The secret to real 28 minute flights discovered

ryo · Apr 26, 2017

The other day i made a test with battery usage normal vs s-mode.
I started from my position with 100% battery and made a flight till reached 80%, then i turned and came back to initial position: at arrival battery was at 69%.
From this simple and quick test i can say that s-mode uses around double battery for same distance so at the end there is an important difference in overall flight minutes even if s-mode is switched just for a few minutes.

AlanTheBeast · Apr 26, 2017

Caveat for anyone interested.

Endurance ≠ Range.

Endurance is always at the vertex of the power curve whereas max range speed lies somewhere to the right as a tangent from the origin to the power curve, with the origin of the tangent line adjusted according to wind.

Out of ground-effect hover (for the purpose of the power curve) of course lies to the left at 0 airspeed (not ground speed).

If I could get out there on a dead calm day and do some measurements I'd publish the power curve and how to use it. But the MP is going back to DJI. Again.

jeffers · Jul 17, 2017

ryo said:
The other day i made a test with battery usage normal vs s-mode.
I started from my position with 100% battery and made a flight till reached 80%, then i turned and came back to initial position: at arrival battery was at 69%.
From this simple and quick test i can say that s-mode uses around double battery for same distance so at the end there is an important difference in overall flight minutes even if s-mode is switched just for a few minutes.

FYI, in sport mode, on the bottom left of your mobile device screen is a small radar showing relative position. There is a small button around the radar that once clicked will show instantaneous power being used. It only displays as a percentage, but I was just doing these tests this afternoon. I am sorry I do not know exactly where they appear, but I was flying a few hours ago and performed these changes. The power only appears in sport mode. Below are my figures from memory. Please do not quote me on these values, as I was just playing around.

Nothing scientific, just curious on a dead calm day. In full forward motion in sport mode, I think I achieved about 30mph and was using about 44% power. Reverse uses the same power at max but only achieved about 18mph, maybe less. Hover was something like 30% while the sweet spot was about 7mph forward flight and used about 22% power.

It has been discussed at length about the asymmetry of the mavic leading to the highest efficiency in forward flight. A great way to achieve efficiency is to set the mavic into fixed wing mode and maintain the forward speed that minimizes power use.