Official Mavic Pro Range Leaderboard!

[CyberNate]

Nate you got video of that return to home with the bounce and flipped over. I hope all is well with the drone though. I think I may have the record for the longest bounce with my p2vp. I think it was 20 out and 12 ft back up. Nate you'll love this

YouTube

Yes, I'll have to upload it. Video had turned itself off on the way back, but luckily I flipped it back on before the very end. I'll check out your video.

 

[CyberNate]

Nate you got video of that return to home with the bounce and flipped over. I hope all is well with the drone though. I think I may have the record for the longest bounce with my p2vp. I think it was 20 out and 12 ft back up. Nate you'll love this

YouTube

That video link of yours doesn't work. Perhaps it's private? I end up in my own video list when I click your link.

 

[Phxbird57]

That video link of yours doesn't work. Perhaps it's private? I end up in my own video list when I click your link.

it is now

 

[Ed209]

Ed you brought up something I've been thinking about. that is air drag. Waxing the top of the mavic maybe and leaving the clear cover on the camera. to me that would be better. The clear cover would be more aerodynamic then with out it. by no meets am I a specialist.

The air pushing against the top of the shell is what causes the most drag because of the angle of attack. The arms are also catching some resistance but definitely not as much as the main body. The P3 was pretty bad with its huge surface area and a "wall" on the front. I actually think db's configuration is best aerodynamically because the external battery is on the bottom and when the Mavic is angled forward, the bottom isn't really catching any drag. But, it's a heatsink so have to consider that. Although, it looks like that didn't really affect performance for DB.

 

[CyberNate]

The air pushing against the top of the shell is what causes the most drag because of the angle of attack. The arms are also catching some resistance but definitely not as much as the main body. The P3 was pretty bad with its huge surface area and a "wall" on the front. I actually think db's configuration is best aerodynamically because the external battery is on the bottom and when the Mavic is angled forward, the bottom isn't really catching any drag. But, it's a heatsink so have to consider that. Although, it looks like that didn't really affect performance for DB.

I was chatting with @Unknown Caller and he also was mounting his 5200mah battery under the heatsink. He said that he burned out one of his downward facing sensors due to overheating. He said that the plate gets so hot that you can't touch it. Perhaps with a small gap cooling could be adequate? I also wanted to move to a mount like DB's, as it seems like the best bet to avoid having batteries in the thrust area as well as for aerodynamic and stability reasons.

 

[Ed209]

I was chatting with @Unknown Caller and he also was mounting his 5200mah battery under the heatsink. He said that he burned out one of his downward facing sensors due to overheating. He said that the plate gets so hot that you can't touch it. Perhaps with a small gap cooling could be adequate? I also wanted to move to a mount like DB's, as it seems like the best bet to avoid having batteries in the thrust area as well as for aerodynamic and stability reasons.

Yeah I think having some separation is key. I've felt the bottom after a long flight and it's VERY hot. I did measure it with an IR thermometer but I forget what the reading was. I think you need enough separation so that the heat sink can do its job and allow some air to pass between the fins and the battery below. I have a few ideas but they would all add weight which sucks. [emoji51]

 

[dirtybum]

i've done quite a few multi thousand foot flights, all three of them that went into critical resulted in uncontrollable landings. If that's the way the Mavic's going to react then I have no business or interest in playing this long distance game with this model!

this time it was straight in, no yaws and at 8% it just went uncontrollable and sideways! this is NOT a characteristic of the other DJI model flight controllers, but for my 0-3 results and cybernate's recent experiences I think there's something present here. I'm tired of EVERY critical resulting in disappointment. Critical SHOULD be manageable! I can be on top of the board, but not without that extra 10% critical flight! So why bother?

 

[CyberNate]

i've done quite a few multi thousand foot flights, all three of them that went into critical resulted in uncontrollable landings. If that's the way the Mavic's going to react then I have no business or interest in playing this long distance game with this model!

this time it was straight in, no yaws and at 8% it just went uncontrollable and sideways! this is NOT a characteristic of the other DJI model flight controllers, but for my 0-3 results and cybernate's recent experiences I think there's something present here. I'm tired of EVERY critical resulting in disappointment. Critical SHOULD be manageable! I can be on top of the board, but not without that extra 10% critical flight! So why bother?

I hear ya DB! Very frustrating! I was lucky to make it back today. I also saw that behavior at 8%, not long after landing mode started. It seems to vary a bit from Mavic to Mavic. Mine's not as bad as yours, but I think Kevin's is much better. He runs his way down without spins and sideways flight.

 

[dirtybum]

The previous p3 & P4 leader board threads have always started out as a resource to help new and experienced flyers gain personal bests and records as well as share the pitfalls of others flights, it's only fair to let new fliers know that a MAJOR percentage of flights that have made it to critical landing have become uncontrollably and have resulted in crash or uncontrolled landings!

This is NOT the norm on the typical phantom flights which are usually predictable & controllable.

 

[dirtybum]

in fact, while on the topic, can we please take a poll? (for new fliers sake)
Anyone who has ever tried to make it home while fighting the critical landing mode, how many have made it smoothly and what's your honest stats?
I'll start... of all 3 flights w/ critical land mode all 3 went sideways & uncontrollable in the last 9%!
(2) stock bat (no extra weight)
(1) external battery

 

[CyberNate]

in fact, while on the topic, can we please take a poll? (for new fliers sake)
Anyone who has ever tried to make it home while fighting the critical landing mode, how many have made it smoothly and what's your honest stats?
I'll start... of all 3 flights w/ critical land mode all 3 went sideways & uncontrollable in the last 9%!
(2) stock bat (no extra weight)
(1) external battery

I've only had 1 time (yesterday) when I couldn't bring it home. The time I lost my Mavic was different, due to main battery switching off. Usually I'm landing at 4% or higher. Yesterday at 3% it was uncontrollable. Today, I had plenty of battery coming in, but it dropped off really fast at the end. I think my external batteries are damaged from yesterday. I also think the direct battery mod makes sub 10% worse because the external batteries run out BEFORE the main due to less resistance and lack of BMS. I discussed this in more detail in the battery mod thread. In the future I'm going to avoid sub 4% landings. 4% is basically really like 1% with external batteries.

 

[Phxbird57]

in fact, while on the topic, can we please take a poll? (for new fliers sake)
Anyone who has ever tried to make it home while fighting the critical landing mode, how many have made it smoothly and what's your honest stats?
I'll start... of all 3 flights w/ critical land mode all 3 went sideways & uncontrollable in the last 9%!
(2) stock bat (no extra weight)
(1) external battery

Dirtybum question did you have a problem with shutting down the motors? my hard landing the other day I could not get the motors to stop.

 

[dirtybum]

I've only had 1 time (yesterday) when I couldn't bring it home. The time I lost my Mavic was different, due to main battery switching off. Usually I'm landing at 4% or higher. Yesterday at 3% it was uncontrollable. Today, I had plenty of battery coming in, but it dropped off really fast at the end. I think my external batteries are damaged from yesterday. I also think the direct battery mod makes sub 10% worse because the external batteries run out BEFORE the main due to less resistance and lack of BMS. I discussed this in more detail in the battery mod thread. In the future I'm going to avoid sub 4% landings. 4% is basically really like 1% with external batteries.

you may think that and I dont know you or what your history of long distance flying is before the Mavic( please share)
but there has been 300+ flights from me as well as 1000+ flights from other veterans on 0-4% landings (a few of us riding 0% for minutes) with phantom models that completely contradict what you're stating about external bat flights!
be careful giving advise to new fliers as fact if its only your opinions/ experiences rather than the average.
external bats dont get damaged from previous flights from running them down to the typical 3.6 per cell.
unless your saying they was damaged in the crash.
what's your long distance history before the Mavic Cybernate?
Did you fly other a/c's long distance?
Was you on the PP forum under a diff name?

 

[dirtybum]

oh and before I get caught up in my own Mavic drama, let me just say congratulations, Nate, for breaking the 10 mile marker. With a 3S Machine, that's something to truly be proud of[emoji41]

 

[dirtybum]

Dirtybum question did you have a problem with shutting down the motors? my hard landing the other day I could not get the motors to stop.

i've had many issues with the Mavic that I had not seen surface with the other phantom models! i'm not surprised that you couldn't shut them down even in an emergency situation, you know with your recent experiences and odd behaviors that the Mavic is a bird all of its own, we can't use our phantom experiences to calculate how this bird is going to behave

 

[digdat0]

I haven't actually ridden the mavic in on autolanding, but based on the notes here I'm getting more and more hesitant to push it below 10%. Frankly, I'd rather get the aircraft back in good working order than post a record, or any new distance as a PR.

Nate and Db - you guys are both on .400 firmware?? WhAt version of dji go 4?

As db said, this characteristic is not normal of other dji aircraft, I'm very used to flying below 5% and autolanding being a tad squirrelly but uncontrollable is just crazy. Heck, i flew my p3 past 0% for 3 minutes a few times, main battery shut off, ran on externals and lost all telemetry .. but that aircraft flew straight and reponded properly to controls. Well, except the one time I flew into a tree .. but in fairness, it was wayy foggy out and when main battery died, I lost camera connection.

This seems to be an issue with how the mavic is routing amps to the motors as part of the software. If I encountered this on a stock mavic, I'd open a case with dji. If it's software, someone has to report it to have it addressed. I think it's the flight controller programming.

 

[CyberNate]

you may think that and I dont know you or what your history of long distance flying is before the Mavic( please share)
but there has been 300+ flights from me as well as 1000+ flights from other veterans on 0-4% landings (a few of us riding 0% for minutes) with phantom models that completely contradict what you're stating about external bat flights!
be careful giving advise to new fliers as fact if its only your opinions/ experiences rather than the average.
external bats dont get damaged from previous flights from running them down to the typical 3.6 per cell.
unless your saying they was damaged in the crash.
what's your long distance history before the Mavic Cybernate?
Did you fly other a/c's long distance?
Was you on the PP forum under a diff name?

you may think that and I dont know you or what your history of long distance flying is before the Mavic( please share)
but there has been 300+ flights from me as well as 1000+ flights from other veterans on 0-4% landings (a few of us riding 0% for minutes) with phantom models that completely contradict what you're stating about external bat flights!
be careful giving advise to new fliers as fact if its only your opinions/ experiences rather than the average.
external bats dont get damaged from previous flights from running them down to the typical 3.6 per cell.
unless your saying they was damaged in the crash.
what's your long distance history before the Mavic Cybernate?
Did you fly other a/c's long distance?
Was you on the PP forum under a diff name?

I already told you previously that I'm relatively new to the hobby. I greatly respect what you veterans of the hobby have achieved and I've learned a great deal from reading your experiences on the other aircrafts.

Regarding my opinions on possible causes, I'm simply parsing the data I have available and trying to make sense of it. It is not a feeling when I measure my batteries after a flight and see deviations that shouldn't be there. How else can you explain greater voltage sag in one battery over another other than internal resistance differences?

Anyway, I'm glad you joined this forum. I watch closely for your posts and your opinions and findings are highly valued and respected.

 

[dirtybum]

well for such a short time you've accomplished a lot, it takes guys like you with a lot of balls and enthusiasm to keep this type of flying & these kind of threads going! my frustration is not with you, it's with this aircraft, there's a lot of things about it that make it ideal for the type of flying we all love. Then there's that one thing that I haven't been able to get past, and you're starting to experience and that's the critical landing.I just hope to make it clear to the new guys that are getting into this and following this thread, that this uncontrollable characteristic that shows up when trying to make it home safely on critical landing can present itself to be very dangerous especially if you're over water or in an area with houses around. We'll keep learning together.
i'm interested to see if this characteristic shows itself if we set the critical landing to a much higher number where our batteries are still have a significant voltage, it would be a worthy test. But now I must rebuild before I can do that test.

 

[MacIak]

well for such a short time you've accomplished a lot, it takes guys like you with a lot of balls and enthusiasm to keep this type of flying & these kind of threads going! my frustration is not with you, it's with this aircraft, there's a lot of things about it that make it ideal for the type of flying we all love. Then there's that one thing that I haven't been able to get past, and you're starting to experience and that's the critical landing.I just hope to make it clear to the new guys that are getting into this and following this thread, that this uncontrollable characteristic that shows up when trying to make it home safely on critical landing can present itself to be very dangerous especially if you're over water or in an area with houses around. We'll keep learning together.
i'm interested to see if this characteristic shows itself if we set the critical landing to a much higher number where our batteries are still have a significant voltage, it would be a worthy test. But now I must rebuild before I can do that test.

Mine did a kamikaze once into the dirt due critical battery..

 

[CyberNate]

I haven't actually ridden the mavic in on autolanding, but based on the notes here I'm getting more and more hesitant to push it below 10%. Frankly, I'd rather get the aircraft back in good working order than post a record, or any new distance as a PR.

Nate and Db - you guys are both on .400 firmware?? WhAt version of dji go 4?

As db said, this characteristic is not normal of other dji aircraft, I'm very used to flying below 5% and autolanding being a tad squirrelly but uncontrollable is just crazy. Heck, i flew my p3 past 0% for 3 minutes a few times, main battery shut off, ran on externals and lost all telemetry .. but that aircraft flew straight and reponded properly to controls. Well, except the one time I flew into a tree .. but in fairness, it was wayy foggy out and when main battery died, I lost camera connection.

This seems to be an issue with how the mavic is routing amps to the motors as part of the software. If I encountered this on a stock mavic, I'd open a case with dji. If it's software, someone has to report it to have it addressed. I think it's the flight controller programming.

I'm running .700 firmware and will update to .800. Latest IOS DJI Go 4 version as well.