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My Experience in "HIGH" Winds!

Joined
Dec 2, 2019
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Age
33
Location
Long Island, NY
Hello everyone. Good day. A quick experience from my personal flying in High Winds.

I flew tonight here in Long Island, NY in 25mph-35mph winds. First battery I took it about 2000ft away from me and stayed in flight for about 20mins.

It returned to me no problem.

My second Battery I took it up to about 277ft and did a 15sec Timelapse in a Position moving away from me at 2mph.

It was a mistake! By the end of the 12min flying for the timelapse, I tried bring it back to me with about 40% battery left. I switched it to Sport Mode for it to cover the 3500ft return. It struggled to go even 15mph and randomly stopped and went and it didn't fly normally as my past flights.

I believe the first flight had shifted the blades out off position slightly and my second flight made it move even more.

Please do not fly in these high winds. I was able to recover my drone 2 blocks away from me with just 2% battery life left. I used my camera and brightened it to see EVERYTHING on the ground, took a mental note off where it was going and allowed it to go.

I hopped in my car, took my controller and drove to the location where it was. I found it hovering between a house and 2 tree's...about 5ft were between it. I could say I am extremely lucky to have gotten back my Mavic 2 Pro.

Please do learn from this experience. Every battery change, check your blades!
 
Hello everyone. Good day. A quick experience from my personal flying in High Winds.

I flew tonight here in Long Island, NY in 25mph-35mph winds. First battery I took it about 2000ft away from me and stayed in flight for about 20mins.

It returned to me no problem.

My second Battery I took it up to about 277ft and did a 15sec Timelapse in a Position moving away from me at 2mph.

It was a mistake! By the end of the 12min flying for the timelapse, I tried bring it back to me with about 40% battery left. I switched it to Sport Mode for it to cover the 3500ft return. It struggled to go even 15mph and randomly stopped and went and it didn't fly normally as my past flights.

I believe the first flight had shifted the blades out off position slightly and my second flight made it move even more.

Please do not fly in these high winds. I was able to recover my drone 2 blocks away from me with just 2% battery life left. I used my camera and brightened it to see EVERYTHING on the ground, took a mental note off where it was going and allowed it to go.

I hopped in my car, took my controller and drove to the location where it was. I found it hovering between a house and 2 tree's...about 5ft were between it. I could say I am extremely lucky to have gotten back my Mavic 2 Pro.

Please do learn from this experience. Every battery change, check your blades!

Im trying to wrap my head around the Blades shifting out of position, when it comes to extreme winds 35 mph and up the legs can fold up causing the blades to scuff up , which is the reason we utilize the Stopper in the Mavic Wet Suit so that the legs do not fold in upon themselves in critical wind shifts .

You will find that lowering your drone as low as you can before shifting into sport mode is going to give you the best execution of getting the drone back in high winds.

One rule we abide by in the storms is not going any higher than 100 ft as those winds can gain serious momentum the higher you go so best to brave the winds an minimal altitude .

Notice the stopper slide into place keeping the legs from bending in .


Phantomrain.org
Gear to fly in and out of the storm
Coal



Screen Shot 2019-12-14 at 9.56.41 PM.png
 
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So what happened my drone was going to RTH while I was flying it back to me. I was flying at 277ft. My RTH Alt is set to 120m...so I think your reply may have actually happened in moving my blades. I was flying fine before it decided to RTH. Can you please direct me to blades that can lock into place? I just brought 4 pairs of blades earlier this week. I just have them because they are very difficult to get in Best Buy.
 
So what happened my drone was going to RTH while I was flying it back to me. I was flying at 277ft. My RTH Alt is set to 120m...so I think your reply may have actually happened in moving my blades. I was flying fine before it decided to RTH. Can you please direct me to blades that can lock into place? I just brought 4 pairs of blades earlier this week. I just have them because they are very difficult to get in Best Buy.

Ok that makes sense , so its not the blades that lock into place if you look on the Wet Suits you will see the Two Knobs and they slide and lock into place in between where the legs fold up.
You can see it better in the Trauma 1 Red and black Wet Suit as the compression band locks them in place an also serves to cover the Vents some.

When you go to fold your drone back up you just slide them back on top and use theme to secure your blades when putting it into a case.
What is nice about Knobs is they dont put any pressure on the blades but just keep them inside and out of the way.

Screen Shot 2019-03-27 at 7.57.02 PM.png
 
This is how my drone looked when I landed it to recover it!! So I should definitely not fly too high and far in these high winds? The highest point in my area is my local hospital at about 70ft. I do however hover over 100ft after launch before flying away from me.
 
I believe the first flight had shifted the blades out off position slightly and my second flight made it move even more.
It's extremely unlikely that your propeller blades shifted.
Wind effects are not complicated.
Imagine you can row your boat at 4 miles/hr and you want to row upstream in a current that's flowing at 5 mph.
 
No image.
It looked like the image from Phantomrain.org. The blades weren't in the original positions. Next time I shall take a photo but most likely, I hope not to have this problem again. Not long ago I flew again but I limited my height to 150ft and kept it above me to get a Timelapse of the moon and clouds. ?
 
It looked like the image from Phantomrain.org. The blades weren't in the original positions. Next time I shall take a photo but most likely, I hope not to have this problem again. Not long ago I flew again but I limited my height to 150ft and kept it above me to get a Timelapse of the moon and clouds. ?
Ok, well I still have no idea what you’re talking about: the blades (propellers), or the arms that fold out and carry the motors?
 
It looked like the image from Phantomrain.org. The blades weren't in the original positions. Next time I shall take a photo but most likely, I hope not to have this problem again. Not long ago I flew again but I limited my height to 150ft and kept it above me to get a Timelapse of the moon and clouds. ?
It couldn't fly properly with the prop blades like that.
It would be hopelessly out of balance.
The props are well designed and work well.
 
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Ok, well I still have no idea what you’re talking about: the blades (propellers), or the arms that fold out and carry the motors?
The propeller's. I recreated in the image below how I recovered my drone. Notice the propeller's are not in the original positions. That was how it looked. The drone could not fly properly. The max speed I reached was 15mph and it suddenly would just stay still, move about 5mph-7mph then it stopped. After a while it started to fly about 2mph and it decided to land wherever it was. It was basically stuggling.

I did a timelapse for 13mins. I used the Lock Direction and set the speed to 2mph...over time it consistently moved (in distance) away from me. I flew 277ft during this. I had less than 40% battery left trying to get it back. Sport Mode on a normal day would have gotten it back to me in less than 1min. My RTH percentage was set to 30%. Things got even more worse when it went into RTH automatically because it was set to 120m or 394ft.

That's when I started to have that drop in speeds. I cancelled the RTH to fly it myself again. How can I upload my flight log for this specific flight? Maybe someone can understand what really happened through that? ?
 

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The propeller's. I recreated in the image below how I recovered my drone. Notice the propeller's are not in the original positions. That was how it looked. The drone could not fly properly. The max speed I reached was 15mph and it suddenly would just stay still, move about 5mph-7mph then it stopped. After a while it started to fly about 2mph and it decided to land wherever it was. It was basically stuggling.

I did a timelapse for 13mins. I used the Lock Direction and set the speed to 2mph...over time it consistently moved (in distance) away from me. I flew 277ft during this. I had less than 40% battery left trying to get it back. Sport Mode on a normal day would have gotten it back to me in less than 1min. My RTH percentage was set to 30%. Things got even more worse when it went into RTH automatically because it was set to 120m or 394ft.

That's when I started to have that drop in speeds. I cancelled the RTH to fly it myself again. How can I upload my flight log for this specific flight? Maybe someone can understand what really happened through that? ?
Your props will have been ok but you just found out about how a headwind affects flight.
Also RTH is a slow driver and you can fly faster yourself.
I don't have the instructions for posting data on my phone but look around the forum and you'll find other threads where people explain it.
 
It couldn't fly properly with the prop blades like that.
It would be hopelessly out of balance.
The props are well designed and work well.
Your props will have been ok but you just found out about how a headwind affects flight.
Also RTH is a slow driver and you can fly faster yourself.
I don't have the instructions for posting data on my phone but look around the forum and you'll find other threads where people explain it.
It was definitely flying against the winds. On ground there were very strong gusts. I am trying to locate my flight record for it. I viewed it on the DJIGo4 app and the time stamps all changed ?
 
The propeller's. I recreated in the image below how I recovered my drone. Notice the propeller's are not in the original positions. That was how it looked. The drone could not fly properly. The max speed I reached was 15mph and it suddenly would just stay still, move about 5mph-7mph then it stopped. After a while it started to fly about 2mph and it decided to land wherever it was. It was basically stuggling.
I'm wondering about your comment regarding the prop's not being in the original positions? Note that the prop' blades swing forward & back on the hinge pin that holds the blade to the plate-set which latches into the motor. When the blades are spun by the motors, then centrifugal force will align them 180 degrees apart. If you are using prop's that don't allow the blades to swing on the hinges as they should - then I'd suggest that you may be using 3rd party inferior prop's. The hinge pins should not allow the blade to 'flop' up and down, but should allow you to push the blade easily forward & back in the plane of its rotation.
 
I suspect the prop positions the OP is suggesting occur after shutdown and NOT inflight. Otherwise the craft would have a prop imbalance condition far outweighing the high wind issue. Suggest that in marginal wind conditions that all flying is performed upwind of your location so the prevailing wind assists your return instead of hindering.
 
I think the OP was very lucky to recover the drone. This flight was marked by bad decisions at every turn. The first was to plan to fly far downwind on a stiff breeze. Once in the air, the OP chose to ignore multiple "High wind -- land ASAP!" warnings. Insufficient experience resulted in an attempt to return at high altitudes--where the wind was even more fierce. The situation was truly dire. The drone was perilously close to being simply blown away like a balloon; indeed had the connection failed, it would have.

There was nothing wrong with the aircraft at any time. The notion that a "propeller shifted out of position" is--sorry OP--beyond dubious. Propellers either work or they fail catastrophically. There's really no middle-ground that allows the bird to continue flight.

I'm reminded of people who buy a 4WD vehicle and believe they're thus somehow invincible. They drive like a bat-outta-* when it's icy and--surprise!--they are the first to go in the ditch. That is to say, ignorance of the capabilities and limits of the technology you're commanding--paired with unwarranted confidence--is a sure path to disaster.

P.S.: I think I’ll donate that last sentence to the analysts here (especially @sar104, @Meta4, and @BudWalker), who seem to be dealing with an uptick in blow-away events lately including—but not limited to—Mavic Minis.
 
Last edited:
when the motors stop, inertia will cause the props to carry on moving in relation to the hub hinge point this is perfectly normal
 
Hello everyone. Good day. A quick experience from my personal flying in High Winds.

I flew tonight here in Long Island, NY in 25mph-35mph winds. First battery I took it about 2000ft away from me and stayed in flight for about 20mins.

It returned to me no problem.

My second Battery I took it up to about 277ft and did a 15sec Timelapse in a Position moving away from me at 2mph.

It was a mistake! By the end of the 12min flying for the timelapse, I tried bring it back to me with about 40% battery left. I switched it to Sport Mode for it to cover the 3500ft return. It struggled to go even 15mph and randomly stopped and went and it didn't fly normally as my past flights.

I believe the first flight had shifted the blades out off position slightly and my second flight made it move even more.

Please do not fly in these high winds. I was able to recover my drone 2 blocks away from me with just 2% battery life left. I used my camera and brightened it to see EVERYTHING on the ground, took a mental note off where it was going and allowed it to go.

I hopped in my car, took my controller and drove to the location where it was. I found it hovering between a house and 2 tree's...about 5ft were between it. I could say I am extremely lucky to have gotten back my Mavic 2 Pro.

Please do learn from this experience. Every battery change, check your blades!
fully agree with you I always do it even if the wind is not so strong.
 
OP- add to your list of rules when flying:
always fly INTO the wind at the beginning of the flight, that way when the battery is low and it is time to turn around you will have the wind helping bring your baby back home. If you do the reverse, you need to realize that the RTH battery calculation will be inaccurate as it has been flying 'with' the wind and when you go to turn around it will suddenly lose time.
 
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