battery status?

[Toiletbowl]

Hello my fellow soloist soloing how do i know battery life if good or not? Because i have dji before using software to check battery status.

 

[Pedals2Paddles]

Well the battery % is at the top of the screen. And if you tap that black bar, it will drop down and show you the voltage too. 16.8 is fully charged, and 13.5 is about to die. Flight time from 100% down to 5-10% should be 15-16 minutes, give or take a minute based on how aggressive you're flying, wind conditions, temperature, etc.

 

[Robert Rose]

The controller screen will report battery life remaining in percentage. Once it gets to 35% you MUST start thinking of how you are getting home. If you are ~600 ft away and ~300 ft altitude, assume it will take ~10% of battery life to get home and land. So, if you start RTH at 35% you will be around 25% when you land. If you wait for the 25% warning you may be at 15% when you land. YRMD. If your battery dies in flight you will have a rock falling 16 ft/sec/sec.

Just buy extra batteries and be sure to charge them the night before you fly. Periodically 3DR offers a 2 for 1 sale (called GOBO here). I find that if I land, turn off the depleted battery, pull it out, immediately slide in the charged battery and turn it on right away, it only takes a few seconds and I have not lost connection to the app or GPS. I can be back in the air in seconds.

 

[Pedals2Paddles]

Landing at 25% is completely unnecessary. I do not know where that notion came from or why people seem to think that is the proper practice. You can safely fly the battery down to 0 if you want, although 5-6% is probably wise. Landing at 25% is flushing about 5 minutes of flight time down the toiletbowl.

That said, you absolutely do need to situational awareness as it relates to location, altitude, and flight time. That situational awareness is how you don't crash, hurt yourself, hurt others, or break things. Battery life is one of those things that situational awareness covers, among many other things. If you're oblivious, you'll probably crash. If you're not oblivious, you can fly for 14-16 minutes and land safely, perfectly under control.

 

[Robert Rose]

As I get more flight time logged I find it more comfortable to land with the battery at a lower %. How do you land if the battery has drained? I just find the 25% voice warning a good wakeup to avoid a box of rocks.

 

[PdxSteve]

There is an unknown safety margin built into the percentage displayed. 0 does not mean 0. It has a bit of emergency reserve left. Best not to test it thought

 

[Robert Rose]

I have been trying to see what is the real lower limit. At 25% I begin to think about where I am. The screen gives a Yellow bar warning. At 15% it shows a RED warning. That seems like enough power to land.

BUT at some point under 15% the battery starts to beep, and that can scare you and be a distraction.

A word of caution. If you are under manual landing control and hit RTH it will CLIMB and then perform a controlled landing. If you are close to Battery Dead, however, the climb will use juice and it seems like it is climbing so that it can smash into the ground harder. Argh.

Also, it seemed to me that the Solo was erratic in responding to the controls when I was close to Dead Battery and under Fly:Manual.

 

[PdxSteve]

You can press FLY again to cancel RTH/climbing.

 

[Robert Rose]

Thanks. BTW, once it is in Manual how do you return to Fly:Auto, press B again, or press Fly?

 

[PdxSteve]

Depends on how your buttons are mapped, but pressing the fly button will always return to fly mode.