Defective Controller

[GoodnNuff]

Spent an hour on the phone with tech support today trying to fix my Solo so that I can fly longer than 30 seconds before RTL initiates and I land. The first several flights I was getting flights up to 45 seconds, but then would get a "controller connection lost" error. After doing level and compass calibrations, I'd be able to fly no more than 30 seconds and then I'd get a "Controller Stick Error" and RTL would ground me again.
Today the plan was to calibrate my control sticks, but we couldn't even connect through Putty to enable the calibration. The controller would drop the wifi signal every few seconds and we'd have to reboot. Certainly explains why I was going into RTL every 30 seconds or so.
3DR thinks I have a defective controller...they will issue an RMA but don't know when they can ship another Solo.
So I called Best Buy to see about exchanging this one, they are out of stock in the whole state, and it will be at least a week or more before more arrive.
So for now, I'm stuck with a boomerang with a 15-30 second flight time.

 

[Richard Dowhan]

Funny I was also on the phone for almost an hour today. Solo was not responding. Control stated "Waiting for solo". We tried pairing the control to solo but no luck. Seems the solo computer had failed. Mine is headed back to 3DR next week. No ETA on new unit. Seems that either the computer hardware or software has serious flaws. I was told to look into the grill under Solo to see if the orange light is on, through a screw hole. I beginning to think 3DR should have delayed the entire launch. I got 2 days in with flying but now down for a lengthy time.

3DR Needs to get it together.

 

[GoodnNuff]

Yes, same here. My orange LED was flashing. It was also very hard to see it through the tiny vent holes where I was asked to look. This was different from the orange bind LED in the bind hole.
I pre ordered a Solo through a local RC store, and was going to cancel my order but will hang on to it. Trouble is, they have no idea when they will get the 6 Solos they preordered.
I packed everything back in the box just a few minutes ago - this one is already to ship back to 3DR or return to BB, which ever will offer the quickest replacement.

 

[RichWest]

Bummer...

 

[rrmccabe]

I was expecting some firmware/software issues. But its alarming to find out the number of hardware failures and returns from such a small sampling of owners.

 

[GoodnNuff]

I was expecting some firmware/software issues. But its alarming to find out the number of hardware failures and returns from such a small sampling of owners.

Yeah, to be honest this is pretty disheartening. With each day I'm more convinced that 3DR truly wasn't ready for this roll out.
Tech support said they were swamped with tickets.

That said, if you are going to have issues and need a replacement or live tech support, 3DR is the company to deal with. I can't think of another company with the quick support they have. The premature roll out is the issue, not their support.

 

[rrmccabe]

The premature roll out is the issue, not their support.

Yep. I still think the P3 forced the roll out. The thing that really concerns me is if they really have hardware issues that will require time to get to the bottom of it and build a second revision of components.

Probably premature to say that but just my gut instinct.

I am likely to exorcize my 30 day return if I have a hardware failure and order a P3 and fly the rest of the year.

Lets hope it goes well.

 

[Freebird]

I was expecting some firmware/software issues. But its alarming to find out the number of hardware failures and returns from such a small sampling of owners.

Yeh very concerning. Did the P3 have this many issues on roll out.

 

[rrmccabe]

Yeh very concerning. Did the P3 have this many issues on roll out.

In my eyes the P3 roll-out was pretty good.

I did see this on another site. Pretty impressive.

(3drobotics)
Jun 19, 3:51 PM

Hi Scott,

I went through your logs and also shared them with the development team.
We found the flyaway log and root cause for it.
First, we found out that the app was not retrieving the last log because it didn't have a number on its name like the rest of the logs.
That's an issue that has been detected and will be fixed in the next release of the app.

From that log, it appears that the IMU module was disconnected from the FMU (Pixhawk 2). That's a hardware issue.
That means, of course, that the pilot didn't do anything to provoke this incident.
As a note, this is the first time since the Solo release that we've seen this issue. It has never happened before.
That's why I got the developers involved.

I will transfer your info to customer service so they can issue an RMA for this unit so you can get a replacement.
They will ask for the controller and other Solo accessories back.
Since this is a hardware failure, we will replace your GoPro, as well.
Unfortunately, we don't sell the GoPro Hero 3; so, we'll get you a Hero 4 instead if that's acceptable.
We just need to know if your GoPro was a Silver or Black edition.

Let me apologize for this issue; we're truly sorry that you experienced a flyaway, Scott.
But we really stand behind our product and will do anything within reason to make our customers happy.

Let me know if you have any questions, Scott.

Best regards,

Diego
[Technical support engineer]

 

[JWJ]

In my eyes the P3 roll-out was pretty good.

I did see this on another site. Pretty impressive.

(3drobotics)
Jun 19, 3:51 PM

That's why I didn't preorder Solo. Seeing that the gimbal release is delayed, I was able to anticipate some problems. Maybe they seemed to be in a hurry in manufacturing even designing to compete with DJI Phantom3. They were in a hurry and hustle, and gimbal developers couldn't observe deadline. I was waiting for Solo for months, but now I might be buying P3. Because Solo would have to go through this disturbance and fuss again when the gimbal is finally released.

 

[Raybro]

In my eyes the P3 roll-out was pretty good.

I did see this on another site. Pretty impressive.

(3drobotics)
Jun 19, 3:51 PM

Hi Scott,

I went through your logs and also shared them with the development team.
We found the flyaway log and root cause for it.
First, we found out that the app was not retrieving the last log because it didn't have a number on its name like the rest of the logs.
That's an issue that has been detected and will be fixed in the next release of the app.

From that log, it appears that the IMU module was disconnected from the FMU (Pixhawk 2). That's a hardware issue.
That means, of course, that the pilot didn't do anything to provoke this incident.
As a note, this is the first time since the Solo release that we've seen this issue. It has never happened before.
That's why I got the developers involved.

I will transfer your info to customer service so they can issue an RMA for this unit so you can get a replacement.
They will ask for the controller and other Solo accessories back.
Since this is a hardware failure, we will replace your GoPro, as well.
Unfortunately, we don't sell the GoPro Hero 3; so, we'll get you a Hero 4 instead if that's acceptable.
We just need to know if your GoPro was a Silver or Black edition.

Let me apologize for this issue; we're truly sorry that you experienced a flyaway, Scott.
But we really stand behind our product and will do anything within reason to make our customers happy.

Let me know if you have any questions, Scott.

Best regards,

Diego
[Technical support engineer]

Yes, read that as well. That site has gotten the trolls (most of them) off and is easier to get to some good information. It's good to know the customer service and tech support is there.

 

[Raybro]

Yeh very concerning. Did the P3 have this many issues on roll out.

They are still working on issues. I spend time on the P2 side and occasionally take a look at the P3 side. I think there are issues with the camera and gimbal right now. They just did a firmware update to correct some video banding issues that some folks aren't too pleased with. It's like any other quad, you have happy people and you have whiners.