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DJI Phantom flyaway

31K views 57 replies 19 participants last post by  casey5347 
#1 ·
Not happy.

I just sent this to DJI:

I purchased my DJI Phantom in late August. After around 10 flights in GPS mode, I flew it this afternoon after checking all settings via the NAZAM Assistant. The compass was calibrated successfully, and failsafe was set to Go Home & Landing and IOC was on.

Prior to flight it went through the boot up process, including getting around 11 satellites. After it gave the OK to fly, I flew it with no problems for around 2 minutes on the fully charged battery.

After approximately 2 minutes after takeoff, I started bringing it in towards me to land, where upon it started ascending, then veering away. Whilst it was doing this, the green LED was still flashing green as per normal ( twice, then off, twice then off etc). After around 10 seconds of trying to get it under control - at which I discovered my Tx was simply not providing any inputs to the Phantom. I tried different flight modes, to no avail. After around 40 seconds, it crashed into the water. This was all in front of around 40 kayakers who witnessed the entire event.

They went out to try to locate it however it was not visible.

All batteries were charged, the compass was fine, fail safe was on, and this has resulted in the loss of one DJI Phantom and one Replay XD camera.

I have flown helicopters including CP, and have a variety of quadcopters, so have plenty of experience flying, and this was absolutely a case of a fly away to the extent that even the fail safe did not respond.

I have now lost over $1000 worth of effectively brand new products

Is there anything that can be done? I still have the Tx & the receipt.
 
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#3 ·
Yeah one of the things I am not happy about is that it wasn't over water when it started losing control!
 
#4 ·
wow bad luck

i hope u end up getting a replacement or something, keep us updated

i was planning on getting one soon, but ill see how this pans out
 
#5 ·
had you had any particularly hard landings with it? dont have to be a hit that broke something just hard enough for you to cringe when it hit? I had something similar happen with my talon and the kk2 board, had a hard landing and shocked the board. It was fine until it warmed up and then i would loose complete control and no inputs would work and the quad would tilt it one direction and keep going until it hit the ground. Almost had the same happen as you, was flying in a paddock and lost control and landed within 2 feet of the water with a motor buried in the quad. I was around 150m away from the dam as i got in the car and drove to where it hit.

Bad luck on the loss of your quad, but as you no longer have the quad for them to be able to check it over to make sure it was a manufacturing fault and not an issue you caused they will put it back on the end user (you) most probably
 
#6 ·
Yeah I know bumps can effect the compass etc however it has had no hard landings at all and has only had 10 or 11 flights. I literally checked all settings prior to this flight and all were ok, the boot up stage was fine, and the first 2 minutes were fine. Just after that it decided to fly out across the road and out over the beach and into the water. I had heard of flyaways however I didn't expect to just have it moving randomly up, out and then diagonally downwards into the water over 40+ seconds, all the time knowing you have no control, even with failsafe.

It was also lucky it didn't hit one of the kayakers. The last 20 metres of descent was at full speed and was only a metre above a few of their heads when it crashed.

Sent from my GT-I9505 using Tapatalk 2
 
#7 · (Edited)
That sounds like the failsafe kicked in if it started to climb (approx. 20m) then head off in a direction. Did it stop flying away, hover for approx about 15 secs, then start descending? I'm wondering if it set a new home position. The home point can also be recorded if you toggle S2 between CL and HL 3-5 times.

Mind you, the LED status doesn't make sense.
 
#8 ·
It definitely wasn't failsafe as it didn't go straight up, rather moving due east and upwards slowly). On top of this I was using GPS mode (and only GPS mode) right up to that point, so if an alternate home point was set it wasn't through my doing.

Sent from my GT-I9505 using Tapatalk 2
 
#10 ·
I emailed them straight after it happened. As yet, no response.

Sent from my GT-I9505 using Tapatalk 2
 
#11 ·
After having a chat with a friend who is heavily engaged in commercial & governmental geospatial mapping using quads/octos he seems to think maybe an ESC blew. He reported similar circumstances with some of their custom units, including such behavior as they try to recover stability.

Sent from my GT-I9505 using Tapatalk 2
 
#12 ·
Phantom fly away are quite common with a lot of very unhappy consumers. There are 2 possibilities, radio interference and space weather (solar activity). In you situation I suspect radio interference since the Phantom was non responsive to any input. There is some varying opinions around the legality of the Phantom TX in Australia depending on which dealer you talk to. PerthRC doesn't sell the Phantom with their reason being that the TX / RX isn't approved for use in Australia cause it only has a hand full of channels to use while Multiwii + many others sells the Phantom openly. There's a growing number of camera shops jumping on the bandwagon selling the Phantom right next to the Go-Pro accessories. Check your transmitter and see if it has the C-Tick sticker on the back, I doubt you'll find it.
I personally don't trust a $1000 (Phantom + Go-Pro Black) worth of hardware to a crappy Chinese radio system. I never flew my Phantom with the included radio as the first thing I did was replace the RX with a Futaba R7008SB and use my 18MZ radio.

I know none of the above helps you get your Phantom back, DJI are notorious for poor customer service so I doubt they will do anything to assist you. At least take solace that you're not alone and many are feeling your pain.

http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showpost.php?p=26170728&postcount=17675

Contact your dealer, state your case and possibly engage fair trading. The more noise you make the higher the possibility they we do the right thing.
 
#14 ·
How deep is the water it went into?

Get some scuba gear and go and get it. I am sure if ya put an add on gumtree, someone would reply who is into diving and go and get it for you for a carton of beer.

Atleast then you have it back and could possibly get further then you could without it??

Just a thought
 
#15 ·
The water was about 10 feet where it went in however it was getting dark at the time. Two of the kayakers went straight over to where it went in and said they could smell burning electronics (it was a pretty calm day), however they couldn't see it anywhere. We went out about 10 minutes later on a wave ski however couldn't see it anywhere. It then got dark. Unfortunately the water currents in the area quickly push items out into the middle of the Derwent River, and the waves picked up that night, and it is not where it landed.


Sent from my GT-I9505 using Tapatalk 2
 
#16 ·
Message Number 2:

Hi,

I posted last week to regarding my DJI Phantom which was lost due to a fly away, however have still not had a response. I am happy to answer any questions regarding the incident and can produce the receipt from Metro Hobbies, along with numerous witnesses who saw the entire event unfold.

It is completely unacceptable that a product your company advertise as have return to home features along with numerous other characteristics that make them easier to fly, could so randomly not only fly away, but ditch itself into the ocean as a result.

Can you please respond?

Regards,
Jackson
 
#17 ·
Update: still no response from DJI

Sent from my GT-I9505 using Tapatalk 2
 
#20 ·
I am not totally surprised by that, from what I have been reading the team at DJI leave a little to be desired in the support area
 
#19 ·
I would love to know what reaction the claim would get!

Sent from my GT-I9505 using Tapatalk 2
 
#22 ·
I agree, the old days of any publicity is good publicity are no longer true, with the internet, bad publicity is exactly that...bad publicity and as a result companies tend to try and correct the bad faster than ever these days
 
#23 ·
My aim is not to give them bad publicity, rather to have an acknowledgment and replacement of a 100% faulty product. By doing so, they also reap the rewards of the positive feedback they receive.

I am absolutely prepared to wear damage I have caused via my own fault (and do so all the time with buggies etc) with RC products however to watch $1000 worth of phantom ditch itself after flying around for 40 seconds with no ability to influence its direction is unacceptable.

Sent from my GT-I9505 using Tapatalk 2
 
#25 ·
There is no grounds for it unfortunately....

Sent from my GT-I9505 using Tapatalk 2
 
#28 ·
Naughty, naughty Matt. :nono:

I thought you were a nice choir boy type. :D
 
#30 ·
Sorry. What I meant to say was belly dancer.
 
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