Smart RTL causes ship to land immediately

[dougputt]

Hi all

Having a issue with Smart RTL...had it set and was flying around when I lost signal instead of climbing to safe alt it prompltly proceeded to land in some dense forrest...Luckily only a few props...

Using the latest open solo dev 4, with autopilot 4

Regards
Doug

 

[Pedals2Paddles]

What option do you have the failsafe set for?

If SmartRTL cannot function because the track buffer overflowed or GPS position was lost, it will fall back to regular RTL or Land mode depending on the option you have set. And in either case, if the GPS position is still lost, it will still end up in land mode. So I'm guess you were either set to the "SmartRTL or Land" option, or you were in the "SmartRTL or RTL" option and the GPS was still lost.

 

[dougputt]

Yes I had the smart RTL or land option set..but I don't believe it ever lost gps signal just the signal from ground controller as I forgot to turn my antenna booster on....

 

[Pedals2Paddles]

OK. So with the "SmartRTL or Land" option, if it cannot SmartRTL, it will land. If the GPS position is lost at any time since takeoff, the SmartRTL will be disabled. If the track buffer becomes full, it can no longer track it's path and SmartRTL will be disabled. Since you say the GPS position was never lost, I would say the position buffer probably filled up. When that happens, you should get a warning on the GCS that says “SmartRTL deactivated: buffer full”. I would pretty much never recommend the SmartRTL or Land option unless you're operating in the desert. Use SmartRTL or RTL unless you have a very specific use case to require landing only.

You can bump up parameter SRTL_POINTS to increase the number of points it can store, but it is limited by the available memory. Off the top of my head, I don't know how much it can be increased on the Solo.

 

[dougputt]

OK. So with the "SmartRTL or Land" option, if it cannot SmartRTL, it will land. If the GPS position is lost at any time since takeoff, the SmartRTL will be disabled. If the track buffer becomes full, it can no longer track it's path and SmartRTL will be disabled. Since you say the GPS position was never lost, I would say the position buffer probably filled up. When that happens, you should get a warning on the GCS that says “SmartRTL deactivated: buffer full”. I would pretty much never recommend the SmartRTL or Land option unless you're operating in the desert. Use SmartRTL or RTL unless you have a very specific use case to require landing only.

You can bump up parameter SRTL_POINTS to increase the number of points it can store, but it is limited by the available memory. Off the top of my head, I don't know how much it can be increased on the Solo.

Okay I'll give it a go...appreciate the help for sure!!

It sometimes seems to start the smart RTL breadcrumbs but I honestly never heard "buffer full" message. I usually do have RTL set but was testing out a new battery after I had done some missions.

Appreciate it,