A flooded corn field ate my solo!!!!!

Dunginhawk · Jul 18, 2015

Well, it happened

Ill preface this story by saying this was 100% PILOT ERROR. No ifs ands or buts. I got stupid and paid for it... How much? not sure yet.

So I was out flying manual mode to test my acceleration. There was no improvement at all... So manual mode, acro, any mode, its simply not allowing faster acceleration. Top speed yes, acceleration, nope.. so we need to look elsewhere for that improvement.

I took it up to around 200 feet, flipped it to acro mode just to see how responsive it was. um, lets just say, IT WAS.
I pushed the right stick up and immediately it flipped. I panicked when i saw it rolling and let go of the stick about 25% from completing the loop. Of course that sends it flying towards the ground.
I could not get to fly mode (nor did i think about it at the time). I posted in another thread how im a GPS flyer, because i panic. I panic and i dont make the right move.
This time, i panicked and made the wrong mode. Instead of flipping it to fly mode, i tried to recover and it went speeding in to a corn field/tree line at about 60 mph.

So i ran inside, put shoes on and ran after it (not too far from me). I walked down a corn row and soon found that spot in the field completely flooded (as i knew it was prone to do from previous flights). I then heard a motor spinning. I finally found the quad about half submerged (the back end, with the front end sticking out of the water).
I picked it up, powered it off, pulled my shoes from the mud (suction). and trudged home.
After hosing myself off, i went inside to assess the damage.
Who knows.

2 motors were seized, 2 were fine. Washing them out got them free again.
After that I completely dismantled the quad part by part. Pulled the motor pods (great design), and everything else.
Im in the process of letting it dry out.
I may put it back together later and test it out.

One strange thing. the battery i pulled out of it wouldnt power off. even after removing from the quad and holding the button, it powers itself back on like it wants to work. im charging it now to see if it will reset. if not, im out a battery perhaps.

Here is a picture of my dismantled quad. AFTER its been cleaned

edh · Jul 18, 2015

Man that sucks, sorry.

Drop all the electronics in a ziplock full of rice.

Good luck.

Dunginhawk · Jul 18, 2015

I dont see a lot of moisture in the inner compartments at all... it was mostly in the arms, which im not that concerned about... have those dried out.
Should be interesting.

Earldgrayjr · Jul 18, 2015

I still wouldn't overlook rice..... Any moisture is a bad thing....and sometimes you can't see it (under components etc.)

If you get the battery to turn off, and restarted, and the Solo wont boot, look for motors that are clicking or jerking as it tries to start. If you see one remove it. If you see another remove it, until it boots, or they are all out.. It won't boot if it knows it has bad motors. If/when you get it booted, try running the (remaining) motors (no props) but be ready to kill it, as one or more may let their smoke out

Dunginhawk · Jul 18, 2015

so i have the battery, 4 motor pods and battery bay in the rice... it would really take forever to get all the other stuff apart... its killing me not to start to assemble this thing to see if its going to live, frankenstein style.

LIke i told RIch mccabe in a text earlier. If this quad survives this crash with only 1 prop gone (it was just gone once it crashed, not broken, GONE). if this survives, im keeping the solo. this thing is built REALLY well.

Raybro · Jul 18, 2015

Dunginhawk said:
so i have the battery, 4 motor pods and battery bay in the rice... it would really take forever to get all the other stuff apart... its killing me not to start to assemble this thing to see if its going to live, frankenstein style.

LIke i told RIch mccabe in a text earlier. If this quad survives this crash with only 1 prop gone (it was just gone once it crashed, not broken, GONE). if this survives, im keeping the solo. this thing is built REALLY well.

Did you get your battery powered off? My GoPro did the same thing when my P2 had to do an emergency landing (low battery) in my flooded pasture. The camera went underwater but kept on recording. The only way I could get it powered off was to remove the battery. I put the camera in rice for a couple of days and it was fine after that.
Before I put it in rice I took a blow dryer to it and some canned air and blew all the water out of all the crevices.
Take your time with it, let it dry good and it should be ok.
If it was salt water it probably would be toast.

Dunginhawk · Jul 18, 2015

Once these kids go to bed in going to go out it back together. Then we will see. Strangely I have high hopes

erikgraham · Jul 18, 2015

Dunginhawk said:
Here is a picture of my dismantled quad. AFTER its been cleaned

Sorry about your Solo... but hey, at least someone picked out a nice tile for your backsplash.

Dirby · Jul 18, 2015

leave everything covered in rice for at least 3 days.
than put it together and try it.

rrmccabe · Jul 18, 2015

Did not see you say. Any physical damage? Mud probably much better than our normal cornfield July dirt

Well hope you dont need parts as you might be grounded awhile.

Was there mud in the motors?

SteveReno · Jul 18, 2015

Everyone's Nightmare for sure, especially mine! cause i will be doing most of my videos over water! Corpus Christi Beaches. Salt water at that. GPS mode for sure & easy as she goes.
Been reading alot /Youtube, But i think the Solo survived most water exposures. I think it is resilient in cases where small amount of water or flips, hitting trees ect... Most online communities offer advice .
I'm a new as they come, but did several weeks of research before i put my $$$ up.

Good luck

firepilot13 · Jul 18, 2015

The battery has become self aware.

Hope everything comes out ok.....

Solo4Me · Jul 18, 2015

The video for troubleshooting the motor pods is here:

Solo4Me · Jul 18, 2015

After having to search a bit for my Solo, I decided that buying a cheap key finder was a good investment. Attach the receiver electronics (about 6 grams w/o case) to the Solo. If it goes down where I can't readily see it, press the transmitter. The finder on the Solo will sound beeps for 4 seconds...rinse and repeat. The other hexagon finder is from XY Find. It can give you GPS coordinates or map the location on Google maps. I haven't tried it yet, so don't know how well it actually works.

Dunginhawk · Jul 18, 2015

Solo4Me im intested in the hexagon one... I dont plan on losing this thing close to my house.. Im expecting to lose it on a 5 mile mission flight.

So, anyone who knows me, knows im impatient as they come. I felt, through my heat gun, etc I had the vast majority of the moisture out of the motors, and the rest was pretty dry after a lot of effort.

I spent an hour putting it back together, testing the motors, calibrating compass again, a whole bunch of gobblygook.

The final result. ZERO damage to the quad, batteries or anything. I lost 1 prop. ONE. everything else is in 100% perfect working order. 2 seized up motor pods I got back working, and all is seemingly well.
Im going to fly it tomorrow at least a full pack to get some air flowing through those motors to make sure they are good and dry.

Im just editing a video documenting my adventure

Im really glad i didnt have the go pro mounted to the quad at the time of crash, although it would have been really freaking cool footage

Dunginhawk · Jul 18, 2015

Here is the video of the events of my day.
It has to finish processing, but its late, im going to bed. enjoy

prowler9 · Jul 19, 2015

Wow man you got lucky!!!

Sent from my SM-N910V using Tapatalk

Solo4Me · Jul 19, 2015

XY Find It site is here http://www.xyfindit.com/#section-features

Looks like it may be limited to the distance of your phone's blue tooth. If so, that isn't going to do what you want.

Earldgrayjr · Jul 19, 2015

Tile works well if you want bluetooth ranges. It has a companion iPhone/Android app and you can make the tiles "sing" when you are finding them, along with map location an signal strength. I tried that and it is a good product, but bluetooth just doesn't propagate far enough for this application in my opinion... Except for my keys

https://www.thetileapp.com/

I want to know whgere my stuff is regardless of where it ends up. The setups I have do that for different things, sone moving very fast, and very high (over 20 miles).

I have had very good luck with the Spot Trace for other projects. It is small, fairly light, and water resistant. If you really wanted to make it lighter, you could remove the water resistant case....

http://www.findmespot.com/en/index.php?cid=128

It uses GPS for location, but also satellites (the Globalstar satellite network) for uplink which gateways to the Internet for connection to iPhone/Andorid apps or a website. I haven't used it with Solo yet, but I think it "should" fit on the battery right in the center of the Solo. I will try it soon with a velcro strap.

I also have a very small GPS unit that transmits on HAM band via APRS, so it can be picked up directly by handheld and other HAM equipment and relay GPS coordinates to them

http://www.byonics.com/mt-1000

The coordinates can also be repeated by HAM relays and uplinked to the Internet from there. HAM travels for ever at above 30 feet, and I have always seen this device show up on the Internet when above that altitude.

http://aprs.fi/#!lat=60.169998&lng=24.94

The problem with that rig is that it has a 36' wire dipole antenna.... It can be separated from the GPS unit, is stiff, and can possibly strapped to the legs of a Solo, but I haven't tried that on the Solo yet either...

rrmccabe · Jul 19, 2015

Thanks for video Ryan and you saved it. Couple lessons learned

You might want to give those pods a couple cans of compressed air now that you are dried out totally. Make sure no particles in there.

And you are right, the phantom would not have survived.