times it landed within 2-4 inches of the take off point. Both flights where short, under 2 minutes and I had 18 Sats and the same relative lighting.

Rob

jamesgb · Feb 5, 2017

Robbyg said:
I think the reason why it will not tell you if it has all the data for a precision landing on take off is because DJI does not want to give you a false sense of security.

On your RTH it might not have the same adequate lighting or shadow angles and satellite reception as it had on take off.

I have done two RTH tests and both times it landed within 2-4 inches of the take off point. Both flights where short, under 2 minutes and I had 18 Sats and the same relative lighting.

Rob

That's a good point. Maybe it could say something like, "visual acquired, precision landing will be attempted on RTH"

I just find myself hovering there wondering, did it get it yet??? [emoji1]

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