WELCOME to the forum Gene! Yes there is a wealth of knowledge here. I'm not particularly that, but I did craft a pretty effective water recovery system if your interested. After having my Mavic for a few months I really was itching to take it on a Canadian fly-in fishing trip I do every May. Never took my Phantom 2 Vision+, cause its just a bit too bulky. Great vid of fishing and boat following was the object. Goal was recovery, but this setup is so stable I can land it on water if needed and if the water is pretty calm. I can give more detail and pic's later if there is interest. I tried the smooth foam craft balls and a couple of other options before doing it this way. Basically I bought a 4 foot 3.25" diameter dark gray pool noodle on Amazon, along with another set of extended landing gear. I like the ones made by SkyReat also on Amazon. You will just use the front legs in my set up. I cut 11-12" long pieces from the pool noodles. Enough to extend from about 1.5-2" infant of the front legs, and a couple inches beyond the arms & body in the back. Permanent marker dab for where the front leg will punch down into the noodle with the noodle angled back slightly toward the body, but far enough away from the body to not interfere with the Mavic sensors. So how will the floats interfere with the downward sensors. Don't ask me how I know. ;-) Thank goodness I had my max height set at 400 feet, but getting it back down over water with auto land my only option was a challenge. The downward sensors can be disabled, but I didn't wanna. I just moved the pool noodles away from the rear of the body so the downward sensors wouldn't pick them up. The front extended legs are needed so the Mavic sits up in the front and slightly down in the rear (noodles under rear arms). Much trial and error was done to determine the best angle for the Mavic to sit so it can be set in a tub of water and the sensitive camera & gimbal are well up and it sits level and stable in the water. No front or rear leaning. I actually hot glued a couple of 1/2" pieces of foam on top of the rear floats, right where it rides on the rear legs just to get it to sit perfect in the wash tub. You'll want to test yours in a laundry sink or bath tub before you finalize your setup. Make sure it sits stable in the water with no forward or backward lean.
Once the spot is marked up front, install the SkyReat front feet on the Mavic. There is a right and left foot. Be mindful of that as you trace the foot pad of the landing gear onto the noodle, with the floats positioned about 1/2 way along the back arms of the Mavic. You'll cut a hole slightly smaller than the foot and about 1/2" deep. I hot glued my feet into place on the noodle once I had the angle back just right. Don't want them coming off in a hard landing. Don't hot glue the feet to the Mavic, just to the floats LOL. Last I bought Softride Hook and Loop Soft Wrap 4 pack from Amazon for like $10 bucks and use them to securely hold the floats to my Mavic at all four locations where the floats rest on the arms. If the floats come off in a hard landing or crash (like the foam balls can on those poor leg extensions that come with them) they haven't done you any good as your Mavic sinks to the depths unrecoverable. To dress them up a bit and to make then a little more aerodynamic in flight, I cut about a 30 deg angle off the front sides of the floats angling toward the body. I took those cut pieces and hot glued them to the flat backs of the floats at the rear.
So do these floats interfere with flight? I am surprised to say no they don't. In lift its no problem at all as the prop's are pulling up. I did notice on decent it was a little iffy on quick decent. To be expected as the floats are interrupting the down stream. But it wasn't really a problem in a controlled decent. In an emergency decent the props may loose their grab. In forward & backward movement it was just fine. Now it is possible that it will be more susceptible in strong wind. I did not take it up in any strong wind or inclement weather of any kind. In fact in the 10 days we were at this remote camp, I was only able to take the Mavic up twice. The 1st time with the floats too close to the downward sensors at the back and I could not stop it from rising to maximum altitude. Never thought of turning off the downward sensors in my panic as it continued to slowly rise no matter what I did. Sooooo glad I had the altitude set at a 400' max.
I've gone long here. If any one is interested, or has questions, I can give more detail. It worked way better than expected and is a permanent part of my Mavic accessories now when water is in the equation.
- hutch
ps: I went ahead and dug out the floats and took some pic's I'll attach. Pictures worth 1000 words. Nothin fancy here, but does the trick!
View attachment 16527 View attachment 16528 View attachment 16529 View attachment 16530 View attachment 16531
