WTF happened to this drone? It just fell...

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Can anyone explain this, I have my theories, but I would like some more opinions.

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I've never looked at my flight logs before, but I think I need to check this one out. I imagine it can't be to hard to collect them and check it out.
 
did you recover the drone......or was that video from your phone ???? Sure seems like a PITA to recover that one.......

Recovery by helicopter skiing or snowshoeing in ?????
 
did you recover the drone......or was that video from your phone ???? Sure seems like a PITA to recover that one.......

Recovery by helicopter skiing or snowshoeing in ?????

I hike up and ski that mountain almost daily, so my roommate and I just skinned up to the area last seen and started our grid search. It could have been much worse than it was if it had failed near the top.
 
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It sounds like a bird hit it. If it was a bird it probably made out worse then the Solo. Those props HURT!
 
Well that's a new one. I don't hear anything the sounds like an impact. Definitely need the dataflash log.
 
Since you were flying line of sight what did you see happen? It is amazing that it hit the snow bounced up and took flight again only to crash into a tree and fall again; what happened there?
 
...It is amazing that it hit the snow bounced up and took flight again only to crash into a tree and fall again; what happened there?

Yes, that bounce was incredible! One reason I like the solo so much is it's heft, never gets blown around in wind and can take a fall. But, this is taking it to new level! I am guessing failed motor because I think I heard squeaking prior to failure. Hiking, skiing, flying, photography in great outdoors---awesome! Good luck I hope you find your solo!
 
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Well that's a new one. I don't hear anything the sounds like an impact. Definitely need the dataflash log.

don't speculate load the logs
Can you maybe point me towards the best process to diagnose my logs?

How To: Reading Solo Logs

I am going to do my best to figure it out tomorrow morning, but maybe someone with more experience could assist me.

Since you were flying line of sight what did you see happen? It is amazing that it hit the snow bounced up and took flight again only to crash into a tree and fall again; what happened there?

I was watching my screen when it dipped out and only showed distortion. So at that moment I wasn't looking at it. My roommate looked over at my screen when I said WTF and also lost LOS. Heard it spool up then it was silent.

I hit the rtl and I am imagining that's what it was trying to do when it hit the tree.

We skinned up there and searched around until we found it laying upside down in the snow. 1 broken propeller and 2 chipped ones. Visually it appears fine but I haven't turned it back on yet. There was a fair bit of snow in the motors, and the battery was out too. I'm just letting it dry out and when I have a good handle on pulling the logs, I'll turn it on tomorrow.

Honestly I'm just glad we got it back, I was starting to think I'd never see it again.

Regarding the noise, I heard that too. The first time was at the top of the mountain. I'm guessing a motor failure as well. As we didn't see any kind of bird action.

Thank you guys for your help!
 
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We've had a few on here that suddenly lost power in flight and crashed. It sounded like you had a brief power loss to the motors and then it recovered. Very strange though.
 
From the looks and sounds of it, it was windy and fairly high speed flight. Presumably cold. Which implies a fairly high demand on the battery. On the rebound, I hear what sounds like the low battery alarm beeping. Wild guess is this is a power issue. A very strange power issue. Looking forward to logs.
 
From the looks and sounds of it, it was windy and fairly high speed flight. Presumably cold. Which implies a fairly high demand on the battery. On the rebound, I hear what sounds like the low battery alarm beeping. Wild guess is this is a power issue. A very strange power issue. Looking forward to logs.

Over 50° outside, battery was over 50% probably more like 60%, and high speed well yes definitely. I've flown this flight multiple times. It's about 2400' in elevation gain from the house to the top of the peak where I the video starts. I can get there in about 2 minutes in stabilization mode, that's also the quickest way to get down too. So at time of crash it was only about 400' above us at the house (lost video feed and I hit RTH, which is what I think it's doing when it hits the trees). I'm going to pull the logs and post themy here, hoping that maybe one of you can help me understand the issue.
 
The low battery alert triggers based on capacity remaining (520mah) or voltage (14.0 volts) presuming you haven't changed those parameters. The voltage has to fall below 14 volts for 2 seconds before it will trip. High power, high speed, flight can cause a voltage drop below that point if you push it hard enough. So that may be why the the battery alarm is sounding (if that is what I'm hearing). The logs will tell the full story regardless. I'll take a look when I get home later if you can post them.
 
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I've reviewed the log. First, HOLY CRAP! You're 10,000+ feet, going 40+ MPH, in a 100+ foot per second descent rate. Damn man. I believe this is what would be referred to as pushing the operational limits to the extreme. However, I can tell you it appears none of that had anything to do with the crash. I can also tell you the battery and power systems were all working fine. In fact, with a descent like that, you were only using about 1/4 the amount of power you would normally need to move that fast. In the image below you can see the throttle output at 24%, the throttle input channel at 1449, which is a little below center stick, and the motors at various outputs levels.

P3QbsO0.jpg



The cause of the crash appears to be much simpler. A rogue thumb on the throttle stick! It appears you inadvertently pulled the throttle down to zero. It was smooth reduction, nothing instant like a control hiccup. Once the stick was all the way down, the motors all dropped to minimum and down it went. In the image you see the CH1-4 outs all at 1074. That's minimum armed output. CH3-in shows the throttle stick input at minimum. And the throttle output at only 8%, which is minimum armed.

fSV0zqF.jpg


A few seconds later, it shows the throttle going back up to about half, presumably when you let go of the stick. It remained in stabilize mode throughout and never lost connection. It did not go into RTH. It was simply inertia and wind that carried it into the trees. I think if you had punched the throttle, it actually would have made it up and over, but you may not have been able to see it at that point.

Lesson here... Fly and Manual modes would never allow this to happen. Those modes have a maximum vertical rate, and the stick controls a % of that maximum rate. Of course, you're limited to that descent rate. If you want to descend (or climb) faster, you need stabilize mode. In stabilize mode, the stick is a scale of minimum to maximum motor output. Putting the stick to minimum puts the motors at minimum, period. If the stick was just a little above minimum, it would still be maintaining level attitude. But minimum is minimum. And these things have the glide ratio of a grand piano.
 
Nice job Pedals. I see something a little different. Not saying if this right or wrong, just different. Bear with me..

As he is coming down flying in Stab mode, he encounters bad EKF errors and the Solo is on it's side and confuse. A split second later amp draw drops to 2a that you see in Pedals post above. The initial EKF errors, Solo losing the horizon and the drop to 2a all happened in about 1sec.
DDz9sZU7ckGA9XP-ivSaiRJ48SWOGUH4cvsuyfvg4uB1_6QesVlUsqHLOoyhC9GaYfrYqiLbs7qrw529NHOGzqCTwwV5BLjVvfDzatS4J8qZXHEGS6Z7N7oid0gPxoVlSt5y78RvYGDPM0BMTFKjY8iBionTJ8fvAiZ4uzBz6lI_ActXCqcpIopm3P4B5JxUJOGNntkQZDuY0B0FN-fR0XgvWtyJNXoas5kBCy5VBazqGA7WKliw81egGsDzPbn4FW5zVcFYGKkmwRLPdIex1icA6i7UIU5urxNoZY_CTL6aydlncpOZ7yB4WKpFJJFP544kPOby-OBA2pGJ9K8GLKgSEg05T9NEP8pltETsHbbHSzeNrN71qEDWjxrCmEkxm-kGMhPPaRJ2q-RQ3RWvuRbDqW7b_2F_8a1f5V3dajQX_TsRK_L-cvDfBFEh3hPgyKC8-rO_uLFVA_xJZ3zAA20H1eKSYQ4KeD59L9D0SjzpzVrCoqWNGNHo9GULBnRq3HmiFz9VtuH8mdHfKllZscqvk2uIZo12BoafODsrrCtVSUgU3yfEgEAL81ldMT6uzjViJNgdL_1YW_huOVO_TIPObVfwk5KdfEKhzb2-kIcHLySF6KLs=w1241-h774-no


As it hits the ground the first time, it starts the recovery and motors are at full and drawing 31.6a.
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The PH announced that it has not received data (from controller) for 5sec and goes into RTL:
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t11gldELz7mRm1h73VA7G0act7kw-pYFD55tPvhz9RDcnZ93QFhW9Pv33QciJK6iAUa5FKgtRXirMCRdMew2BUw7wJE7MGTtsug1zPiOIeP2IaTR0pfx4S6QL4qASsdD1caob30f2vMRGKCtxdubhuktHyUgyxQ4f9xsyZVLvxWDUQqGXo5G_P6ULlHb1czqAQVAyYrh04cO-L6b2qYPHCRbRC3hNrvVLmlzhp6DNLPfgZCOHGVEUf2xQmre7AVv0PR4Bc_M0mMlVih4WcdparfoKSJNSqNNeSMB2gArj-ySduZQ-i_1F71dV-I4qOh5rIuEGF3FI35Zl88u24cDj2EmFElChZh1zC_Rja5dOUlc6CMGT5ljgetrU3IMh6YwoQ5PuUvJuVmOAH-7wLn4_HWsdHVMwNy5gtpMPGLYBwXLjC-sB2Az6ff-kJu5aR5RlKgk4tfks1OMNepWk2BGDN0hG78NTMYg9LP32oh6RoWljYUNAnLSXSMaynMdUiWUtJBPAwbpDE7MOB9Rd7naEsXxZOcKS-YniOhQdf2EsvIgwZ1BL8GSjPo0oJlYfzxxqBTZ760BtGSmUCJmX4XDUDimxensmoJ2tkIfXU1RVt2DXkMDrSEj=w1258-h885-no


Solo is now not connected to the controller no longer feeding the log to the controller, but at this point in the video Solo has recovered and enters RTL. The problem is that Solo thinks it's 400' high and RTL will not have Solo climb, but instead makes a direct heading to HP. But the problem is that just being a few feet off the ground, there are trees in the way. Then the crash. Just my .02
 
The EKF and RC disconnect errors weren't showing up when I played back the telemetry logs. I believe the 2 amps reflects the motors at minimum though. Descending like that, they're basically windmilling using nothing.
 
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