Recent content by ChuckD

I do use that program, but you're right, it's just an estimate of conditions at different altitudes using the wind profile power law. It's a good guess, but I would have sworn that I had started in almost no wind. Perhaps carrying a pocket wind meter might be smart. It's interesting that...

Seems like the quad would know that it was working hard to stay level, so I'd think they could implement this without any extra hardware at all. It would be nice to know things were getting rough before I wind up in a full blown fly-away.

This is really a suggestion for Yuneec, but it's always good to throw this stuff out in a public forum for comments. I'd like to get a warning on my ST10 (or other controller) if the Q500 is struggling to maintain position, due to excessive wind conditions. Recently we had a windy day here...

I'm really thinking for my own purposes, and not for flying over public transportation.... I just used a train as an example because here in my office there's a railroad track nearby and a train was going through, so it got me thinking. I'm sure other people get contracted to shoot moving...

Strange thing is that this never happened before, and it only seemed to happen when I faced west towards the sunset. You'll notice that at one point I turn left (south), and the shaking stops. Then I turn back west, and it starts up again. I'm suspecting high winds at altitude, but there's no...

Ok, so I just converted this video real fast with QuickTime. I hadn't intended to film anything, but once things got weird, I decided to press 'record' just in case I had one of those epic crashes about to happen, then I could share with all! Check out about 15 seconds into the video the weird...

I took it out tonight again just to see what the light under the motor would do, and it seems that it's some type of illusion! Occasionally I'd get the camera/gimbal in the way slightly, and it would create what seemed to be a flashing effect on one of the motor lights. However (and this is...

Just playing around today, and for the most part the day was too windy. So at the end of the day, it died down a bit so I went for a quick flight. After taking off, I noticed that occasionally one of the white lights under the left front motor would flash occasionally. No other warnings, but...

The price is pretty amazing for this, especially if you watch the Intel video where the drone avoids all those obstacles and desert cacti. I do realize the Intel sensor is extra, but it just shows you what a 60 million dollar investment can do! Looks like I'll be selling my brand new Q500 4K...

Realizing that in normal circumstances we shouldn't be flying 'over' too many things, I was wondering what would be adequate distance above a vehicle to avoid any ground turbulence. For example, let's say a train was passing underneath at 40 mph. Obviously I don't want to be immediately above...

Assuming that most fly-aways are due to errant GPS signals, it seems that Yuneec should be modifying the software to look for large, odd jumps in GPS position. You're flying along with a good set of coordinates, then suddenly the bird thinks it's a half mile from where it was? Obviously...

I'm surprised you can actually get off the ground with the cover in place. It's hard to keep my cover on just to store the Q.