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Long range fliers - share your tips of flying long range?

Well, it transmits the takeoff location, so if you don't move they'll know where you are.

Also, it's only legal (in the US) to use an attached RID module on a drone that doesn't have built-in RID.
I always move after I take off. I walk and follow the direction my drone goes as far as i can.. I try staying out of site as well. Don't need a karen attack.
 
Funny-- after reading your post about how you love to fly long range, I thought that I'm probably your exact opposite. I love flying short-range! Most of my flights are quite tame and "conservative" in that regard. I just feel more secure, the closer my drone is to me. I suppose my ideal type of flying is to "take a look" at a building or natural feature, which was fairly small, so that I am able to fly over and around it without flying more than about 300 ft from launch point.
 
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I always move after I take off. I walk and follow the direction my drone goes as far as i can.. I try staying out of site as well. Don't need a karen attack.
That's my favorite way to do longer flights. I launch, then follow the drone, walking along behind it as it flies, trying to stay not too far away from it.
 
That's my favorite way to do longer flights. I launch, then follow the drone, walking along behind it as it flies, trying to stay not too far away from it.
I will agree to part about following my drone especially to keep vlos. When I created and flew a long mission that was far away (and likely to lose connection but continue), I took a walk as the drone practically flew by itself. Honestly I didn't want to wait until it came back into range to reconnect so I ended up walking quite far until I was satisfied and turned around to walk back to original point or homepoint just in time to beat the drone. I realize I could have marked the last mission waypoint to the new location where I was standing which is not where my car was parked and I didn't want to carry the drone back.
 
Speaking of....look at this post from last year. A lot of people still think it is "ok" as long as you are uner 400 ft AGL or you fly a lightweight drone.

 
My favorite thing is flying long range.
Here are the things that come to the top of my head, how to get maximum from my flight:
- Turn off the obstacle avoidance sensor, to get more battery juice.
- Start low, and increase altitude slightly, every time when the RC signal bar decreases.
- Check the wind and consider that the Forced RTH spot, might not be enough and you need to RTH earlier than that.
- Do not press sticks to increase the speed, during RTH, because that drains battery faster.
- Do not fly in sports mode. Battery will drain faster.
- If you really going for LOOONG distance, make sure to set up a new, safe, home point somewhere along the way. So in case you will have to do emergency landing, and drive to pick up your bird - you know where it is, and it's safely landed.

What else, what other advice do you have for achieving maximum range on the long range flight?
I hadn't thought about turning off obstacle avoidance, but just for safety I don't think I would. One of my concerns is the OA might warn me of a bird earlier.
 
I always move after I take off. I walk and follow the direction my drone goes as far as i can.. I try staying out of site as well. Don't need a karen attack.

Do you reset the Home Point?
 
Speaking of....look at this post from last year. A lot of people still think it is "ok" as long as you are uner 400 ft AGL or you fly a lightweight drone.


🤔 My view: Violating the law is always a risk. There are also a lot of ridiculously restrictive laws and regulations aimed at the lowest common denominator citizen, and/or way overbroad, because of the sad fact that our democracy, still the best form of government mankind has ever come up with, is full of leaders who are most of 'em corrupt, lazy, lying-arse crooks that sought office for power, privilege, and fame, not any real motive to serve their community.

So, we all violate laws. I'll admit right here I exceed speed limits routinely, all the time. There are all kinds of roads in my area that are 25mph and I, and everyone else on those 4 lane main arteries are going 30-35, always. Why? The posted limit is absurd.

Same with BVLOS. Yes, I've violated the rule. Save the arguments for a different thread. I have no safety concern BVLOS than VLOS because in my opinion my operation and piloting is safer using the camera as my eyes to maintain situational awareness after I get more than 500 feet away, yet still well within VLOS. My naked eye and ears tells me there's a plane or helicopter out there to be concerned about; the camera view tells me where it is relative to my drone so I can react effectively.

And the VLOS rule is vague. What is VLOS? I would argue that we all fly BVLOS regularly according to the definition of VLOS in the regs. A drone becomes too far to distinguish relative distance compared to another object well before you can't see it.

So, a lot of "common sense" is involved in complying with, and enforcing the VLOS rule. Unlike the 400ft ceiling, VLOS is subjective. Like "disturbing the peace". If you're way out of visual range over open, cattle grazing land and it comes to the attention of a pertinent authority, they're likely to ignore it. They have much better things to do that their boss cares about.

OTOH, if you're 3 miles BVLOS over downtown Santa Cruz, you very well may get a letter or even a visit.

The law isn't – in theory – about controlling citizens. It's about an orderly and safe society.
 
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I have buzzers and strobes but I don't regularly use them. If I were in Mexico and wanted to fly long range, I would activate them for that flight.
The strobes for better visibility, right? But why the buzzers? And why Mexico?
 
People allways imagine BVLOS is flying at 4+ Km... BVLOS is whenever you lose visual line of sight of the drone. Behind a tree at 10 meters, it's BVLOS; with the sun behind the drone, it's BVLOS; whenever you can't locate your drone in less than a second in the sky, it's BVLOS; whenever you can't see the arms of the drone and know its attitude (seeing black dot in the sky), it's BVLOS.

Flying VLOS is basically flying like you'd fly an RC plane. In any other situation, unless you have a dedicated observer (who would stare a drone for 30 minutes in exchange for nothing?) you are BVLOS.

The problem with long ranging is not BVLOS, is that you won't hear copters/planes or have visual awareness of the drone's surroundings apart that what you see on the screen/goggles.
 
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Do you reset the Home Point?
Yes and No. I just manually fly it back to where I am when the battery is low. and I walk it back to my car. However, If I can walk to my car before i expect the battery to die, I meet the drone at my original home point or car. I let it hover out of reach of anyone while it's in my line of site, until i get there, and initiate a landing once i am there, and i believe no one is going to bother me.
 
Yes and No. I just manually fly it back to where I am when the battery is low. and I walk it back to my car. However, If I can walk to my car before i expect the battery to die, I meet the drone at my original home point or car. I let it hover out of reach of anyone while it's in my line of site, until i get there, and initiate a landing once i am there, and i believe no one is going to bother me.
While that is certainly an option and well with the capabilities of the drone, I haven't run across too many people who do it that way. I certainly wouldn't but if it works for you....I can think of valid reasons such as launching in a wide open empty flat parking lot but walking out into the beach up near the water to fly in order to get better VLOS. I wouldn't want my homepoint anywhere near the water, too. In addition, I have seen several requests for dynamic homepoint so there's also that to consider.
 
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1/4 mile range and vlos!!!…….there was a post on amazon(review),guy bought his first drone,flew it from his front yard(take off) to park(walked with drone in vlos),in park he decided to test RTH,drone turned around and flew back to take off position (front yard),being beginner ,in panic he ran after drone all way back to his home,drone was in vlos at all time,no laws broken
 
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One thing that has bothered me a couple of times is when you loose connection at max range (several km away) due to some pilot error, and the connection is not restored automatically until the ac is just a couple of km away. That is something to be aware of with the M3. It depends on conditions probably.

It's because of the antenna orientation inside the drone (the legs), you get better connection with the drone flying away from you that coming to you, it happens to all DJI drones to some degree.

To minimize it, just switch to FCC mode. I noticed that the recent permanent FCC hack has better connection than the usual DH app FCC hack.
 
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As noted here, your drone is emitting Aeroscope/RID from the drone and can be picked up as far as 50Km, although a common phone/tablet won't go longer than 3.5Km or so and the portable Aeroscope unit tops around 5Km.

I've been long ranging/travelling/exploring for around 580 hours of flight time, most of which have been BVLOS usually in the range of 1,000 to 3,000 meters. My record is reaching 9,040 meters and coming back, but I usually perform this test only once to see the capabilities of the drone whenever I pick a new one, and then stay under a comfortable 4Km radius for the most part.

All that time I've been flying a drone (except the Autel, but it died at just 60 hours) it has been emitting Aeroscope (Mini 2, Air2S, Mavic 3), and since the last year, also RID, I've never been caught mainly because I live in a sparse populated area under uncontrolled airspace, but 30 minutes of flight is plenty of time to hunt anyone down with Aeroscope/RID.

I also never had an incident... yet, **** happens so it's just a matter of time that a prop goes off, or a motor dies midflight, but I try to minimize risks as much as I can.

My main tip is simple, pick a Mavic 3, hack it with the latest hack that removes Aeroscope/RID and enjoy your time as a photographer/videographer/hobbyist. Flying is fun, chilling and probably the safest hobby on earth, so there's no reason to be more royalist than the king with all that nonsensical overregulation.

I was not aware that there is any hack that removes aeroscope and rid for mavic 3. Which service provides this?
 
My favorite thing is flying long range.
Here are the things that come to the top of my head, how to get maximum from my flight:
- Turn off the obstacle avoidance sensor, to get more battery juice.
- Start low, and increase altitude slightly, every time when the RC signal bar decreases.
- Check the wind and consider that the Forced RTH spot, might not be enough and you need to RTH earlier than that.
- Do not press sticks to increase the speed, during RTH, because that drains battery faster.
- Do not fly in sports mode. Battery will drain faster.
- If you really going for LOOONG distance, make sure to set up a new, safe, home point somewhere along the way. So in case you will have to do emergency landing, and drive to pick up your bird - you know where it is, and it's safely landed.

What else, what other advice do you have for achieving maximum range on the long range flight?
I'm sure you asked a TECHNICAL question. But US citizens quickly forgot that people fly quadcopters in other countries besides their country. And they kill the topic of discussion only with LEGAL aspects.
Third page of discussion - did anyone give useful advice? Ask US residents what they consider long-distance flights - they will answer - to the nearest fence)
How many miles or kilometers is a long-distance flight? Several years ago, I published here my video and flight log for 10 km on the old, very first Mavic Air. Now I fly even further on Mavic3, but I don't show the video to anyone)
1. My advice is to fly early in the morning. Before dawn. There is no wind.
2. The second piece of advice is to install a GPS tracker.
3. Change the battery firmware so that it does not turn off before 2v per cell. The settings of a regular standard battery are not for long-distance flights.
There are a few more small features, but you need to know the specific DJI model.
And the main advice - watch recordings of long-distance record flights on YouTube. A large battery is good, but it should not be excessively heavy. There must be harmony.
 
Simple physics: gaining altitude incrementally doesn't save energy when compared with gaining altitude in one continuous ascension. In both instances, the same amount of work is involved, and the same expenditure of energy (battery output) is required over the course of a flight. A third option, of course, would be to promptly gain maximum altitude at the beginning of the flight and then control a gradual ascent (something like gliding, but not quite) over the course of the flight. In any scenario you can imagine, you'd still use the same amount of energy to perform the same amount of work (altitude gain).

Whatever method you choose, you're still violating the law, and honestly, flying excessive distances BVLOS doesn't really prove anything.
 
Outside the thrill doing something I know I shouldn’t, what is the attraction of flying long distance?

Personally I visit a specific location, put drone in the air to capture what I want.

I don’t get why taking off two miles away for that location, limiting the time I can actually spend meaningfully capturing footage is of any functional use…. Or is that not the point?
 
Simple physics: gaining altitude incrementally doesn't save energy when compared with gaining altitude in one continuous ascension. In both instances, the same amount of work is involved, and the same expenditure of energy (battery output) is required over the course of a flight.
If this were simple physics, then everyone could fly far)
You are trying to reason about higher mathematics with knowledge of arithmetic.
 
Outside the thrill doing something I know I shouldn’t, what is the attraction of flying long distance?

Personally I visit a specific location, put drone in the air to capture what I want.

I don’t get why taking off two miles away for that location, limiting the time I can actually spend meaningfully capturing footage is of any functional use…. Or is that not the point?
Note: this post doesn't address the legality or the wisdom of flying long distance

Here's an example of epic cinematic video taken by the Air 2 (not me, not my video). While I don't exactly know where the pilot was standing during each of these shots, something tells me it is nearly impossible to drive or hike to each of these locations close enough to fly only a short distance. And, unless you have 3 weeks there isn't enough time capture everything based on the time of day, the weather, etc. It's one of the main reasons why the range of your drone is important (which roughly translates to battery life) to giving us the ability to shoot more and better shots; VLOS notwithstanding. We wouldn't be using our technology to the fullest if we didn't. Different laws in different countries but the needs are often similar:

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The last time I went to this glacier (without my drone), I realize there is only so much of it (the ice-field) you can see *without* going long range, for example (not me, not my video):

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