R.I.P Phantom (I didn't even have time to name him)
2I decided it would be a good idea to go pick up my good pal @Ignorant and go fly our our Phantoms. It had recently rained so the clouds were pretty low today. I had a great plan, we shall go try flying through the clouds with my shiny new GoPro & Gimbal and make a cool video to show off on @garyhgaryh 's new video section. I calibrated my compass. Waited for the GPS to lock,at least I think i did, I was pretty excited to fly so this memory is a little foggy. Pressed record and took off. He got it so high, he was just a spec in the sky. I looked down at my controller to make sure I was in Home Lock just in case and when I looked up, I couldn't find him. At first I was stoked. I made it through the cloud cover, DOPE! This is going to be great! I left it up there for a bit and rotated around so I would get a 360 video of what he was seeing. After about 20 seconds I got nervous and started bringing him down. I guess my brain decided it was a great time to become dyslexic because after about 3-4 seconds I realized I was pulling down on the right stick. It's ok, I thought, I'm in Home Lock mode so It should just be pulling back to its center so I figure it has to be right above me still. I was kind of freaking out at this point as I was pulling down on the left stick expecting it to poke through the clouds at any moment. Sadly, it never did. The area we are in is about the worst place, other than the ocean sorry @snapster, to crash. Its very hilly and covered with foliage (is that the word?) um, green stuff, and trees, lots of trees. 
After giving it some thought we figure I must have never gotten a solid GPS lock before taking off so Home Lock wasn't really working. So when I was pulling back on the right stick (after having just done a few 360 spins) it just flew off in one direction for about 5 seconds then when I pulled back on the left stick, maybe I was panicking and pulled all the way past the little click and it probably dropped from the sky. Who knows?
I read all the warnings and I thought I was being careful and I thought there was no way this could possibly happen to me. I'm feeling pretty stupid right about now and I hope you will read this and remember to always verify a GPS lock because I really think I just got too excited and neglected to double check that it was ready to fly safely. I also probably should have waited till I saved for an FPV setup before flying out of my line of sight, but them clouds were calling me!
Hindsight's a bitch.
Rest In Peace lil guy!
This was him on his first flight. :(
P.S. The GoPro is still recording if it wasn't destroyed in the fall.
- 8 comments, 27 replies
- Comment
Sorry for your loss pal.
Thanks @Ignorant . I should have cut my losses and gone home when I stained my brand new M logo shirt at breakfast.
Shit that sucks. I try to tell myself each flight is the last and even calculate how much per hour of fun I've got invested but man that doesn't work on a first flight.
I've heard of others using cell based locator beacons. It's been nagging me that I don't have that on mine - maybe something for a different thread out of respect for the missing here. :(
edit: oh I misread and thought it was first flight. so if it's any consolation try the cost/flight-time calc and see how much your fun cost you per hour.
@snapster Thanks! Thats a good way of looking at it. It was definately worth it overall. It been fun and I'll get another at aome point.
@crapstick That's terrible. It's like I lost a buddy! If you flew straight up, pulling the stick back when it's right above you it's just going to go around in circles I believe. Pulling the left stick back past the detent will kill the motors. Did you enable IOC mode before you flew it? Man, I feel for you. When I first flew it I was worried about flyaways and tried to learn everything I can before I went off on a journey. I only flew it in my back yard and no higher than a 20 sec count of vertical space. As I got familiar with the controls, I started flying further and further (and higher and higher) away. Now I can fly it and have it disappear.. Put it in Home lock and have it come back to me.. Wish you had put a GPS tracker on that sucker... I got mine but haven't set it up yet...
@garyhgaryh Yes. I had IOC mode enabled and i have tested it and I know it worked. I just did a few stupid things in a row that would have caused it to fail.
@crapstick I caught myself getting mixed up with the left and right levers. It's a common problem I bet. I once tried lowering my phantom with the right stick, but I ended up losing sight of it and got confused, then hit HL to find me. Looks like u did that, but you had clouds obsuring the drone.
Just curious, after you calibrated the compass, did you see any red lights amongst green blinks?
@garyhgaryh After calibrating the compass, it flashed green confirming it worked. My problem is that I don't think I gave it enough time to grab its home location before I took off, so holding back even with homelock enabled just took it further away instead of circling. I was like a stupid impatient kid. Lesson learned.
@crapstick Once you have the green flashing lights and launch, then a home position was established. I'm not sure how you would confirm it, but you an also set one of your unused position as fail safe and see if it returns to you (or you can turn off the remote). Do you plan on buying another one?
Sorry, @garyhgaryh I don't think I was clear enough. I confrimed the compass locked but didnt confirm the GPS locked to enough satellites. It was probably still searching when I blasted off. I will definately get another one. These things are way too much fun.
@garyhgaryh I mean the atti switch up&down 5 times then rotate process.
@crapstick Got it.. After I do that (the compass config), I put it down and wait for the rapid green flashing lights (they say about 20 of them). Sometimes I think I missed the sequence so I make sure there are no red lights (which means over 7 or 8 satellite). I hope you get oen quick because I always enjoyed your post (don't disappear on us).
@crapstick Sorry for your loss.
With your next one, you can make seeing the rapid fire green flash (home locked) part of your takeoff checklist, then practice using the failsafe a few times so you have some faith in it. I need to do this myself.
Later hopefully it's habit, so if you ever lose it you can remember through the panic to turn off the tx and let it fly itself home. Or set your third mode position switch to failsafe if turning off the tx is scary.
@djslack when i get another one, I will have a pre flight checklist tattoed to my good arm. This will never happen again. At least I will never admit it again. 😁
@garyhgaryh Thanks! I'm already searching around for my next one. Maybe I should have a dead homie carwash to raise funds. Lol!
@djslack Believe it or not. That was the first time I ever lost track of it and also the first time I forgot to wait for the green lights. I would call it bad luck but it was mostly carelessness.
I'm sorry for your loss. At least you have an excellent photo to remember him by.
I appreciate the hopeless feeling you must have. I commend you for what seems like a good attitude about it. Cheers, mate.
@ruouttaurmind LOL! Thanks. Thats awesome.
@crapstick yeah I really like your attitude. Most people blame the phantom. You looked back and blamed yourself and had such a positive outlook on such a negative event that I think you're generally a happy person. This will probably not stop you from getting another one. And I bet you're not gonna let this happen again! On this YouTube video I watch weeks ago, this guy on the video seems to have cut off his motors in flight and blamed the phantom for just dropping out of the sky like a brick. I'll look for the video this weekend and post it here.
@crapstick you should go back with @ignorants phantom or your soon to be new one and do surveillance on the entire area. If it's caught up in a tree you may find it. This guy lost his in the forest and did this with his new replacement phantom. Took footage home and saw a white spec on top of a tree. Went to investigate and found it after five months. It had snowed and rained in that time, but it started right up with charged batteries! I'll also look for that video.
@garyhgaryh Thanks for the kind words. I'm really bummed, but it was just doing exactly what I was telling it to do. Haha! It's a little weird because it's not alive but I feel guilty, despite its efforts to stay up. I just forced it to crash land because I was in panic mode. Poor guy didn't have a chance. @ignorant immediately offered to fly a recon mission over the area but he doesn't have his camera yet. I will definitely be scoping out the area with my next one. It sort of sounds like fun.
@crapstick
@crapstick 50 days not five months! At least it's possible to find it after so many days. Good luck buddy!
@garyhgaryh That's so cool! I like when his face lights up when it turns on. I'm so motivated to go find him now!
@crapstick I don't suppose you put any kind of information on him did you? I have a label on the bottom of all mine that says "Reward if found" with my phone number.
@ruouttaurmind Nope. It was one of those things I was going to get around to doing. If someone watches the videos on the gopro and recognizes local landmarks by my house or uses google maps, they should be able to track down where I live. I'm thinking most people wouldn't put that much effort into tho.
@ruouttaurmind Yeah, I put reward with my cell phone # on a label using a label maker machine the first day I got it.
I'm thinking it had home lock, but the left stick pull down brought it down to tree or ground level. You could have fun (for nerd values of fun) treating this like a search and rescue problem, drawing a circle on a map around your launch location, making a grid, and having a treasure hunt looking for it.
Who knows, maybe the little guy landed safe and is just waiting for you!
@zippyus Yeah, if you really want to get motivated, watch all the lost phantom videos on youtube and watch how people track it down. One guy just drew a pie from where he launched and use a google app to make sure he got all the pie area covered. I think in @crapstick 's case, the thing was above the clouds so he doesn't know where to start. Just use a circle...
@zippyus I plan on finding it and selling it back to @crapstick
@Ignorant Lol! Thanks! I'll give you a pack of GrimeBoss wipes if you do.
@zippyus I will bribe @ignorant every week to allow me to connect another camera to his quad and do a search and rescue. I'll update our progress.
Sorry for your loss!
I've been pretty careful/timid/wimpish with mine so far.
Not gonna name it yet, not even gonna put a camera on it yet. Learnding first for me.
Also, the "Cloud to Butt" Chrome extension is awesome on drone.horse.
@armchair Thanks! lol!