Lost GPS and CRASHED

olegred · Sep 24, 2017

So, I fly Solo to get an aerial view of the buildings for my job. Normally I would use Tower to draw the path and send it out automatically. However, a couple of days ago the drone lost GPS almost immediately after takeoff. It went into manual as it should have, and I was able to bring it home and land.

I was a bit nervous to flight since then. Today I decided to test the drone on the beach. Probably was not a very good idea as I had sand and water on one side and quite a busy street on the other. Anyway, I made one run without a camera and the Solo flew perfectly. I put on the camera and decided to do another one. The drone lost GPS again almost immediately, went into the manual mode, and with the wind and a bit of panic I lost control. All I was able to do was to direct Solo away from the buildings and the water. It landed in the sand broke one propeller and totaled the gimbal. Here's the video of the crash.

So I was wondering.

1. What causes it to lose GPS?
2. Can anything be done to prevent this?
3. When you go into manual mode and the drone is some distance from you what is the best strategy to bring it back? I was thinking about pushing both levers somewhat to the right, so that it flies in circle and can figure out which way it is directed. BTW, anyone selling gimbal?

Thanks

Maddog · Sep 24, 2017

There are a number of reasons why you can lose GPS and if you search "GPS" here there is a lot of information.
Many people swap out the stock GPS for an upgraded one.
mRo GPS u-Blox Neo-M8N / 3DR SOLO Upgrade (New)

If you lose GPS lock, Solo will switch to FLY: MANUAL. You then need to take control and land. That's another reason to always keep Solo in sight.. If your confused about its orientation, and you have the room, climb straight up. Altitude is your friend and you might regain GPS lock.

Have you downloaded and read the manual? The answers to question 3 are there in detail.
Check the classifieds for gimbals or eBay or Amazon.

This is a good upgrade to see Solo:
https://3drpilots.com/threads/brite-lite-anti-collision-lighting.11505/

rcflyingaddict · Sep 25, 2017

olegred said:
So, I fly Solo to get an aerial view of the buildings for my job. Normally I would use Tower to draw the path and send it out automatically. However, a couple of days ago the drone lost GPS almost immediately after takeoff. It went into manual as it should have, and I was able to bring it home and land.

I was a bit nervous to flight since then. Today I decided to test the drone on the beach. Probably was not a very good idea as I had sand and water on one side and quite a busy street on the other. Anyway, I made one run without a camera and the Solo flew perfectly. I put on the camera and decided to do another one. The drone lost GPS again almost immediately, went into the manual mode, and with the wind and a bit of panic I lost control. All I was able to do was to direct Solo away from the buildings and the water. It landed in the sand broke one propeller and totaled the gimbal. Here's the video of the crash.

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So I was wondering.

1. What causes it to lose GPS?
2. Can anything be done to prevent this?
3. When you go into manual mode and the drone is some distance from you what is the best strategy to bring it back? I was thinking about pushing both levers somewhat to the right, so that it flies in circle and can figure out which way it is directed. BTW, anyone selling gimbal?

Thanks

Sorry to hear about your mishap but I'm curious why your platform of choice for building areal's is the Solo? I have only had mine a few days so granted my experience may not scale well for the time being but out of my 7 or so flights I'd have to say there have been several 'oh shit' moments that are fine since I'm just RC'ing it but if I needed a tool to get the shot in a mixed env I would think about using a different platform.

just_bruce · Sep 25, 2017

olegred said:
So, I fly Solo to get an aerial view of the buildings for my job. Normally I would use Tower to draw the path and send it out automatically. However, a couple of days ago the drone lost GPS almost immediately after takeoff. It went into manual as it should have, and I was able to bring it home and land.

I was a bit nervous to flight since then. Today I decided to test the drone on the beach. Probably was not a very good idea as I had sand and water on one side and quite a busy street on the other. Anyway, I made one run without a camera and the Solo flew perfectly. I put on the camera and decided to do another one. The drone lost GPS again almost immediately, went into the manual mode, and with the wind and a bit of panic I lost control. All I was able to do was to direct Solo away from the buildings and the water. It landed in the sand broke one propeller and totaled the gimbal. Here's the video of the crash.

To view this content we will need your consent to set third party cookies.
For more detailed information, see our cookies page.

So I was wondering.

1. What causes it to lose GPS?
2. Can anything be done to prevent this?
3. When you go into manual mode and the drone is some distance from you what is the best strategy to bring it back? I was thinking about pushing both levers somewhat to the right, so that it flies in circle and can figure out which way it is directed. BTW, anyone selling gimbal?

Thanks

In what manner did you total the gimbal? I've discovered that lots of them are probably repairable. Just curious.

Lon Denard · Sep 25, 2017

just_bruce said:
In what manner did you total the gimbal? I've discovered that lots of them are probably repairable. Just curious.

I agree, I repaired two of mine. One the arm was just bent and I bent it back. It's aluminum, if you didn't know.

Pedals2Paddles · Sep 25, 2017

olegred said:
3. When you go into manual mode and the drone is some distance from you what is the best strategy to bring it back? I was thinking about pushing both levers somewhat to the right, so that it flies in circle and can figure out which way it is directed.

You need to practice manual flight more. And you need constant situational awareness.

olegred · Sep 25, 2017

Maddog said:
There are a number of reasons why you can lose GPS and if you search "GPS" here there is a lot of information.
Many people swap out the stock GPS for an upgraded one.
mRo GPS u-Blox Neo-M8N / 3DR SOLO Upgrade (New)

If you lose GPS lock, Solo will switch to FLY: MANUAL. You then need to take control and land. That's another reason to always keep Solo in sight.. If your confused about its orientation, and you have the room, climb straight up. Altitude is your friend and you might regain GPS lock.

Have you downloaded and read the manual? The answers to question 3 are there in detail.
Check the classifieds for gimbals or eBay or Amazon.

This is a good upgrade to see Solo:
https://3drpilots.com/threads/brite-lite-anti-collision-lighting.11505/

I am guilty of not reading the manual. I downloaded it and will read. However, how do you hit "brake" button. My drone started floating and I did not know which way it faced. So I kinda pressed forward and spinned it and once it was going into the sand I just stuck with it. I am also guilty of not flying more in manual mode, I will practice that. Also, hitting home button did not do anything for me, and how would it, since gps is gone? Also I have a setting on "return to me", does it matter?

olegred · Sep 25, 2017

rcflyingaddict said:
Sorry to hear about your mishap but I'm curious why your platform of choice for building areal's is the Solo? I have only had mine a few days so granted my experience may not scale well for the time being but out of my 7 or so flights I'd have to say there have been several 'oh shit' moments that are fine since I'm just RC'ing it but if I needed a tool to get the shot in a mixed env I would think about using a different platform.

I am not that experienced either. I would say I came across Solo by accident. Bought a bundle with everything , incuding GoPro for 500. What platform do you like best? I have not tried any other.

olegred · Sep 25, 2017

just_bruce said:
In what manner did you total the gimbal? I've discovered that lots of them are probably repairable. Just curious.

Thank you for responding. I get no video feed from it to the Solo app. The gimbal also does not turn all the way down, just a quarter of the way. It still stabilizes and no easily visible mechanical damage.

Maddog · Sep 25, 2017

olegred said:
I am guilty of not reading the manual. I downloaded it and will read. However, how do you hit "brake" button. My drone started floating and I did not know which way it faced. So I kinda pressed forward and spinned it and once it was going into the sand I just stuck with it. I am also guilty of not flying more in manual mode, I will practice that. Also, hitting home button did not do anything for me, and how would it, since gps is gone? Also I have a setting on "return to me", does it matter?

The brake or pause button is to the right of the home button.
You are correct that pause and return functions won't work if GPS is lost.

"Return to home" -Solo returns to the point where it got its GPS lock before takeoff.
"Return to me"- Solo will return to you if you moved away from the takeoff position.

olegred · Sep 25, 2017

Maddog said:
The brake or pause button is to the right of the home button.
You are correct that pause and return functions won't work if GPS is lost.

"Return to home" -Solo returns to the point where it got its GPS lock before takeoff.
"Return to me"- Solo will return to you if you moved away from the takeoff position.

But again, only if it has a GPS lock. GPS goes out, everything else goes out except for a manual mode. If you can not get it under control you are screwed.

just_bruce · Sep 25, 2017

Hmm. Sounds like the tilt motor shaft got bent. And either the ribbon cables broke internally or the connector tore off the top of the board, or the ribbon cable connector on the underside was damaged.

Also, Return to Me only works with Solex and the iOS version of the 3DR app as I understand it. Just FYI.

Pedals2Paddles · Sep 25, 2017

FYI if you press the pause/brake button when GPS is not available, it will switch to manual mode.

IrishmanPDX · Sep 25, 2017

Throwing in something here, but I managed to get a great flight in at the beach last Friday in the PNW. I had tall cliffs behind me, open sea in front of me. What I noticed though was that when I went to start my flights, I was only getting 4 sats (clear skies, a fog bank a good bit off the coast) at startup. Took a while to get 8 sats (this was at 9:47am). 2nd battery in, same thing, however after that, number of sats slowly but surely grew until I was getting 20 sats or more by my 6th flight at 11:47am. Is there a warmup time associated with GPS? (using the MRO chip on all 3 birds with a ver 2 sheild). Just thought it odd that I was slowly but surely gaining sats as the day got later. Did notice some drift while hovering, so hence my desire to upgrade to a HERE system.

just_bruce · Sep 25, 2017

IrishmanPDX said:
Throwing in something here, but I managed to get a great flight in at the beach last Friday in the PNW. I had tall cliffs behind me, open sea in front of me. What I noticed though was that when I went to start my flights, I was only getting 4 sats (clear skies, a fog bank a good bit off the coast) at startup. Took a while to get 8 sats (this was at 9:47am). 2nd battery in, same thing, however after that, number of sats slowly but surely grew until I was getting 20 sats or more by my 6th flight at 11:47am. Is there a warmup time associated with GPS? (using the MRO chip on all 3 birds with a ver 2 sheild). Just thought it odd that I was slowly but surely gaining sats as the day got later. Did notice some drift while hovering, so hence my desire to upgrade to a HERE system.

How long had it been since you'd flown that particular bird? It might have been updating the almanac/ephemerides. Which are necessary to achieving a "lock" on any given satellite as they contain data about the positioning of the satellites in space. If too far out of date (i.e. you haven't flown in a while) they are downloaded and updated.

Kp-index was also a 5 or 6 early that morning, which tends to interfere with GPS.

IrishmanPDX · Sep 25, 2017

just_bruce said:
How long had it been since you'd flown that particular bird? It might have been updating the almanac/ephemerides. Which are necessary to achieving a "lock" on any given satellite as they contain data about the positioning of the satellites in space. If too far out of date (i.e. you haven't flown in a while) they are downloaded and updated.

Kp-index was also a 5 or 6 early that morning, which tends to interfere with GPS.

I had flown it the previous evening, however.... wasn't achieving SAT lock from the rental house, figured it was maybe the tree's blocking the signal combined with an overcast sky. So took it down to the beach for a short flight, got SAT lock no problem, but can't recall how many sats. Maybe I didn't fly long enough for an entire update the previous evening? Had flown it at my house in Portland the previous week, but I suppose the distance difference would be a factor in GPS positioning?

One thing I did notice was that while it was hovering, there was a good bit of drift, yet when using the RTH, it did keep landing within 2 feet of the take off point (moist sand left some nice leg prints for reference).

just_bruce · Sep 25, 2017

Distance can cause an update to commence as well, but usually over a degree of latitude or longitude is needed with modern receivers to trigger it.

I'm betting the Kp spike and the solar storm that caused it were the most likely factors

IrishmanPDX · Sep 25, 2017

Must have just caught the tail end of it so. I did one shot hovering over a rock off shore, and even with wind gusts, the solo was rock steady during that hover. Trying to get video uploaded shortly.

rcflyingaddict · Sep 25, 2017

Pedals2Paddles said:
FYI if you press the pause/brake button when GPS is not available, it will switch to manual mode.

That is good to know!

rcflyingaddict · Sep 25, 2017

olegred said:
I am not that experienced either. I would say I came across Solo by accident. Bought a bundle with everything , incuding GoPro for 500. What platform do you like best? I have not tried any other.

Solo bundles are great and your deal sounds even better. I think the Solo kit is fine but does require a bit more knowledge and attention to detail when flying than say other platforms being used to capture areal's such as dji's. Unfortunately the gimbal is going for more than a solo currently - hope you are able to salvage yours.