RC Signal Lost Rapidly on/off, faulty controller?

[MrMattSz]

Okay, so starting with a few points.
-I've tried firmware .700, .800 and now .900
-I've recently upgraded from a Phantom 3 Standard to my Mavic Pro
-I'm familiar with correct antenna positioning for best signal
-I'm currently using an iPhone 5S as the device with my remote in Airplane Mode

I'm trying to work out if my issue is a remote with poor signal, or if I am experiencing normal limitations of this drone. I've seen other people with similar problems say they have spoken to DJI and ended up having parts replaced under warranty.
But I've also seen people say other things have helped them and nothing needed replacing.

There are 3 scenarios that I have experienced.
1. Attempting to fly my Mavic over a construction site (at this stage flat land) in a suburban area, about 30 minutes away from the city and any high buildings.
I got 50m up almost directly above me and couldn't reach 60m without RC Signal loss, but it wasn't consistent, it would flick on and off rapidly. Video signal was dropping in an out as well. I had a reasonable proximity to power lines, but there weren't any directly between me and the drone.

2. Flying my Mavic from a house across a valley with a few houses where I start from, but the middle and the other side of the valley has nothing but grass, with a few houses on the very far side. I got about 300m away before RC Signal loss flicking on and off rapidly, this time video signal seemed fine.

3. Flying my Mavic from the centre of a large park, over a golf course. I could get as far as 600m away, started getting RC Signal Loss on/off from about 400-450m onwards, but the drone still responded until 600m and the video transmission continued uninterrupted the whole time.

Does this sound like a faulty controller?

Something else?

Can I provide any more info that might help work out what's going on?

Or is this just normal?

Thanks for reading!

 

[Crótach]

Hi,

I was just going to start a similar thread when I saw this! I have the same issue.

Got my mavic a month ago, tried it a couple of times at home and everything worked fine. Flew around a small city where I live, so there is plenty of interference around and no issues.

Now I'm on holidays and the first time i started the drone it kept disconnecting rapidly, like every couple of seconds, even though I was standing right next to it! Managed to take off and then it lost connection as it was above me. Didn't get to fly anywhere and I managed to land it by hitting the home button on the remote. For some reason the remote was not showing a disconnect, only the phone app. I'm using android 7.1 and oneplus 3t.

Then I tried again yesterday in the alps, mavic took off, made some movies of the waterfalls below me, all was good until i tried to bring it back. It was in the middle of landing when it got disconnected and flew off in the air to hover near some trees, about 4-5 meters away from the takeoff site and completely inaccessible. I was walking around the path trying to get a signal to bring it to land and it just kept hovering in the wrong location. Precision take off tick box was selected, so that's another point that doesn't work well.

Somehow it got connected to the remote but not the app, and i managed to land it manually.

Every time I fly it now, it gives me a heart attack. I packed it up and I'm not going to use it anymore on holidays.

Is there anything I can try when I get home? Firmware downgrade, different cable or anything?

I bought it new on ebay, but when i tried to register with dji they said it comes from an unauthorized reseller and they dont offer any warranty so i am screwed at the moment.

 

[logge]

Hi,

I encountered a very similar experience today. I have been flying my Mavic for about two months in France without any problems at all, mostly in remote areas and have been able to fly several kilometers away from my position without any problems.

Today I went to Sweden to visit my parents and of course I brought the Mavic along. They live on the countryside with only a couple of houses nearby so you can understand my surprise when I got a strong interference warning when turning on the drone. It went away and I thought it was just something temporary, so I launched the drone. What then happened was that I lot the video feed while the drone was hovering just a few meters in front of me. All controls were still responding though. I immediately landed it.

A little bit later in the evning I decided to do another attempt. This time the drone took off, then lost signal completely (first video, then controls).

Then all of a sudden it shot straight up in the sky, and started flying slowly away from me. Not realizing at the moment that it was the automatic return to home that had kicked in, I panicked and tried to wildly control it with the remote but to no avail. Fortunately, it soon started to return to the take off location and started to descend. Finally in the last few meters I regained the connection and landed it as fast as I could.

A little bit later I tried to test the connection but without taking off by walking around with the remote in the garden. This time I had no problem whatsoever with the connection or the video feed.

I'm now wondering what could cause such strong interference that the connection is lost even when the remote is within meters of the aircraft?

As I already mentioned the house is in the country side, so I really don't understand what could cause this.

Only things I can think of:

- wifi was enabled on my phone and possibly connected to the wifi in the house
- there is a high voltage power cable about 500 meters from the house

I'll try it again tomorrow in another area.

Here are the flight logs:

Airdata UAV - Flight Data Analysis for Drones

Thanks

 

[Crótach]

I'm thinking of trying airplane mode on the phone to reduce interference and a different usb cable.

Planning another trip to the alps but i won't be launching the drone without a lot of clearance

 

[logge]

I tried mine again this morning in the same location and now it worked flawlessly... Then a little bit later, tried it again and the signal was again lost. Very confusing...

 

[MrMattSz]

Hey everyone, I talked to DJI Support and they had me try a specific list of things to try in order, and it seems to have maybe fixed my problem!

I just tested it out the front of my work, numerous wifi networks around me, right next to power lines etc, and I got to my 120m height limit easily with half signal still on the remote (instead of it dropping at 50m like last time). This was with my iPhone 5S in Airplane mode with WiFi on.

I will confirm in the next day or two when I get a chance to go to a proper park again, but for anyone who's wondering, here are the steps I was told to go through.

-Log out of app.
-Delete/Uninstall App (Remove any data if possible such as on Android)
-Re-download app.
-Login.
-Backup SD Card contents and then format.
-Update (or refresh) firmware again with the Desktop App, first on the Aircraft, then the Remote Controller.
-Relink the controller, either manually or with the app.

That's it!
I had my doubts, but it seems to have made a massive difference so far, will report back with how I go longer distance wise.

Cheers.

 

[Crótach]

Thanks for the reply!

I'll try this when I get home next week. For now the mavic stays packed so he doesn't fly off into the alps

 

[logge]

For me the issue definitely seems to have been mostly with the app and/or the usb cable.

I have now been flying it dozens of times in the same location. Switching to another cable seems to have improved the problem, but not completely removed it. However, in the few instances when I still experience signal loss when starting up the Mavic, simply restarting the app one or a few times seems to fix it.

I did not experience any loss of signal during flight.

 

[vastshadow]

hello, im having the same problem with the phantom 3 Standard Drone. I can fly up-to 100m then i get full RC Signal loss. The RTH Feature shoots the drone up-to 300m in the air and fly's back to my home-point. I have no idea what do to, DJI patched where we cant change channels frequents and cant rollback up a past update without the error an error message. Please help