Mavic Air 2 colliding with Activetrack object

[him7403]

The first time I enabled activetrack on my Mavic Air 2 it crashed into the selected object.
I've been flying mavic drones for a while and took delivery of a Mavic Air 2 yesterday. In a wide open field selected my truck on Activetrack, set to zero rotation at a distance of ~40m away with a fair altitude. Switched to sport mode (which I appreciate cancels collision avoidance). And set off, accelerating the truck to ~20mph then keeping the speed steady. I was holding the controller, but not making any adjustments. The drone quickly caught up. Then, as if possessed, honed in on my truck and continued to acclerate towards it. Seeing the imminent disaster on the screen I didnt have time to hit the little stop button, instead I pulled it into reverse and tried to increase altitude. It didn't respond and slammed into the tailgate.

Q: Should the drone not maintain a fairly consistent distance from the object its tracking?

Q: Even with collision avoidance off, why would it continue to acclerate into the source object?

Some background, which may be of relevance:
It was the drone's first outing, and it had never even seen an object to avoid before.
As you'll see on the video, there wasn't anything else around in the nearby airspace.
The truck was 'selected' whilst in normal mode. Once registered with the green box, I switched to sport.
The field had a slight incline.
It survived the crash, save for breaking a tail light.
I've since tested the object avoidance on normal mode and just walking between tree trunks and buildings, it seems to work well.

I'm sending the drone back to DJI to take a look. I offered to send the footage as I feel it is of relevance, but they didn't want to see it.

Any help would be really appreciated, thanks.

Mavic collision footage / youtube link

post here: Mavic Air 2 - DJI Products forum
dji mod is active there

 

[AAP]

Thanks for all your help with this. The plot thickens; I've since recreated the scenario, this time in normal speed mode and it did the same again, time after time. Youtube clip beneath.
With the truck selected on activetrack, trace and parralel work fine and maintained a safe distance.
When in rotation mode and the slider set dead centre, allowing no right or left rotation , on flat ground or a decline it works fine. However, give it a slight incline and it keeps getting closer, faster, and lower down.
I didn't tough any controls once underway but wanting to wreck the drone, I hit stop just in time before colliding with the truck. It's interesting that the bottom sensors don't seem to detect the ground until the last few seconds, even when its ~3ft off the ground. They defintely 'work' because they kick in whenever I bring it into land.

In response to @Aaron24 , i'm going to check that. It seems to lose altitide when following the truck up an incline, but need to see if the rate of ascent/decent actually goes into the negative. And you should be able to see how it drops itself relative the the nearby woodland canopies. The truck started at an elevation of 115m and the collisions/near misses were around 129m (14m difference)

Mavic activetrack collision test

 

[rehkram]

I can imagine a dji programmer is currently furiously coding something like this pseudocode:

If activeTrack;
    If sportMode;
        frontSensor = on;
    else;
        frontSensor = off;
    endif;
endif;

Anyone know what programming language(s) dji use, BTW?

 

[AAP]

@Aaron24 hit the nail on the head. On parallel and trace modes my drone adjusts altitude as the ground rises and falls. On rotation mode it doesn’t. Aside from +\- 0.1m/s due to wind it stayed level. So as the truck drove uphill it was simply keeping its altitude.
what’s worrying to me is that whilst maintaining that altitude it got closer and closer to the truck on the horizontal plane to the point of crashing.
Would be interested to see if anyone else can replicate this and let me know if my particular drone is a dud.

 

[kidroc]

Didn’t know he was from UK.

Why assume!!! This is why the forums have gone down the tubes lately...

 

[InvisibleName]

Why assume!!! This is why the forums have gone down the tubes lately...

Sorry? Your point is?

 

[method007]

Why assume!!! This is why the forums have gone down the tubes lately...

What forums are you talking about?

 

[Pietros]

Thanks for all your help with this. The plot thickens; I've since recreated the scenario, this time in normal speed mode and it did the same again, time after time. Youtube clip beneath.
With the truck selected on activetrack, trace and parralel work fine and maintained a safe distance.
When in rotation mode and the slider set dead centre, allowing no right or left rotation , on flat ground or a decline it works fine. However, give it a slight incline and it keeps getting closer, faster, and lower down.
I didn't tough any controls once underway but wanting to wreck the drone, I hit stop just in time before colliding with the truck. It's interesting that the bottom sensors don't seem to detect the ground until the last few seconds, even when its ~3ft off the ground. They defintely 'work' because they kick in whenever I bring it into land.

In response to @Aaron24 , i'm going to check that. It seems to lose altitide when following the truck up an incline, but need to see if the rate of ascent/decent actually goes into the negative. And you should be able to see how it drops itself relative the the nearby woodland canopies. The truck started at an elevation of 115m and the collisions/near misses were around 129m (14m difference)

Mavic activetrack collision test

Perhaps it just doesn't like Volkswagens - it aimed right for the logo in your first video...

 

[pelermon]

Is there a
Seek and Destroy mode
on these Air2s?
My neighbors cat is in trouble if there is.
(Beats up my cat)

 

[pd64]

I did the same video yesterday started in normal and switched to sport and had no issues. My problem was I started in parallel but if flew behind me not beside me.

 

[Ice_2k]

I did the same video yesterday started in normal and switched to sport and had no issues. My problem was I started in parallel but if flew behind me not beside me.

The OP is not in AT, but in POI mode. But without giving it a direction in which to circle. Adding terrain height change to that seems to have triggered a corner case that DJI engineers did not cover.

 

[bp328i]

Have you looked at the flight data with the stick inputs? Might not show anything but worth a look.

 

[pd64]

The OP is not in AT, but in POI mode. But without giving it a direction in which to circle. Adding terrain height change to that seems to have triggered a corner case that DJI engineers did not cover.

I was out earlier today and had a similar situation when I was in active track parallel. Was following on my side and then dropped altitude, flew over top of my truck and if I wasn't in normal mode I think it would have crashed into me. I hit the pause and landed it. I'll post a link later when I edit the video.

 

[pd64]

Here's what happened with mine. Maybe the fence it was flying over caused this? I wasn't touching the controller at all....in N mode AT Parallel:

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[GtoJon]

The first time I enabled activetrack on my Mavic Air 2 it crashed into the selected object.
I've been flying mavic drones for a while and took delivery of a Mavic Air 2 yesterday. In a wide open field selected my truck on Activetrack, set to zero rotation at a distance of ~40m away with a fair altitude. Switched to sport mode (which I appreciate cancels collision avoidance). And set off, accelerating the truck to ~20mph then keeping the speed steady. I was holding the controller, but not making any adjustments. The drone quickly caught up. Then, as if possessed, honed in on my truck and continued to acclerate towards it. Seeing the imminent disaster on the screen I didnt have time to hit the little stop button, instead I pulled it into reverse and tried to increase altitude. It didn't respond and slammed into the tailgate.

Q: Should the drone not maintain a fairly consistent distance from the object its tracking?

Q: Even with collision avoidance off, why would it continue to acclerate into the source object?

Some background, which may be of relevance:
It was the drone's first outing, and it had never even seen an object to avoid before.
As you'll see on the video, there wasn't anything else around in the nearby airspace.
The truck was 'selected' whilst in normal mode. Once registered with the green box, I switched to sport.
The field had a slight incline.
It survived the crash, save for breaking a tail light.
I've since tested the object avoidance on normal mode and just walking between tree trunks and buildings, it seems to work well.

I'm sending the drone back to DJI to take a look. I offered to send the footage as I feel it is of relevance, but they didn't want to see it.

Any help would be really appreciated, thanks.

Mavic collision footage / youtube link

Ouch, I would also think switch to sport mode would cancel active track. But, with DJI, if it is a DJI error, they replace your craft without hesitation. My I2 "Detected Object Above" when there wasn't, backed into a tree & totaled it. But, the first time they sent a badly rebuilt I2 within 2 weeks that wasn't mine. They shipped it back & did take a month to replace with new. This was 3 years ago.
The only problem I see is ... does the MA2 record logs like their bigger brothers?

In any case, I think DJI will be fast to rectify your problem properly.

Cheers, Jon

 

[GtoJon]

Here's what happened with mine. Maybe the fence it was flying over caused this? I wasn't touching the controller at all....in N mode AT Parallel:

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At this point, I think it may have more to do with Dodge RAM?? RAM being the operative word

Cheers, Jon