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With all the lost drones im being paranoid and mabye too cautious

DrizzyDrones

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So i find myself with alot of days i wont fly because of wind even tho lot of times it probably isn’t a problem but if i keep waiting on no wind situations my flying is gonna be alot less. Lol but im new to the hobby and even tho i am very confident in my ability and ive done enough reading to where I believe I would be able to not panic and give me the best chancees to recover in a bad situation (panic causes everything to go bad lol) however with all the lost drone posts i am hesitant with wind. I was thinking about taking one of those cheap gps trackers that take a sim card and attaching it to the mini at least I would get actual location a Opposed to the last known. Ive read something about someone putting one
Of those cheap Bluetooth tracker things like for lost keys that might work too starting from the last known location and keep trying to connect but i picked up a tracker from wish that takes a sim I use it on my dog when in the Woods.. they are really cheap but believe it or not they work and they are just big enough to fit a sim card in . Id feel safer to gain the confidence and get the feel for exactly what wind is ok and what it cant handle any thoughts?
 
These sim trackers might be too heavy for the mini.

The trackimo might fit on the top of a MM (back towards the battery cover) with velcro, you can't place it on the front as this would affect the gps antenna.
 
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So i find myself with alot of days i wont fly because of wind even tho lot of times it probably isn’t a problem but if i keep waiting on no wind situations my flying is gonna be alot less. Lol but im new to the hobby and even tho i am very confident in my ability and ive done enough reading to where I believe I would be able to not panic and give me the best chancees to recover in a bad situation (panic causes everything to go bad lol) however with all the lost drone posts i am hesitant with wind.

You can get some wind experience by practicing fly into the wind in a safe area and see how the mini behaves upwind at different altitudes. If you run into problems, lower your altitude and manually fly downwind home. If you fly upwind in "cine" or "position" mode you can pump it up to "sport" mode if you have to to help hold your position, then you can then safely fly downwind to live and fly another day. It's a good thing to practice plus you get out flying and learning rather than waiting for still days.
 
What you also have to remember is that there might be 100's of people posting they lost their MM in the wind but how many people have flown with no problems.. I have 100+ flights on my MM and because I haven't lost it I havent posted about it.. definitely worth checking the wind as part of your pre flight.. and take note of high wind warnings and reduce altitude or land but the MM is fun and will withstand a bit..
 
What you also have to remember is that there might be 100's of people posting they lost their MM in the wind but how many people have flown with no problems.. I have 100+ flights on my MM and because I haven't lost it I havent posted about it.. definitely worth checking the wind as part of your pre flight.. and take note of high wind warnings and reduce altitude or land but the MM is fun and will withstand a bit..

This post is so true! Take all forums with a grain of salt, and also thinking about some only join because of a problem, so it alters the percentage of the actual people who have issues. I belong to two motorcycle forums, if I went by the problems posted, I would never buy a motorbike, because they all break down, on a regular basis. In reality, combined between all of my bikes, i haven't had a single issue, that wasn't caused by me crashing it, in the last decade, besides a dead battery. Another consideration for the mini, is that for many, it is a first drone, thus they learn on it, and do foolish things. If it were their second, third, or fourth drone, and they learned on something else, their mini would be less likely to get crashed. My daughter's first car was an old beat up Honda Accord, something to learn on, before she got her current car, because some more dings in the Accord wasn't a big deal, she only paid $4200 for it. First winter she hit the ditch and crumpled the right front fender on it, I pulled it out with my Jeep, and off she went. After two years of driving it, she sold it for $3900, and hasn't scratched her new car so far, a 2019 Subaru WRX, she also drives my vehicles regularly.
My point is simply that for myself and many others, the mini is our first drone, and we learn on it, which greatly impacts the crash rates, because we screw up learning.
 
Personally as with EyesWideShut I think practical experience is irreplacable. Even if you have the knowledge I'd suspect many people will have an "oh sugar" moment when encountering a problem for real for the first time. I too would suggest practise, in a breeze, in an open safe place is a good idea. (The response if RTH is triggered within 20m of home is a prime example, that for me was an OH SUGAR moment with my P3 adv as it would have landed on a STEEP slope )
Remember, in a wide open and safe place, you can alway land it 'whereever' if even the low wind prove too strong.
I had the idea of trying my Mini in wind with a strong nylon thread tether, probably 100m of thread, it worked but I was stupid enough to do it in an area surrounded by obstacles one of which ultimately snagged the tether. A taut tether will tend to pull a being-blown-away-drone down so be aware of this.
If I try it again, as an experiment, in a WIDE OPEN area I think I will attach paper clips to the tether at 1 or 2 metre intervals below the drone ( maybe 5 in total) as I did have some concerns about the tether thread (when loose) not falling fast enough when the drone was descending and possbly use a fishing rod and reel as winding the thread onto a 'bobbin' was tedious
 
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Practise makes perfect. Take your mini out on a breezy day, open clear space, take off (not very high, say 20-30ft) fly it into the wind, any problems, land, and pick up mini.

And any other variations …… Do not over complicate matters.

Have some fun, take a little risk.
 
I agree 100% which is the point of why i was thinking about having a “failsafe” Locator so even if it was lost and dead battery id still have the precise location of it. And I was only intending on using it on the windy days while feeling the drones limits call it a wind training wheel. Newfoundland has alot of wind being an island and can change in a blink. Let me ask you guys the whole wind warning alert I think its in effective because how do you know when its a serious one.. lots of flghts pop that warning up and conditions are pretty good.. seems like a small gust will issue wind warning.. i think it should be less sensitive and mabye alert once the drone gets carried a certain distance say a ft or something. What exactly induces a wind warning now seems like Doesnt take much and lots of videos people ignore it because its so often lol
 
And i lm not Trying Be over complicating But im not concerned about the wind when in an open field or low and close flying lol it’s when a breezy day turns really windy mid flight and your km from home pt over trees I wouldn’t mind attaching a beacon on riskier flights or longer range it can go from dead clam to real windy quick closer to the coast ya go .. I wouldn’t want payload restriction because of it tho.
 
I am inclined to agree that there do appear to be a lot of wind warnings but the thing is we do not really know what wind it is encountering up there.
A numeric indication of the wind speed or its air speed might be useful and possible since it seems to me it has to 'know' its airspeed to hold its position but, as an alternative, I would like to see the addition of a way to switch into ATTI mode i.e. position holding off, so that we can see the drift caused by the wind.
The Phantom 3 Adv & Pro have this and I find it useful for judging the wind speed "up there", it's scared the do daa out of me at times to see it but it is useful.
 
But it does kinda make it less effective of you took every wind warning telling you to lower and come home seriously you wouldn’t have very much flying. If it was only when you had serious wind then u would know “**** wind warning better change something “ it Could be so dji can come back at people and say they were given a wind warning.. lol but based on the fact I probably get a Cpl wind warning on every flight Its hard to take it as a real warning system. I wouldn’t want a boat that set off alert systems that boat is taking on water every time it rained its like the boy who cried wolf and then when it is a real serious situation u ignore it and mini blows away ... so I just judge it from ground and uav app but there are definitely times when it is not windy at ground but up a cpl hundred feet it’s gusting
 
Even with high wind warning my MM holds position like a champ. Almost every flight I see wind warning(living on island) but never had a slight blowaway(have around 270 flights). I fly it every time I want to take a good shot even in really windy situation. Never had any problems. I always fly in sport mode and usually above sea(filming ships)
 
What you also have to remember is that there might be 100's of people posting they lost their MM in the wind but how many people have flown with no problems.. I have 100+ flights on my MM and because I haven't lost it I havent posted about it.. definitely worth checking the wind as part of your pre flight.. and take note of high wind warnings and reduce altitude or land but the MM is fun and will withstand a bit..

I have flown 20+ flights where the Florida wind picked up really quick while in flight, some as high as 25+ mph. I had no problems bringing it in, it just took a little longer and I had to slow it down prior to landing. The MM handles wind really good, constantly counteracting the gusts.
 
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I have flown 20+ flights where the Florida wind picked up really quick while in flight, some as high as 25+ mph. I had no problems bringing it in, it just took a little longer and I had to slow it down prior to landing. The MM handles wind really good, constantly counteracting the gusts.

It may feel that way to you, but the MM is actually very underpowered and doesn't handle wind at all well compared to the other Mavics.
 
Tbh anything adding weight to the Mavic Mini should be ruled out unless really really needed.

I've been much more confident now that we've been given the option to land the MM beyond RC connection. Should I be unable to return the little being I've trained my mind on quickly setting the Landing option for Signal loss and proceed to go on with the wind flow and land in a suitable place for later recovery: in this instance when going beyond objects or losing connection the drone completes the landing by itself and even if I don't have the most accurate landing position I have a very limited patch of land to search on, thus providing the best chances of recovery, hopefully before someone else's recovery.
 
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