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Startup with a "Powered On" battery

Have you ever "Hot Swapped" the battery on your Mavic Zoom / Pro

  • NO - I'd be nervous

    Votes: 2 11.8%
  • NO - I've got time to do things properly!

    Votes: 14 82.4%
  • YES - but I'd never admit it in a public poll

    Votes: 1 5.9%
  • YES - this is probably more common than you know

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • YOU sir, are asking for trouble!

    Votes: 3 17.6%

  • Total voters
    17

TreeHugger

Trees - Nature's Drone Magnets!
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I've done this many times without an issue - would like to hear from others their thoughts /experience.
About me - new to drones, not to electronics.
Current opinion is that when removing the battery after having just landed (no power off of battery), then immediately popping in a "powered on" battery is akin to having used the battery power button - only much quicker.
Assume that I've already stopped video recording before the land.
 
I've done this many times without an issue - would like to hear from others their thoughts /experience.
About me - new to drones, not to electronics.
Current opinion is that when removing the battery after having just landed (no power off of battery), then immediately popping in a "powered on" battery is akin to having used the battery power button - only much quicker.
Assume that I've already stopped video recording before the land.
I guess I’m never in that big of a hurry. Grand total of 5 seconds saved?
 
Time saved, not to much depending.
Hurt my drone, probably not.
Pushing the limits where possible - priceless - it keeps me young.
 
When switches make and break (close and open), there will be an arc, more on break than make. The size of the arc is in relation to voltage and current. When removing the battery under load, the battery contacts behave as the switch contacts. Then there is the question of power on and off sequence, as when you shut down or power up a computer, the process is done in an orderly, step by step manner. Yanking the battery doesn't allow this.

Does all this make any difference? Don't know, but it's hardly worth the gamble to me.
 
Hurt my drone, probably not.
Pushing the limits where possible - priceless - it keeps me young.
“Probably” is the key word there. Pulling the power from the computer increases the chances of data corruption. However small, the probability is increased with little benefit. I’m all for pushing boundaries but I need to have an appropriate risk to reward proposition. Risking screwing up the drone by doing something the manufacturer specifically says not to do for a 5 second gain just doesn’t make sense to me.
 
As a retired electronics engineer I can affirm that this is a bad idea. Some electronics are specifically designed for “hot swap” with additional components to tame the current surge and voltage spikes. I doubt the drone is designed for this situation. The chance of turning your drone into a brick is quite high.
 
Wonderful! We shall see if it might adversely affect anything over time - as a former ET myself, still working in tech, I concur with some of the commentary.
However, the 52k relay race isn't going to win itself - seconds count. Yes, I just made that up.

I tend to be hard on my toys and push hard. Ordered a set of "Wet Suits" from from @Phantomrain.org and fully intend to fly high during inclement weather.
Risky? You betcha!
 
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Wonderful! We shall see if it might adversely affect anything over time - as a former ET myself, still working in tech, I concur with some of the commentary.
However, the 52k relay race isn't going to win itself - seconds count. Yes, I just made that up.

I tend to be hard on my toys and push hard. Ordered a set of "Wet Suits" from from @Phantomrain.org and fully intend to fly high during inclement weather.
Risky? You betcha!

I have done it a few times by accident , does not seem to hurt the drone at all. Im sure DJI accounted for those that would do that by accident also. So keep pushing the envelope .

Phantomrain.org
Gear to fly in the rain.
 
"does not seem"
Amazing comment.

To all noobs, don't hot swap! The tec is not designed for it.
I you really want to, do it. And after a few times you may have to buy a new drone. your choice.
 
I have done it a few times by accident , does not seem to hurt the drone at all. Im sure DJI accounted for those that would do that by accident also. So keep pushing the envelope .

Let me Elaborate on my point: When it is Brutally cold outside and were warming the Battery we do sometimes Hot Swap as the wind and the cold can make things difficult , knowing that the battery is on can save you from getting frozen. ;)



Phantomrain.org
Gear to fly in the rain.
 
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Why take the chance with a 1500$ drone, basically the drone is a flying mini-computer, with chips and circuits.
Go ahead, do what you want, but then don't come back and complain that there was a fly-away, GPS not locking, gimbal going wild and a plethora of many other things that can go wrong.
Maybe not show up today, but down the road a few days or weeks, you may be able to trace back the malfunction to that operation. Just my opinion.
 
Why take the chance with a 1500$ drone, basically the drone is a flying mini-computer, with chips and circuits.
Go ahead, do what you want, but then don't come back and complain that there was a fly-away, GPS not locking, gimbal going wild and a plethora of many other things that can go wrong.
Maybe not show up today, but down the road a few days or weeks, you may be able to trace back the malfunction to that operation. Just my opinion.

This is 100% true but the thread is about the OP asking if others have done it , have they had issues , and that no one on the thread that has done it has had any issues.

So that is good to know for those that have done it on accident as that they dont have to worry that there drone is going to blow up. Hot Swapping works well in the extreme Cold so that is when most our likely to do it.
 
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So true - I do things because I can. It seems most have never, or would ever consider this as normal practice. I found this ability on accident as well, @Phantomrain.org , I'm going to continue hot swapping till something breaks.
I'm finding I enjoy repairing drones, and may even take it past the hobby stage, and do it for $. By then, I will have continued the normal usage (some might consider extreme) and will have logged some rainy days as well. Hopefully huge thunderstorms with lots of lightning :)
Thanks everyone for your input & comments!
 
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Why take the chance with a 1500$ drone, basically the drone is a flying mini-computer, with chips and circuits.
Go ahead, do what you want, but then don't come back and complain that there was a fly-away, GPS not locking, gimbal going wild and a plethora of many other things that can go wrong.
Maybe not show up today, but down the road a few days or weeks, you may be able to trace back the malfunction to that operation. Just my opinion.

I think it's a very good point that a failure may not be obvious on power on but cause irrecoverable problems during a flight. With electronics there are no guarantees, you could power something off incorrectly 100 times in a row and it would work fine or you could do it once and kill it. I've worked with technology for many years and seen numerous devices survive unexpected power cut outs but I've seen a small number that haven't, it feels like Russian roulette.

Aside from the risk I'm not understanding how what the OP is proposing is significantly quicker. The Mavic 2 is quick to power down so yanking the battery straight off is going to save at most two seconds as opposed to double pressing power to shut the drone down properly. I'm not understanding how 'powering on' the battery saves any time at all, you're going to need to press the power button anyway and the drone is still going to need time to power up. On a battery change a couple of seconds is nothing against the amount of time the drone needs to land and then take off and fly back to its position which is going to be unchanged.

If the required function is so critical to risk an expensive drone to save a couple of seconds it makes no sense to be using one drone with a risky process, I'd have two and swap them over at different times if it was that important. And if the footage was important I wouldn't be trying to cut corners I'd be double checking everything is right before take off, there are numerous crashes and problems on the crash/flyaway forum where people took off prematurely or didn't do some basic checks which in the air became a problem that they couldn't recover from.
 
I think it's a very good point that a failure may not be obvious on power on but cause irrecoverable problems during a flight. With electronics there are no guarantees, you could power something off incorrectly 100 times in a row and it would work fine or you could do it once and kill it. I've worked with technology for many years and seen numerous devices survive unexpected power cut outs but I've seen a small number that haven't, it feels like Russian roulette.

Aside from the risk I'm not understanding how what the OP is proposing is significantly quicker. The Mavic 2 is quick to power down so yanking the battery straight off is going to save at most two seconds as opposed to double pressing power to shut the drone down properly. I'm not understanding how 'powering on' the battery saves any time at all, you're going to need to press the power button anyway and the drone is still going to need time to power up. On a battery change a couple of seconds is nothing against the amount of time the drone needs to land and then take off and fly back to its position which is going to be unchanged.

If the required function is so critical to risk an expensive drone to save a couple of seconds it makes no sense to be using one drone with a risky process, I'd have two and swap them over at different times if it was that important. And if the footage was important I wouldn't be trying to cut corners I'd be double checking everything is right before take off, there are numerous crashes and problems on the crash/flyaway forum where people took off prematurely or didn't do some basic checks which in the air became a problem that they couldn't recover from.

The OP was simply asking if anyone had any experience with this and most do not , mainly because of the reason you and others point out.
But there our a few of us that do have experience with this , sometimes accidental and at time on purpose.

The glowing theme is if you do it accidentally , there is not need to panic, or send the drone into DJI or get a new battery as its not Russian Roulette , and its not a one time deal breaker by any means because if it was believe me we would of seen it on the forum. So rest easy my accidental or frozen finger friends..as there our those of us testing new waters every day... ;) .
 
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So thanks all - this was setup with the intent of a poll. Please register your choice :). I've allowed flexible options for the poll - you can change your choices.

Further - I shall ease your minds that I do this only with my "extreme drone" the same one that will be flown in rain, storms, ANY type of inclement weather to include sub-zero temperatures.

Register your choice for the poll and stay tuned for success -

Thanks!
 
The OP was simply asking if anyone had any experience with this and most do not , mainly because of the reason you and others point out.
But there our a few of us that do have experience with this , sometimes accidental and at time on purpose.

The glowing theme is if you do it accidentally , there is not need to panic, or send the drone into DJI or get a new battery as its not Russian Roulette , and its not a one time deal breaker by any means because if it was believe me we would of seen it on the forum. So rest easy my accidental or frozen finger friends..as there our those of us testing new waters every day... ;) .

Thanks @Phantomrain.org

Yes - I'll be posting more of what I believe to be the engineering that allows this to occur successfully, without incident. I believe you to be correct in a previous post that stated

"... Im sure DJI accounted for those that would do that by accident "

Accidentally - over and over and over.... :)
 
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