Sudden Battery Drain

[Chuck]

I had a weird thing occur today. I was out at a local park where I test fly sometimes. I had a guy come up who was very interested in the Solo. Seems he crashed his Phantom Vision+ recently and needed a new gimbal and camera. He was talking to me about Solo and whether that would be a better option for his money. I was showing him features of the Solo and did a couple of smart shots, and saw my battery was down to about 32%. I was maybe 100ft. out and maybe 150ft. up, and went to show him RTL. My Solo did as it should, and started up. My RTL is set at 195ft, and as you know it goes up pretty quickly. Within 20secs. of starting it's ascent, I got the 25% battery warning, the critical battery warning, and the audible beeps from Solo itself. I watched the battery plummet to 10%, hit pause to regain control, and landed it myself with 1% battery showing on the screen. I was so intent on landing safely, I never got to check the battery voltage screen to see what it read. Now, I normally return and land with between 23% and 28% left. I have never had the battery drain so fast, even from 30%. My question is, do you think the rapid ascent when RTL was activated caused such a fast drain of the battery? I know going up rapidly uses a lot of juice, but this kind of drain has never happened before. Has anyone else experienced this? I thought maybe the battery percentages were off on the screen, but when I hooked the battery up to the charger, only 1 LED was lit. It seems to be charging ok, and I will put it in and test it in the morning with some very low and slow flying. I was just wondering what everybody's thoughts was on this. Thanks in advance for your help.

 

[Psywarrior]

Unless you are regularly flying around trees or structures that are over 150' tall, I would lower my RTH altitude.

Yes, once the battery gets below 50% a hard pull on it is exaggerated in usage. Think of it this way...you are fully rested and have to pick up a #100 sack of potatoes. No problem. A quick little humph and it's up. But, later in the day, you're starting to wind down a bit and have to pick up another. It takes you much more effort to pick up that sack.

Battery power is not linear although the meters/gauges measure that way. The percentage reading is based on a moderate load of maintaining a hover in zero wind. The more it drains, the faster it drains and e more it drains the more a load will affect it.

 

[Chuck]

That makes sense. It is just that it has never happened before in similar situations. For sure I will adjust my RTH setting to the area I am flying in for future flights. Thanks a lot for your input.

 

[Dash Hewes]

This is typical battery behavior, at the bottom end of the power band it depletes very rapidly. Add the quick increase to ascend on a low battery and you have all variables you witnessed.
Land at 25% and try not to go beyond 20%.

 

[Chuck]

I usually head home with 30%+ left on the battery, and after landing I usually have 20%+ left. This hasn't happened before. I will try a controlled test with the same battery today, and make sure all is ok with it. Thanks to all who got back to me with your thoughts on this. Much appreciated.

 

[RikMiddle]

I had a weird thing occur today. I was out at a local park where I test fly sometimes. I had a guy come up who was very interested in the Solo. Seems he crashed his Phantom Vision+ recently and needed a new gimbal and camera. He was talking to me about Solo and whether that would be a better option for his money. I was showing him features of the Solo and did a couple of smart shots, and saw my battery was down to about 32%. I was maybe 100ft. out and maybe 150ft. up, and went to show him RTL. My Solo did as it should, and started up. My RTL is set at 195ft, and as you know it goes up pretty quickly. Within 20secs. of starting it's ascent, I got the 25% battery warning, the critical battery warning, and the audible beeps from Solo itself. I watched the battery plummet to 10%, hit pause to regain control, and landed it myself with 1% battery showing on the screen. I was so intent on landing safely, I never got to check the battery voltage screen to see what it read. Now, I normally return and land with between 23% and 28% left. I have never had the battery drain so fast, even from 30%. My question is, do you think the rapid ascent when RTL was activated caused such a fast drain of the battery? I know going up rapidly uses a lot of juice, but this kind of drain has never happened before. Has anyone else experienced this? I thought maybe the battery percentages were off on the screen, but when I hooked the battery up to the charger, only 1 LED was lit. It seems to be charging ok, and I will put it in and test it in the morning with some very low and slow flying. I was just wondering what everybody's thoughts was on this. Thanks in advance for your help.

yup, same thing happened on my last flight.
i had about 35% left and wanted to show someone who had just showed some interest.
took off, up 50' and 25% warning, hit home ,landed with less than 10%.
fly and learn...

 

[Chuck]

Just curious. What was your RTH altitude set at?

 

[RikMiddle]

Just curious. What was your RTH altitude set at?

90 feet, I notice when that kicks in, solo seems to go into full tilt boogie like it's late for dinner.
so much so, on this example I forgot to mention, controller spit out "failsafe" on it's way home.

I now have 3 batt's , so I'm starting to think 30% and I'm headed home from now on...

 

[Chuck]

Yes, it does hit the afterburner on the way up. Also remember, I think 3DR added an extra 10ft. to your RTH setting as an extra safeguard, no matter what it is set at. A good idea, but easy to forget sometimes.

 

[erikgraham]

As other have said, that rapid upward climb is no doubt the culprit, especially with a low battery.

But what concerns me is that you landed with only 1% left. I would watch that battery closely from now on. It might be damaged.

 

[The Juggler]

I also experienced this yesterday. RTH is set to 75ft. This was my first flight since installing gimbal and updating to latest software. I got the Battery warning notice at 25% (which I normally ignore), but it dropped to 10% very quickly after. On its RTH descent it triggered 'failsafe' landing and it landed, took off again to about 5 feet, and then landed again. I thought perhaps it was because I hadn't used that battery for about 2 weeks. (using Solo App Beta on LG G Pad)

 

[Chuck]

That kinda puts a twist on the situation. I charged my battery after getting home, and it charged up normally. I am going to take it back out later and do a very controlled low flight, and pay special attention when it gets down to about 30%. I will also lower my RTH setting. I will just see how it goes. Thanks for your input, Juggler.

 

[Dash Hewes]

Flew today north of Boston in Newbury, it was very windy and 60F, got the 25% call at 10 min, this is very disappointing. This battery of five has about 10 flights on it. All flying was in manual.

 

[locutus]

Hi Dash. I live in Essex.Any good flying areas up there?

 

[Dash Hewes]

Hi locutus,
There's plenty of place to fly, but....I have the 333 exemption and have not had a problem with folks bugging me. Just fly by the rules and have fun.

 

[Maddog]

I'd like to add a battery problem to this thread:

Two days ago I went flying near my house. I fully charged one battery 15 minutes before I fired Solo up.
I started Solo, hit fly and it climbed to about 10 ft., which is normal.
I looked at the controller and it said battery was at 88% ! What?
The flight went ahead normally and I landed shortly after hitting 25%.
I sent a repair ticket and logs to 3DR and this is what they said regarding the battery issue after viewing the logs:

..Both batteries start at above 94% of charge. No issues there.
(2 flights that day)

Really? No issue?
Has anybody else had this "non-issue"?

Regarding battery life: about 2 weeks ago I was flying slowly above a storm damaged warehouse. At 7 minutes I got a 25% warning.
I landed manually 90 seconds later (Solo was only a block away at 100 ft) and battery was at "fail safe".

I have never gotten more than 15 minutes flight time since installing the gimbal. That was part 2 of my repair ticket. I got the following response regarding flight time:

..15 minutes of flight time is normal if the gimbal is installed.
I never saw that in any of the advertising for Solo- all I saw was 20-25 minutes of flight time. If I knew it was 15 minutes with gimbal, I would never have bought it.

You can't do much in 15 minutes, taking into account start-up time, flight to and from filming location, and perhaps hovering time while you set up smart shot.

I am not a happy camper...

 

[J R]

I haven't experienced any battery issues at this point with the Solo. Most likely because I'm landed by 30%. I'm trying to take it easy on my three new batteries and I'm still in the testing phase with this bird.

However, I have not seen these things with either of my "white" birds. I've got eight batteries between those two birds and fortunately haven't had any battery issues "yet". I also don't see the more rapid depletion described here when the batteries get to the lower spectrum. Maybe a little but not very much. I will condition my statement with two things though, I always try to get my birds on the ground with about 30% and I rarely use the RTH function, I'm not sure I ever have except for testing purposes.

All that being said, I do think the battery time for the Solo is quite a bit lower than what I expected. I can get a good 18 minutes on my P3 and still land with 30%. I'm not sure I've been able to get 12 on the Solo. I'm not trying to start a Solo/Phantom ruckus, I'm just sharing my experience. I'm a proud Solo owner and supporter. Any comparisons that I provide are simply to help make the Solo a better machine.

Jerry

 

[Del]

Hmmmm... Thinking here... !!
Thinking that a battery to get that low so fast.. Either.. Is a bad battery.. Or something sucking the juice out of it.. Like a bad motor working really hard because of bad bearings or somthing..??

Just my thoughts..

 

[Maddog]

Hmmmm... Thinking here... !!
Thinking that a battery to get that low so fast.. Either.. Is a bad battery.. Or something sucking the juice out of it.. Like a bad motor working really hard because of bad bearings or somthing..??

Just my thoughts..

Would something like that show up in the logs? I really don't know. I can download them but I can't open them in MP.

 

[Maddog]

I haven't experienced any battery issues at this point with the Solo. Most likely because I'm landed by 30%. I'm trying to take it easy on my three new batteries and I'm still in the testing phase with this bird.

However, I have not seen these things with either of my "white" birds. I've got eight batteries between those two birds and fortunately haven't had any battery issues "yet". I also don't see the more rapid depletion described here when the batteries get to the lower spectrum. Maybe a little but not very much. I will condition my statement with two things though, I always try to get my birds on the ground with about 30% and I rarely use the RTH function, I'm not sure I ever have except for testing purposes.

All that being said, I do think the battery time for the Solo is quite a bit lower than what I expected. I can get a good 18 minutes on my P3 and still land with 30%. I'm not sure I've been able to get 12 on the Solo. I'm not trying to start a Solo/Phantom ruckus, I'm just sharing my experience. I'm a proud Solo owner and supporter. Any comparisons that I provide are simply to help make the Solo a better machine.

Jerry

Jerry, not trying to start a ruckus either, but how do you like your Phantom? Would it be a good backup to the Solo?