Solex app causing 3DR Solo to crash

Cory Wilson · Sep 25, 2018

Hi everyone Im new to this 3DRPilots and I really need help.

Today we completed a Here gps upgrade and green cube upgrade to 3 different Solos. After installing all of the firmware and making sure everything was up to date, we took the birds out for a test.

We only flew 2 of the 3 because the app changed flight modes by itself switching into loiter and RTL causing one of our drones to lose control resulting in us force landing in tall grass, and another we had total loss of control and the bird flew top speed into a tree and smashed into the pavement below.

Im sure its user error however we really need to figure this out ASAP so any help is appreciated.

just_bruce · Sep 25, 2018

Start out by giving more detail. Give a step-by-step of what you did, preferably in order. Then give a blow-by-blow of the 'crashes' or flights. Log files would probaby also be helpful. Dataflash is most useful, but T-logs might tell another story.

By the by, I doubt that Solex is the source of the problem. I could be wrong, but it seems very unlikely

IrishmanPDX · Sep 25, 2018

Agreed, I've got 2 birds with the HERE GPS upgrade, both of them are green cubed and I use Solex to fly them. I've never had a single issue with them at all. I've certainly never had the app change flight modes by itself. Really do need more detail on this one.

Pedals2Paddles · Sep 25, 2018

I assure you the Solex app did not make any mode changes for you or otherwise on it's own. It just doesn't work like that and has no means to even do such a thing.

The solo will switch to RTL as its failsafe mode for loss of controller signal or low battery. It will also switch to RTL if you press the home button on the controller, or switch to it from the mode dropdown in the app.

Cory Wilson · Sep 25, 2018

okay so I am currently trying to download the flight logs and cant seem to open them with google drive, not sure what i need to download to view the files
as for the flights in a more orderly fashion. ( I want to point out that I am by no means blaming any of the hardware, I believe this was user error. )

flight one:

12 satellites
loiter mode
manually took off from our landing pad using the transmitter
the bird tried to make a loop ( I am assuming) and we attempted to use the transmitter to take control. We were only trying to do a hover test.
the bird fought us trying to do its own thing while we were attempting to use the transmitter and had to make a steady decent ( while the bird was flying sideways ) resulting in a crash landing.

Flight two:

12 satellites
attempted to use stabilize mode
when we spun up the motors we noticed that the throttle was way to high, almost as though it was reading our transmitter like a traditional rc throttle like our FR SKY transmitters. to compensate for this error we had to hold the gimbal stick down but not at 0% so we didn't cut the motors.

We got the bird into the air and it immediately switched to loiter mode in the solex app without us telling it to do so. we had the same issue of fighting the bird so we attempted to use RTL, at first this looked promising and the bird raised altitude and headed to the correct location, then the bird went back into loiter mode and began flying over a parking lot (thankfully completely empty). We tried to fight the bird and bring it back to where we were in the field but instead it went top speed in the opposite direction and collided with a tree.

We are currently replacing the hardware that was damaged but I really want to gain as much insight on what we did wrong so we don't repeat this.

I also want to point out that I am completely new to Solex and its clear that I don't know how to properly use the app

Cory Wilson · Sep 25, 2018

Pedals2Paddles said:
I assure you the Solex app did not make any mode changes for you or otherwise on it's own. It just doesn't work like that and has no means to even do such a thing.

The solo will switch to RTL as its failsafe mode for loss of controller signal or low battery. It will also switch to RTL if you press the home button on the controller, or switch to it from the mode dropdown in the app.

Whats strange is that we didn't touch the app and it verbally informed us of the flight mode change as well as showing "loiter" in the top middle of the screen where the dropdown is. Im wondering if maybe we had a mission loaded and it was trying to execute said mission without us realizing.

Cory Wilson · Sep 25, 2018

just_bruce said:
Start out by giving more detail. Give a step-by-step of what you did, preferably in order. Then give a blow-by-blow of the 'crashes' or flights. Log files would probaby also be helpful. Dataflash is most useful, but T-logs might tell another story.

By the by, I doubt that Solex is the source of the problem. I could be wrong, but it seems very unlikely

I see the flight logs and I downloaded the most recent one to my tablet (android) but im not having any luck opening it, is there an app or a certain program I have to use to open it?

Cory Wilson · Sep 25, 2018

Im signing off for the night but will be back in the morning, thank you for taking the time everyone

Pedals2Paddles · Sep 25, 2018

You can't just open the log files with Google Drive. It's not a text file. It sounds like you have completely misconfigured all the parameters, or loaded the wrong firmware, or god knows what. Nothing you are describing makes any sense.

Cory Wilson said:
After installing all of the firmware and making sure everything was up to date, we took the birds out for a test.

What firmware did you install? Better yet, what instructions did you follow??

just_bruce · Sep 25, 2018

The sideways flight thing has happened to me when either A) The Level calibration is shite or B) There is bad GPS data. The fact that the PixHawk was calling for flight mode changes [Solex was just announcing them] would seem to indicate something wrong with the sensors.

Saijin_Naib · Sep 25, 2018

Cory Wilson said:
Im wondering if maybe we had a mission loaded and it was trying to execute said mission without us realizing.

I'm going to come off like a complete asshole here, but I need to say it:
If you don't even know if you loaded a mission or put it into autonomous mode, you need to not be flying. At all. That's the car/driving equivalent of "I'm not even sure if we had it in gear and had the foot on the gas or not, or if anyone was even at the wheel". Not a good position to take with something that weighs almost 5lbs, can hit 50mph, and has CFRP blades.

Step back, re-assess your familiarity with the platform, and start with baby steps. Learn how to pull logs, learn how to push a flight plan, go over the pre-flight checks meticulously.

I'm saying this as someone that started from zero two summers ago with the Solo (or any non-toygrade quad, really) and built up from there.

Cory Wilson · Sep 26, 2018

When doing the install of new hardware after the initial updates on the solo system, we followed two of jester drones videos.
Also I couldn't figure out how to open the doc in mission planner either.
current firmware is open solo 3.0 for oth the controller and quad.

Also its true that I have limited experience with the 3DR Solo platform and this is my first time using the Solex app, we rushed into this and definitely should have consulted this forum right off the rip, lessons learned.

Oh and we did not have a mission loaded, we checked it it, I threw it out there as a possibility because I wasn't sure if that was something that could happen. we played with the mission tab at in the office and we weren't sure if maybe that was an issue. (keep in mind we have 0 experience with the Solex app)

Cory Wilson · Sep 26, 2018

Pedals2Paddles said:
You can't just open the log files with Google Drive. It's not a text file. It sounds like you have completely misconfigured all the parameters, or loaded the wrong firmware, or god knows what. Nothing you are describing makes any sense.

What firmware did you install? Better yet, what instructions did you follow??

can you run me through the process of opening the flight logs via solex? Sorry Ive never pulled flight logs from an AV before.

Cory Wilson · Sep 26, 2018

Saijin_Naib said:
I'm going to come off like a complete asshole here, but I need to say it:
If you don't even know if you loaded a mission or put it into autonomous mode, you need to not be flying. At all. That's the car/driving equivalent of "I'm not even sure if we had it in gear and had the foot on the gas or not, or if anyone was even at the wheel". Not a good position to take with something that weighs almost 5lbs, can hit 50mph, and has CFRP blades.

Step back, re-assess your familiarity with the platform, and start with baby steps. Learn how to pull logs, learn how to push a flight plan, go over the pre-flight checks meticulously.

I'm saying this as someone that started from zero two summers ago with the Solo (or any non-toygrade quad, really) and built up from there.

Alright ouch but noted, were gonna go through and re-download all of the firmware and take this step by step. We also have a different team of pilots that are gonna do the test flights and show us in person how to use the app. we have more parts coming in to rebuild the damaged Solos but I really want to make sure we do all of the upgrades properly so we don't waste time ringing these things down to sarasota for these other pilots. Thats why Im here

Cory Wilson · Sep 26, 2018

just_bruce said:
The sideways flight thing has happened to me when either A) The Level calibration is shite or B) There is bad GPS data. The fact that the PixHawk was calling for flight mode changes [Solex was just announcing them] would seem to indicate something wrong with the sensors.

I don't think it was level cal because the solo had no problem taking off straight up without drifting. However the GPS is a good area to look at, so we did the param change from 38 to 0 on the compass orient, and the gps wouldn't allow us to arm. My coworker changed another peram in mission planner and I believe it was the GPS pre-arm check, we unchecked the box because we figured if we had 12 satellites the gps was fine. Looking back I feel like this was the source of this issue, however if we change that back we wont be ale to arm and we will have a whole other issue.

Cory Wilson · Sep 26, 2018

Cory Wilson said:
I don't think it was level cal because the solo had no problem taking off straight up without drifting. However the GPS is a good area to look at, so we did the param change from 38 to 0 on the compass orient, and the gps wouldn't allow us to arm. My coworker changed another peram in mission planner and I believe it was the GPS pre-arm check, we unchecked the box because we figured if we had 12 satellites the gps was fine. Looking back I feel like this was the source of this issue, however if we change that back we wont be ale to arm and we will have a whole other issue.

update the param was an arming check not a pre-arming check

Pedals2Paddles · Sep 26, 2018

You turned off the GPS arming check.... You realize then when you disable an error message, that doesn't actually mean the error is no longer real? If you house was on fire, taking the battery out of the smoke detector doesn't mean the house is no longer on fire. Also, the COMPASS_ORIENT parameter has no impact on GPS operation. I think you have completely bungled up parameters and calibrations. I suggest hitting the the reset params button in Solex (in the Firmware menu) and reboot. Change the compass orient back to zero (or load the compass FW package in solex) and reboot. Compass calibration and reboot. Level calibration and reboot. Test fly.

Cory Wilson · Sep 26, 2018

Pedals2Paddles said:
You turned off the GPS arming check.... You realize then when you disable an error message, that doesn't actually mean the error is no longer real? If you house was on fire, taking the battery out of the smoke detector doesn't mean the house is no longer on fire. Also, the COMPASS_ORIENT parameter has no impact on GPS operation. I think you have completely bungled up parameters and calibrations. I suggest hitting the the reset params button in Solex (in the Firmware menu) and reboot. Change the compass orient back to zero (or load the compass FW package in solex) and reboot. Compass calibration and reboot. Level calibration and reboot. Test fly.

My mistake I meant to type compass pre arm check lol and also yes Im fully aware that disabling an error message doesn't make the error go away. we will attempt to do what you just said now. also the compass orient value was something we were told to change in the first video link I sent which is why we did it.