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Mavic crash / repair story

NIBLES

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Joined
Jul 5, 2018
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Hi there,

I just thought I should share my recent experience crashing and repairing my significantly damaged Mavic. I have been flying for 18 months with minimal ‘near misses’ and always ensure I put some forethought into my flights.

A recent spare of the moment flight with the intention to ‘run down’ some batteries saw me hit an earth wire (powerline) at full noise in sport mode. The collision was such that the front of the Mavic passed under the wire and the rear caught the wire given the pitch the AC was in. This ultimately snagged the Mavic, bringing it to a halt instantly. Throughout the chaos of the impact and loss of control I lost visual contact. I didn’t realise I had collided with the wire at the time but thought maybe a prop loss had caused the terminal issue. After 30 seconds of wrestling the controller as the Mavic spiralled and wondering what was happening, the Mavic disconnected from the remote. I could only assume the Mavic had proceeded to hit the ground and was laying rest in the middle of a paddock (wheat crop).

After a few minutes with no contact I knew the situation was bad and the Mavic was almost certainly on the ground somewhere. I proceeded to use the app to find the last known position of the Mavic some 600m away and 50m into a wheat crop from the main road. After 20 minutes of searching I pinpointed the Mavic’s general resting place but couldn’t sight it as the wheat crop where it lay was some 3’ high, and the Mavic lay beneath the surface. I attempted to start the motors to see if I could hear it and thankfully heard it rustling in the grass a couple of meters away.

I quick visual inspection confirmed my thoughts that the Mavic was badly damaged. The rear right motor was dangling by a single wire about the arm (initial impact damage), the front right antenna leg was also broken off (secondary ground impact). Though terminal looking at the time this appeared to be the only damage.

After much debate and research online, I decided to take the plunge in repairing my Mavic. With next to zero experience in electronic repair but reasonable mechanical aptitude I thought why not, nothing ventured nothing gained.

Firstly, I confirmed the Mavic still powered up and everything still functioned correctly ie Gimble ect. With the extent of the effected components evident I proceeded to order some new parts via ebay, this included front and rear right arms (complete) along with a 75w soldering station. The parts totalled $140.00

After watching several Mavic specific repair videos and general soldering ‘how to’ videos I took the plunge. The extent of the soldering skill involved was reasonable and with no experienced I practiced for approx. 1 hour on redundant electronics I had lying around. I won’t get into the particulars but will say the temperature required to carry out the particular solder joint competently is 450°C within a 2 second window each joint before the iron overheats the boards within the Mavic.

I am proud to say I carried out the work successfully. The result is a fully operating Mavic with zero problems and seemingly unaffected flight characteristics.

Please see the crash video & photos below, to date I have cycled 9 batteries of flight through the repaired Mavic. I hope to experience ongoing use and reliability, time will tell.

Link to video of crash
Dropbox - 2018_09_29_16_39_01_1.mp4
 

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Well done m8 - well impressed
 
WOW thanks for sharing
I used to fancy myself Being pretty handy..... But as of lately my shaky hands and my degenrative eye sight
I op'ed to turn to someone else..
So after my last crash i package up my mavic and sent it to someone I trusted.......
.............................I know it's in good hands
I've done all i could........
Now I just have to wait...................cR
.

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