Solo landed in lake. I'm F###ED!!!

locutus · Sep 10, 2015

So the other day I take solo out and I obviously don't have a GPS lock, I launch it to get a better GPS signal. My intentions were to have it return home so it has a home location. It looks like I did not do that.
Solo was out about 200 feet and about 75 feet up and not surprisingly I lose the signal. I have a DBS antenna as well. So It returns home although home was 20 feet offshore...OVER THE FRIGGIN LAKE..... solo would not reconnect as it was about 30...30 feet away!! It sunk and was submerged for about 45 minutes.

I blew it out with an air compressor and let it dry overnight inside of a hot vehicle. Everything seemed to be dry the next day. As I plugged a good battery in, Green lights lit up and although it made strange sounds. There was no communication.
One of the motor pods blew smoke from a capacitor. I sent the logs into 3dr and since it was launched without home location, I'm shit out of luck.

Aram (3D Robotics)

Sep 10, 4:18 PM

Hello Andrew,

I have been reviewing the log file you send, and now I understand what happened.
It seems like the vehicle was armed without having a GPS lock, so it took off on FLY: Manual (without GPS dependency). The home position is established as soon as the vehicle acquires GPS lock, the vehicle acquire a GPS lock while it was over the water around the GPS coordinate 42.614891 -70.807954. When the vehicle lost connection with the controller, it engaged Return to Home, but since the home position was over the water, there is where it lands. I am attaching a picture where it shows where was the home position established.
Home Position page 16, Section 3.7.
Solo User Manual | 3DR | Drone & UAV Technology

I am really sorry that this happened to your vehicle. We want to help you getting your vehicle working again. Hopefully is not a total vehicle loss, and I believe the best thing to do at the moment would be waiting for it to dry completely, and then check after what is the overall damage on it to see what we would need to replace. Despite the loss of communication between the Controller and Solo this is cannot be considered a hardware or software malfunction, as the loss of communication is somehow expected to happen under certain conditions, for that reason the flight controller has Fail Safes implemented on software, to prevent harm when something the communication is lost.

Let me know if you have additional questions Andrew, or if there's anything I can help with while we wait to diagnose the damage on the vehicle.

Aram Robledo
[Technical Support Engineer]

Attachment(s)
Home Location.

Sent from my iPhone

Richard · Sep 10, 2015

ouch sorry to hear this, maybe it is just the pod and nothing else that is cooked.

locutus · Sep 10, 2015

Thanks. I hope so as well. Has anybody else sunk there solo and what was the outcome?

RichWest · Sep 10, 2015

~~Heat~~ Warmth and air circulation will help a great deal to dry everything out. There is another thread recently discussing water landing, two members discussed their resolve.....which I think both had success.

Edit: Here's the link to the thread - Let's go swimming ! | 3D Robotics Drone Forum

Sorry that you have troubles...

MarqueGlisson · Sep 10, 2015

Wow I really hope all turns out well.

z3r01 · Sep 10, 2015

i would have out in rice and let the rice get all the moisture...even moisture can stay inside small parts

BobT · Sep 10, 2015

I repair iPhones and iPads for a living, with any water damage electronic device I go for the Silica beads. Since the SOLO is pretty big this could be tricky but a large tupperware bin that seals airtight and a the bottom filled with silica should work well. You can usually find a large bucket of the beads at walmart Silica Gel Crystals 1.5 lb Tub - Walmart.com

RichWest · Sep 10, 2015

I read your previous post suggesting silica beads. Now curious as to how long to "soak" in the beads? Is more really better/faster? Really is a great idea...thanks for sharing.

BobT said:
I repair iPhones and iPads for a living, with any water damage electronic device I go for the Silica beads. Since the SOLO is pretty big this could be tricky but a large tupperware bin that seals airtight and a the bottom filled with silica should work well. You can usually find a large bucket of the beads at walmart Silica Gel Crystals 1.5 lb Tub - Walmart.com

Adimuzio513 · Sep 10, 2015

Yea buddy sorry to hear this its all our worst nightmares, hope it turns out to be a fairly inexpensive fix.

Overnight seems like a decent time but when submerged water gets everywhere, into every little space crack and crevice. You really need to tear the electronic item apart and I've had great luck drying any visible water then using rice or silica as mentioned if you ever have anything electronic get submerged again. It's hard to dry small spaces that water becomes stuck in maybe put it near a fan as well. Give it a couple days and rotate a bit so gravity works for ya and more times than not it should have no or little damage. Sorry again man good luck with everything from here.

BobT · Sep 10, 2015

If there is still water in an iPhone I give it atleast 24 hrs in a sealed bag, with the size and possible amount of water in the SOLO I would say 3 days at least. never use direct heat (heat gun or hair dryer). Air circulation and low humidity is your best option.

Adimuzio513 · Sep 11, 2015

Almost forgot when you send it in have them go over your antenna connections and such that distance seems awful short for a disconnect. Seems like something was wrong somewhere, can't get warranty anyway since home was set on the fly, I'm guilty of this too sometimes but still worth checking for future flying. I've not had one RTL since owning solo, I've now done the mod and bought an fpvlr antenna but any way it goes it seems like that shouldn't have happened. I fly Los but still well over 1000 feet in a wifi and tree congested area and forgot range was a problem entirely now. Just an idea so it doesn't happen again.

Rich · Sep 11, 2015

For exact reasons such as this, I have been promoting a Dynamic Home Point.

Unfortunately 3DR has not acknowledged that they think it is a good idea or not. I'd love to see this as a future feature. It would solve issues such as this.

Of course, almost nothing will help if you lose complete communications with the Solo and can't control it at all. In the past, I have lost communications when the Solo was only about 40 feet from me with nothing between the controller and the Solo.

I still wish 3DR had not used WiFi for the essential control communications protocol. I am still thinking about writing an article about my thoughts, but it would only stir up a lot of negative vibes, so for now, I'm keeping it to myself, as we only have WiFi to use for now.

z3r01 · Sep 11, 2015

Rich said:
For exact reasons such as this, I have been promoting a Dynamic Home Point.

Unfortunately 3DR has not acknowledged that they think it is a good idea or not. I'd love to see this as a future feature. It would solve issues such as this.

Of course, almost nothing will help if you lose complete communications with the Solo and can't control it at all. In the past, I have lost communications when the Solo was only about 40 feet from me with nothing between the controller and the Solo.

I still wish 3DR had not used WiFi for the essential control communications protocol. I am still thinking about writing an article about my thoughts, but it would only stir up a lot of negative vibes, so for now, I'm keeping it to myself, as we only have WiFi to use for now.

This would definitely be a great feature add on and the cool part is, it's just programming and no hardware upgrades

Retired2Fly · Sep 11, 2015

Rich said:
For exact reasons such as this, I have been promoting a Dynamic Home Point.

Unfortunately 3DR has not acknowledged that they think it is a good idea or not. I'd love to see this as a future feature. It would solve issues such as this.

Of course, almost nothing will help if you lose complete communications with the Solo and can't control it at all. In the past, I have lost communications when the Solo was only about 40 feet from me with nothing between the controller and the Solo.

I still wish 3DR had not used WiFi for the essential control communications protocol. I am still thinking about writing an article about my thoughts, but it would only stir up a lot of negative vibes, so for now, I'm keeping it to myself, as we only have WiFi to use for now.

Dynamic home point functionality has been discussed with ARDUcopter long before Pixhawk and the solo. The reason it was not implemented is that it would require a TX with a GPS or a smart device connected to a TX with GPS to implement.

z3r01 said:
This would definitely be a great feature add on and the cool part is, it's just programming and no hardware upgrades

Actually it is not just programming as a GPS module in your solo TX or smart device would be required. Since solo does not require a smart deice to operate there are just too many situation variables to overcome for it to be feasible to implement at this time. The reason DJI was able to offer this functionality is that their MRs through their DJI GO software app is that DJI MRs operate in a proprietary closed system and they require a smart device with a GPS to run their DJI GO app so all they have to check for an attached smart device and then get GPS coordinates from the attached smart device since they know the device has a GPS.

Rich · Sep 11, 2015

Retired2Fly, but the Solo and it's controller DO use a smart device connected to it, and most of them have their own internal GPS. This is the basis of how the 'Follow Me' and "Look at Me" modes work now.

So 3DR could easily implement the Dynamic Home Point, and also include some smart options to this mode as I have proposed, such as having the drone come home to where you are (using the GPS position of your smart device), but hover 20 feet up and 20 feet away from your position, waiting for you to manually initiate a landing (unless the battery is getting too weak before you arrive, or if you lose control, then it can manually land itself).

If the smart device is not being used, or somehow doesn't have a GPS, simply don't offer this as an option to be used (same as Follow Me does).

z3r01 · Sep 11, 2015

I believe that it can still function , I mean , you're already capturing GPS location on both , to relay that into pixhawk might be viable ? I mean I'm no expert , just going on theory. But it could be plausible based on the two on board computers

~z3r01~

rrmccabe · Sep 11, 2015

z3r01 said:
you're already capturing GPS location on both , to relay that into pixhawk might be viable ?

GPS on both what? I don't think there is any GPS on the controller.

z3r01 · Sep 11, 2015

No not in the controller , I meant the app lol sorry this tapatalk is new to me lol

~z3r01~

Retired2Fly · Sep 11, 2015

Rich said:
Retired2Fly, but the Solo and it's controller DO use a smart device connected to it, and most of them have their own internal GPS. This is the basis of how the 'Follow Me' and "Look at Me" modes work now.

So 3DR could easily implement the Dynamic Home Point, and also include some smart options to this mode as I have proposed, such as having the drone come home to where you are (using the GPS position of your smart device), but hover 20 feet up and 20 feet away from your position, waiting for you to manually initiate a landing (unless the battery is getting too weak before you arrive, or if you lose control, then it can manually land itself).

If the smart device is not being used, or somehow doesn't have a GPS, simply don't offer this as an option to be used (same as Follow Me does).

However unlike the DJI product the solo does not require a smart device with a verified GPS. That is the big difference. There is noting in the OOB solo product that would allow dynamic home point to be implemented in a consistent manner since the assumption that a device providing GPS location would be available is not necessarily a valid assumption and not all GPS devices provide GPS data in a consistent format.. At best, 3DR could make Dynamic home points an advanced feature but even then without validating the smart devices GPS's locks status they would have to include disclaimers excluding any use from their warranty.

Rich · Sep 11, 2015

I'm promoting that Dynamic Home Point is an option under the Advanced features. Its use need some thought and control. The user needs to use some thought before allowing the Solo to land as the Dynamic Home Point may not always be a safe place to have the Solo auto-land.

So I'm in agreement that this needs to be understood and controlled by the user, and thus buried in the Advanced menu as an option for use by experienced operators (with the appropriate warnings in the documentation).

So let's not kill it because a dumb user won't understand it. IMHO, this is no more difficult to understand than sport, drift mode, or Fly:Stabilize mode.