Lost Control - Lost Solo

[Beowulf]

So Perhaps i put too much faith in the technology or perhaps I panicked, regardless, I lost my solo yesterday during a manual flight that went sideways pretty quickly.

shortly after takeoff I received the first in a series of error messages that resulted in a 5 minute flight and ultimate lost drone.

the first error message was lost signal from controller quickly followed by Lost GPS signal fly manual mode. At this point the drone took off downwind. (after GPS loss it went to fly manual) I regained control but at this point Drone is now 150 to 200 m downwind and I have lost orientation of the drone. Initiate Return Home on controller.

I then receive another error message (GPS) Loss. At this Point im running downwind trying to follow drone. GPS comes online and offline several times (looks like 4 total from the flight log) and I have not only lost site of Solo it appears i lost connection with controller and my Android.

While this is going on, (lost visual and GPS in and out) battery warnings commence. 25%, 15% 10% 0%

as battery warning goes off I hear the solo and its nearby. I make visual for a brief instant while it appears very unstable and is trying to land on its own.

I proceed to point of last seen and cannot find solo.

search for an hour and then get into the Telemetry Logs in Tower. Last Known Position according to Tlog is about 250 m downwind from last visual. last T log shows Solo attempting to RTH at 70m altitutaed with 5% battery remaining.

1. is it possible that Solo Flew for a period of time after last T log Entry? I saw it trying to land and this corresponded to 0% battery warning with controller.

2. My Gut tells me to look near the point of last visual. T Log has me looking 250 m downwind of that position. With GPS being In and Out, Im not sure where to even look. (second attempt at searching) Spend 6 hours from noon till dark looking yesterday

3. since solo gone missing i cant get a wifi link to controller. any thoughts?

 

[Marich]

You said Solo was 150-250 meters away at the onset of trouble, but then suggest it was close by and could be seen and heard. How close would you guess?
It's almost certainly near the last visual if it was trying to land, and with those warnings coming so often it surely was. I'd keep scouring the area.
There are certain tricks to spotting things in such a search: for instance, look for propellers or landing gear instead of the drone as a whole.

 

[fpvsteve]

Sorry for your loss man.
1. 2. yes. With GPS fading in and out, Solo is likely at a different position as recorded in the Tlog

3. Solo crashed and likely the battery disconnected, that's why you can't connect to Solo wifi anymore.

Try to search around the last visual, and then follow the direction downwind.
Good luck!

 

[Beowulf]

Thanks, for quick feedback. Last Visual really looked like Farmers Field or Level gravel area... which should have made for easy find. Downwind of that is Wooded Area, tall grass or Landfill Site. As is flight path from last tlog entry to launch site. The irony is if it crashed in the dump at least i know its somewhat disposed of properly in the event i dont find it.

My Next Challenge is deciphering the Tlog. I have it uploaded. First Flight was a Autonomous survey flight via tower. Second Flight was the manual flight that went bonkers. around 23% in the Tlog file.

 

[Cyberblitz]

Looked at your log. Wow, you really let it go down to the wire; last recorded percentage of battery was 4%. It may have just lost power in the end and fell out of the sky. There were alot of fail-safe errors and it tried to RTL. Did you over-ride this? It does look like you had control over it up untill complete signal loss - signal loss only occured the once, at the end, otherwise the log would be full of holes.

There were also a lot of Fence Breaches too, not sure why? Did you set a Virtual fence during your automated 1st flight. This may have caused all your errors.

There were also a lot of EKF errors too. Also I didn't come across any GPS loss at all; you GPS count remained within acceptable numbers (10-15).

 

[pyrate]

Did you submit logs to 3dr? If there were a lot of ekf errors they may cover it

 

[Cyberblitz]

It is possible EKF errors attributed to the crash: it is possible irregular signals from the GPS and the Pixhawx don't agree. This could be due to high wind conditions or simply electrical interference. It's hard to know.

 

[Beowulf]

I will submit the logs. I'm still holding some hope that I find the drone when I go back tomorrow.
Thanks to cyber blitz for looking at the log. Im at a loss to explain my account of the flight vs. The actual log. As I said the flight went sideways pretty quickly. And I spent the whole time trying to regain control. And panic using rtl button.
I was up on a knoll with clear view to east of launch. Flight was intended to fly east. Early into flight I got loss of connection message on controller very quickly followed by loss of gps warning on controller. Drone drifts downwind and out of sight. Controller signal regained and I attempt to fly manual first need to reestablish orientation of drone. Drone at this point is well downwind and barely visible. I give up on manual flight and Initiate rtl. Receive loss satellite warning. Drone drifts further downwind now out of sight. I initiate chase while pressing return home button button. 25 % battery warning. Drone is still out of sight. Receive another gps loss warning. Retry return home. Will not initiate due to no gps. I can't fly it at this point cause I have no clue where it is or its orientation. 10 % battery warning. Rtl is initiated. I watch battery life drain as I scan sky for solo. Get 0% battery warning. This coincides with final audible and visual of drone attempting to land about 100 m downwind of launch. Drone drops behind earth berm and I lose visual. Observed landing about 250 m upwind from last known log entry. Log of flight shows drone in failsafe mode for last moments of flight.

What I can't figure out. Aside from most of the flight is why the last 4%of battery life wasn't captured in log. I was still getting flight info on the controller right up to 0% batery where I observed solo attempting to land with 0% battery. I'm certain I saw the solo attempting to land shortly after I received the dreaded 0%.

 

[Cyberblitz]

Looking at the weather at the time of the incident, wind was approximately 25km/he with a temperature of 4 degrees, which is within the parameters of the drone.

 

[Beowulf]

Wind estimated to be less than 15 knots at time. Im sure about the wind, I'm a kite surfer and yes it was windy but not windy enough to kite. My rule of thumb is don't fly drone if I can fly kite instead.

 

[pyrate]

sometimes the controller alerts are wonky, almost everytime I land mine mid battery it will say searching for GPS but in fact GPS lock is still there according to the logs.
Today it did it twice, never had less than 15 sats and no higher, than .8 hdop. according to the logs

 

[Cyberblitz]

The weather was well within acceptable parameters. Sometimes RTL can seem erratic, and you just need to give it chance to respond. In your panicked state, you may have unintentionally cancelled RTL.

It looks like it was returning then turns away again. It was returning to RTL in the last few seconds.

 

[SARDG]

3. Solo crashed and likely the battery disconnected, that's why you can't connect to Solo wifi anymore...

Actually, OP said he couldn't get a Wi-Fi link to the controller, which is worrisome if that means no link from device to controller.
"3. since solo gone missing i cant get a wifi link to controller. any thoughts..."

 

[Cyberblitz]

From the logs, there was no wifi loss, not untill the end, otherwise the logs would be full of holes

 

[SARDG]

From the logs, there was no wifi loss, not untill the end, otherwise the logs would be full of holes

...and so one would think that they could connect from device to controller, right now. No bird required.

 

[Cyberblitz]

...and so one would think that they could connect from device to controller, right now. No bird required.

That's not what I said! That's ridiculous; how can a controller connect to a device when its no longer powered or out of range?

I'm saying throughout the flight the logs show there was no connection loss at all, not until the end. Remember, the radio frequency relies on 2.4 GHz WIFI technology, so yes WIFI loss was not lost until the end. Obviously, there's no way you can connect to it now until its found and powered.

 

[SARDG]

That's not what I said! That's ridiculous; how can a controller connect to a device when its no longer powered or out of range?

I'm saying throughout the flight the logs show there was no connection loss at all, not until the end. Remember, the radio frequency relies on 2.4 GHz WIFI technology, so yes WIFI loss was not lost until the end. Obviously, there's no way you can connect to it now until its found and powered.

A phone/tablet is normally referred to as a "device"; Solo as a "bird". It was the OP who said he couldn't connect to the "controller" after the bird was lost - and that makes no sense... unless the controller Wi-Fi quit functioning. Or if the OP thinks he should still get a link from controller to bird after 0% battery in Solo... which is absurd.

The Solo app refers to Solo as a "vehicle" when the controller cannot connect to it - which of course it can't because the bird is DOA.

 

[Cyberblitz]

Ah yes, i misinterpreted.. My bad

 

[SARDG]

Ah yes, i misinterpreted.. My bad

Besides.. you can't argue with me... I'm a female.

 

[Beowulf]

To clarify I cannot pair android device to controller. Vehicle still MIA and I don't expect to get connection from it.

Last I saw of vehicle it was attempting to land it was about 20to30 meters altitude. I would estimate that last visual of solo was 10 to 30 seconds after I received the 0% battery warning. From 25% battery down to 0% I had no visual on drone. All I was able to do was look at controller and watch the battery power drop, altitude and distance on the controller screen. I was looking for any sign of solo by scanning point of last visual to rtl point. Shortly after the 0% warning I heard the solos engines and was able see it. It was descending and and attempting to land. It's flight was not stable but I was shocked to se it still in the air. In my mind it was lost and I was shocked to see it still flying about 30 seconds into 0% battery.

I'm not exactly sure where link from controller to android was lost during the flight but at this point I get no WiFi signal when controller is powered.

Does vehicle need to be present and powered in order for controller to pair with phone or tablet?
I read in another thread that controller is black box. Therefore it should be possible to pair a tablet or laptop to controller post crash to get flight log. The flight log I posted was in my android device storage folder. It matches to the vehicle history I can see in tower app.

When controller powered a WiFi connection called solo link should be visible to any tablet or laptop. My controller has no WiFi connection when powered.

This morning I will go search for vehicle once more. I think I will devote my time to searching area where last seen. The last known point from log has vehicle at 70 m altitude over some dense bush. I don't believe it's there given it still had battery when log ended and I had visual of solo in flight attempting to land. Is it possible that the controller has additional flight info?