Taking "down and out" to mean the CSC position, then I would suggest that it is a very bad way to try and
land the drone, the drone may be moving laterally at significant speed at the moment of contact with the ground.
For a 'controlled landing' in a panic situation throttle closed is the best way to go in my opinion.
I suspect the delay that you saw is the landing protection thing kicking in after the drone sensed it is within 50cm of the ground.
If, however, your are thinking that the CSC position may stop the motors in mid air and cause the drone to freefall then, I think you are mistaken.
I think you will find that, with the drone in mid air, the DEFAULT response to the CSC position is a descending helix, which, depending on the flight mode (S or P or C or whatever the relevant term are for the
MA2), can involve significant lateral speed.
In the DEFAULT CSC response mode, "emergency only"?, I think the motors will only stop in midair
after the drone has experienced an "emergency", such as a collision. (Madness in my opinion as you can't use it to
avoid the collision)
To actually stop the motors, as and when YOU want them to stop, in mid air I think you will find you have to switch the CSC reponse mode to "Anytime" and then the trigger period, which is around 2sec I think, is IMO FAR too short i.e. if you routinely flew in that response mode I think there would be a reasonable chance of accidentally triggering a mid air shut down.
I have had a MM at 100m+ and, with the CSC response mode set to "emergency only", put the sticks in the CSC position and the MM descended in powered flight, in that helix, at the descent rate appropriate to the flight mode and actually slowed its descent as the ground came within range of the VPS.
As soon as the stick were release the MM hovered.
I have done a similar test with the MM at maybe 2m, the CSC response mode set to "Anytime" and the flight mode to C (the slowest). The mini again descended in a helix for about a second or so and then dropped after the motors stopped, the fall was around 12 to 18 inches (yes I mix units) on to grass.
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