Wanna Take Me Higher, Ya!

[MoToad]

Waaay sub zero around here right now so not doing much flying. But I am still thinking about how to get around the 500M ceiling. Very annoying for me as I live in the mountains. One fella suggested flying to a ledge or whatever, setting down and coming up again to reset the Homepoint. That may work and I may try it. Wondering if there is anyone out there that does this because I do have concerns. Like setting down halfway up a mountain and losing the signal. And would it mean shutting down and restarting doing that. The mountains, up the lake from me here, are heavily treed and lack road access in a lot of places. Thus my reason for being careful with line of sight and all that. Any input on this would be greatly appreciated.

 

[moldorf]

apparently if you have a Mavic 3 and are more than 30 miles from the nearest airport, the latest update sets the ceiling at 1000M...3280 feet

 

[MoToad]

Mavic Air2. Would it apply to that?

 

[akdrone]

Mavic Air2. Would it apply to that?

Nope. Not yet. For $2000 you can lose and replace your Mavic 2 (no clue about the real cost) or for an extra grand get a Mavic Classic But before you do check your area to see if you’re in a 500m limitation zone cause it looks to me like about 80% of the lower 48 is still restricted.

 

[moldorf]

Nope. Not yet. For $2000 you can lose and replace your Mavic 2 (no clue about the real cost) or for an extra grand get a Mavic Classic But before you do check your area to see if you’re in a 500m limitation zone cause it looks to me like about 80% of the lower 48 is still restricted.

I haven't really looked at states other than where I live, Oregon. But half of the state, eastern Oregon doesn't have those restrictions except for 3 or 4 small airports in towns of 4000-8000 people

I'm not sure if private airstrips are exclusion zones

 

[Meta4]

One fella suggested flying to a ledge or whatever, setting down and coming up again to reset the Homepoint.

That's more of a hypothetical solution than a practical one.
Finding a suitable landing spot which also has a clear line of sight you where you are is not easy.

 

[GregS]

Waaay sub zero around here right now so not doing much flying. But I am still thinking about how to get around the 500M ceiling. Very annoying for me as I live in the mountains. One fella suggested flying to a ledge or whatever, setting down and coming up again to reset the Homepoint. That may work and I may try it. Wondering if there is anyone out there that does this because I do have concerns. Like setting down halfway up a mountain and losing the signal. And would it mean shutting down and restarting doing that. The mountains, up the lake from me here, are heavily treed and lack road access in a lot of places. Thus my reason for being careful with line of sight and all that. Any input on this would be greatly appreciated.

You have concerns? I would like to drive 50 in a 30 speed zone; but I don't because it's against the law! You cannot see the drone at that altitude.

 

[MoToad]

Akdrone. I am finally (after three mavics) really happy with the Air2 and Smart controller. Cost is a factor and, altho I could get a fair buck for it after only having it for a year, I am not ready to do that. If they are now allowing a 1000m ceiling for the M3 I can't see why they would not allow it for others.
Moldorf. Up here in the mountains of BC there are barely any restricted zones, aside from airports. It is still a matter of the 500m cutoff.
Meta4. Totally agree. I hope to test it somewhere that I can get to the drone if need be.

 

[MoToad]

You have concerns? I would like to drive 50 in a 30 speed zone; but I don't because it's against the law! You cannot see the drone at that altitude.

I would have thought you could see my point but I will show you in this picture. If you look at the nearest rock outcrop at the top left of the pic you will see where I got stopped. That outcrop is just over 500m from the lake. To be able to climb over that and do a pan shot would have been wonderful.

 

[howardK]

I have a M1P and use NLD software. it has removed all NFZ's and altitude restrictions, but I STILL FLY SAFE AND ADIBE BY THE LAWS

 

[MoToad]

I completely hear ya, howardK. I will look into it. Dronehacks was a complete wash.
Edit: Yep. Like Dronehacks, NLD's list shows nothing but speed increase for my present firmware (.0920). Controller is telling me however, there is an update available. Might as well go ahead and do it. But before that, does anyone know where I can find out what is on the update? No success looking at the DJI support page.

 

[akdrone]

Akdrone. I am finally (after three mavics) really happy with the Air2 and Smart controller. Cost is a factor and, altho I could get a fair buck for it after only having it for a year, I am not ready to do that. If they are now allowing a 1000m ceiling for the M3 I can't see why they would not allow it for others.
Moldorf. Up here in the mountains of BC there are barely any restricted zones, aside from airports. It is still a matter of the 500m cutoff.
Meta4. Totally agree. I hope to test it somewhere that I can get to the drone if need be.

ya...all tongue in cheek .

 

[akdrone]

I completely hear ya, howardK. I will look into it. Dronehacks was a complete wash.
Edit: Yep. Like Dronehacks, NLD's list shows nothing but speed increase for my present firmware (.0920). Controller is telling me however, there is an update available. Might as well go ahead and do it. But before that, does anyone know where I can find out what is on the update? No success looking at the DJI support page.

It's clear to me that DJI does not always provide full disclosure on their updates so I don't think there is any way to know about everything. Unless I missed something the Mavic 3 update that brought Remote ID did not let us know previous to installing it that RID was going to be installed. DJI's website typically has at least some indication of the changes to a firmware update but it seems it can't be trusted to provide full disclosure.

 

[Zbip57]

One fella suggested flying to a ledge or whatever, setting down and coming up again to reset the Homepoint.

Supposedly that will reset the takeoff height to zero, giving you another 500m to climb higher from there. But there are all sorts of risks in doing that.

If the drone is already 500m higher than you, it's unlikely you'll have direct line-of-sight to your chosen landing ledge. You'll be able to see it from your drone's camera view with the camera aimed straight down, but the video and control signal may well be interrupted on the way down. When that happens, the drone will go into its configured failsafe procedure.

If you have it set to Land upon signal loss, the drone will continue straight down to the chosen landing spot, but you'll have no signal to restart the motors and take off again.

If you have failsafe set to its default Return-to-Home, it won't land up there at all, but will instead try to RTH when control signal is lost. Your RTH height should be configured to 500m. If configured to anything lower than that, for example only 60m, and the drone is already well above that height, upon loss of signal it'll just turn straight for Home at whatever height it's currently at. Hopefully it's not behind any trees at that point.

Does your Air2 have obstacle avoidance that'll automatically make it climb during RTH if it encounters trees on the way? Even so, it'll never climb higher than the 500m hard limit. So be careful when nearing that height limit.

 

[Merrill277]

I have an MA2 and have the same problem here in the rockies of Idaho. I was flying to the ceiling and then laterally the rest of the way as I could go no higher. If you do this, you should fly like 40 feet below the ceiling because what if something happens and you suddenly lose contact. You hear this beep beep beep that tells you you are getting too close to something. Because you can't see the monitor what do you do? You can reverse or fly up to avoid a limb or cliff or something. But if you are at your ceiling already, you cannot fly up. So leave some space. Otherwise IDK, it sucks.

 

[MoToad]

Found a solution, but it will cost ya. Or me, for that matter. Someone mentioned the Mav 3 has doubled the ceiling height. Looked into it and sure enough it's true. I love my setup and would be happy to keep it if they would adjust the ceiling. And that might happen, just don't know when. Sooo...looked at the DJI store and can get the Mav 3 with smart controller for 1599. Looked for my Mav Air2 and I guess they are not selling it any more. Just trying to get a price. Found it on Amazon.ca, my setup sans the insurance package and it's going for a whopping 3500 Can. That's with the Smart Controller and Flymore. With tax that's 4 geez up here. Anyhoo today I listed my Mav Air2 for 2 gees Can and will see what happens. it's practically new and only flew it a few times last summer. Having a Mav 3 would be exciting but if I don't get the sale it's no sweat.

 

[howardK]

mine was still the most cost effective though you trade off some of the features.

 

[MoToad]

And again, as I said Howard, that outfit, along with Dronehacks, requires a certain firmware for my MA2 which I am not allowed to roll back to. So it's a nogo. Kinda hoping I can sell the MA2 as the more I see about the Mav3, the more I like. The new cruise control is a big plus. The only downside I can see is it's a bit of a brute.

 

[moldorf]

Sooo...looked at the DJI store and can get the Mav 3 with smart controller for 1599.

you might need to clarify that.

the only Mavic 3 for sale at DJI for $1599 is the Mavic 3 classic. And it doesn't include a 'smart' controller, it comes with the RC-N1; and one battery

now Mavic 3 Classic will get you in the air, and as far as I know it has the update that will bump the ceiling to 1000M as long as you are more than 50KM/30miles from any airport

now I was pretty interested in that increased ceiling since I spend a lot of time camping in very remote areas with lots of cliffs and steep mountains. So I had a couple of online chats with DJI; but I wasn't satisfied, either time, that I was chatting with somebody who really knew what the deal was. The first person said I had to apply for a waiver from DJI before the drone would be released to fly above 500M. I asked if I could apply a couple of weeks in advance since there is no cell service in the areas I fly. The representative wasn't sure and I repeated that having the 1000M ceiling was useless if the drone was locked at 500M.

the 2nd person I chatted with told me, with the stipulation they weren't 100% certain, (big help, right?) the drone would recognize uncontrolled space by GPS location and unlock automatically if it wasn't within 30 miles of any airport. I then asked about private airstrips (which the FAA tracks) and if any private airstrips within the 30 mile radius would prevent the drone from unlocking the 500M ceiling. This is pretty close to how that conversation went:

me: "would a private airstrip with 30 miles prevent the drone from flying up to 3280 feet?"

DJI representative: "I don't know if that would be the case"

me: "is there anybody else there that would know?"

DJI representative: "I don't know if there is anybody here I can ask who would know what I don't know"

That answer kind of drilled it's way into my brain and bounced around till my hard drive crashed. At that point, understandably, I gave up. I figured I'd give it a few months and inquire again when DJI reps might have a much better handle on this feature

 

[MoToad]

This is what I'm seeing:

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store.dji.com