Minimum satellite signals for Mavic Air??

[sar104]

No and that's my point - GPS is the automation for drone flying. If you really only want pictures and videos then all the automation is good - but to fly the drone GPS is not necessary.

I am perplexed by all the comments about losing GPS causing a drone to fly into a wall. If you lose GPS then the drone is harder to fly but shouldn't go off on its own and crash.

All the automation is designed to focus on stability, flight aid and image quality. I like to turn off the Visual aids and just fly my MA around to get a feel for flying it.

If GPS is lost then it will not fly off anywhere, but it may get blown away, or the pilot may lose control. There is an added subtlety though - if the problem is a yaw error and the FC doesn't quickly switch to ATTI mode, and often it doesn't, then in the meantime it may exhibit unstable, uncontrolled flight and fly in the wrong direction while trying to hold position. The more recent firmware appears to try much harder to resolve yaw errors rather than just gracefully switching to ATTI - one of the reasons that I keep ATTI programmed on the flight mode switch in place of sport mode.

 

[vanderzyde0]

I don't see the option on MA to go to ATTI mode per switching - are you using DJI GO 4 software? Maybe referring to a different model drone?

Sounds like the computers/algorithms for switching over due to yaw error are faulty and need to be updated or DJI should be replacing a lot of drones under warranty.

My earlier point of actually learning to fly the drone is a valuable skill when all this automation fails.

 

[CanadaDrone]

No and that's my point - GPS is the automation for drone flying. If you really only want pictures and videos then all the automation is good - but to fly the drone GPS is not necessary.

I am perplexed by all the comments about losing GPS causing a drone to fly into a wall. If you lose GPS then the drone is harder to fly but shouldn't go off on its own and crash.

All the automation is designed to focus on stability, flight aid and image quality. I like to turn off the Visual aids and just fly my MA around to get a feel for flying it.

Let's say the drone is fighting some wind next to a tree, and you suddenly lose GPS - the drone will probably hit the tree before you can react. Or lets say you're flying beyond VLOS, you or your spotter probably won't notice a slight drift and/or you will not know if the drone is fighting any wind - lose GPS and if you are near any obstacles you are almost certainly going to hit them before you react.

Of course GPS isn't necessary for flying, but the stability and ease of flight is the #1 reason why these types of drones are so popular and accessible.

I am more than capable of flying the drone with zero aids, not even attitude hold, but on a $1000-$2000+ drone I have no interest in doing that personally.

If you put it in Sport mode all the obstacle sensors are disabled anyway, and you can have quite a lot of fun without worrying about drift or anything like that.

 

[vanderzyde0]

Hovering in wind very close to an object is the only instance where possibly if you lose GPS you would have an issue.

But I am referring to many people here that conclude because someone lost GPS the drone "flew off at high speed and was not responding to flight inputs and crashed 100 feet away"

 

[CanadaDrone]

Hovering in wind very close to an object is the only instance where possibly if you lose GPS you would have an issue.

But I am referring to many people here that conclude because someone lost GPS the drone "flew off at high speed and was not responding to flight inputs and crashed 100 feet away"

In that case I would agree, the drone isn't going to fly off full-tilt at hard angles as soon as it loses GPS. It's just going to become really unstable (relative to the GPS flight) and be at the mercy of the wind. If that is happening to people there is likely something else at play, either a defective part or maybe they panicked and used aggressive controller inputs without realizing to over correct.

 

[sar104]

I don't see the option on MA to go to ATTI mode per switching - are you using DJI GO 4 software? Maybe referring to a different model drone?

Sounds like the computers/algorithms for switching over due to yaw error are faulty and need to be updated or DJI should be replacing a lot of drones under warranty.

My earlier point of actually learning to fly the drone is a valuable skill when all this automation fails.

It's not an option without changing one of the firmware parameters, but that's easy to do on any of the Mavics.

 

[Drgnfli]

I like UAV Forecast too - but it always says its not good to fly...

Change the settings to whatever comfortable &/or SAFE settings you want on that app. E.G. I don't like to fly when the temp is below 55 degrees F. so I've adjusted that temperature in the settings.

 

[Meta4]

I like UAV Forecast too - but it always says its not good to fly...

Turn down (or off) some of their silly default settings.
Does cloud cover matter to you?
I can't understand why that reduces their rating.
Turn the K-Index off completely.
It's never been shown to have any effect on drones at all.
Adjust the others to suit what you are happy with.

 

[W2EJ]

I like UAV Forecast too - but it always says its not good to fly...

You're right, it's too cautious. It's really a great app though. What you have to do is go into the settings and adjust a few things. For instance, I lowered the temperature to 22 rather than 32. The quad does just fine at lower than 32. You can tweak it here and there.