C23 issues, unclear on what's going wrong.

[Crazy Crow]

Hi guys,

After owning a Typhoon H with CGO3+ for several years I descided to get the H plus with C23 camera. Bought it second hand for a descent price.
After flying it for the first time I noticed the video dropped out several times and the gimbal kept buzzing and shaking. The second issue was fixed with the 784 firmware, although the first issue persists.

To discribe the issue:
Connecting to the camera sometimes fails and I have to do it manually through the wifi settings menu in the android tablet. After doing so it will show up in the flight mode 2.0 app and can be linked through the binding menu.
Drone boots up nomally and connects like it should as does the gimbal. Take off and flight is always fine. Press record button and video starts shooting. After about 30 to 120 seconds the video drops out and the st16 image freezes, the connection icon in the top right corner stays the same so it shows no connection failure. After aproximately 45 to 60 seconds the image pops back up on the st16s and recording has stopped. The process remains the same throughout the flight.
After the flight, checking the recorded videos, they stop at the moment of the dropout. Several recorded videos can not be rendered by media player on the pc so some get corrupted by the dropouts.

It seems the camera just drops out and reboots or something. I have tried a test while the drone sits on the table and keep the camera panning around. The dropouts happen at random times. The green light on the C23 blinks untill the dropout and keeps blinking for a short while during the dropout and then turns green again, immediately the video is back on the st16s. In flight it seems to take a lot longer for the video to come back. At one point I even had to land to reconnect the camera.

To my knowledge both drone and camera are up to date.
I have tried 2 different SD cards and with both the issue returns.
I have reset the camera by holding the reset switches in the bottom of the camera.
I reset the ST16S to factory settings and reinstalled the Flight mode 2.0 app.

Is there anything more I can try?
Flying like this is very frustrating and at some points even dangerous so I am somewhat scared to keep flying it like this.

 

[h-elsner]

Poor WiFi connection should not stop the video from recording. Also the ffect that some videos are not readably (buffer not stored, not finlized video) points to power supply.
I would like to see the flight2logs from such a case during flight. I want to check if there are drop-outs of telemetry too. Also on the screen - is telemetry (altitude, distance) stopping to work too?
Could you check power supply contacts on the camera mount? Maybe clean it as well *** the connectors inside the drone and the camera. Only thoughts....

 

[Crazy Crow]

Poor WiFi connection should not stop the video from recording. Also the ffect that some videos are not readably (buffer not stored, not finlized video) points to power supply.
I would like to see the flight2logs from such a case during flight. I want to check if there are drop-outs of telemetry too. Also on the screen - is telemetry (altitude, distance) stopping to work too?
Could you check power supply contacts on the camera mount? Maybe clean it as well *** the connectors inside the drone and the camera. Only thoughts....

That is also my initial thought. It doesn’t feel like a reception issue. I will check the power circuit to make sure it’s not a power dropout.

Although that would be strange since the camera does not do a full restart.
The blinking blue/green light (while recording) just goes of for a very short moment before returning to green. At that point the image pops right back up on the ST16S

 

[WTFDproject]

...Connecting to the camera sometimes fails and I have to do it manually through the wifi settings menu in the android tablet. After doing so it will show up in the flight mode 2.0 app and can be linked through the binding menu.
.....
Is there anything more I can try?

Connecting to the camera sometimes fails and I have to do it manually through the wifi settings menu
Are you certain the camera is a C23 and not an E90? Do you know of any camera repairs that may have resulted in the camera being a bybrid of the two variants?

Is there anything more I can try?
What SD cards are you using?
What format is used on the SD cards?
At what resolution, frame rate are you recording?

Have you tried reducing resolution and frame rate to the minimum to see if that will help? (Many standard SD cards have problems handling resolution higher than 1080p and 48 frames /second.)

 

[Crazy Crow]

I do not know about any repairs ever done to it. But I’m certain it is a C23. It shows op in the bind screen as a C23.
I don’t know about that Hybrid possibility but I suspect it is still original.

I’m recording in 4K 60 so that might be the issue. I had not thought of that yet. I will try shooting at 1080 tomorrow and post the results. The SD cards I used are 32gb cards from Kingston and Intenso.

 

[Crazy Crow]

I just got in touch with the guy who sold it to me and he said he used to have the same issue.
The shop that sold it to him had advised to buy another antenna (like the itellite antennas) and he says that after that he always flew without problems. So I will dig into the antenna as well.

 

[WTFDproject]

I’m recording in 4K 60 so that might be the issue. I had not thought of that yet. I will try shooting at 1080 tomorrow and post the results. The SD cards I used are 32gb cards from Kingston and Intenso.

I think the SD cards have to be Class 10 and have the U3 symbol (see image below). The smart guys will have to tell us what that means and why it matters. I just remember that cards with lower ratings give problems.

.. the guy who sold it to me .. said he used to have the same issue.
The shop .... advised to buy another antenna (like the itellite antennas)...after that flew without problems. So I will dig into the antenna as well.

Interesting information.
As @h-elsner said, an antenna problem does not match up with all symptoms.

But it is possible more than one issue exists.
Problems with the SD Card or the camera itself, such as power, are likely to show up at any distance. With the camera very close or far away.
Antenna problems are likely to show up more as distance increases.

Did the seller mention what type SD cards he was using?

 

[Crazy Crow]

I use one of the cards that he used and one that I had myself from my previous Typhoon H. I will check what it says on the cards asap. (Not near my drone right now).

As for the antenna it is indeed weird since it happens wheter near or far.
I did get the larger patch antenna with the drone but that does not seem to help. It happens with both the original mushroon and patch antennas as well as with the larger Itellite antenna.
Nevertheless it is still worth opening the C23 up and checking the antenna’s condition.

 

[WTFDproject]

Nevertheless it is still worth opening the C23 up and checking the antenna’s condition.

I would advise not until it is proved necessary.
The C23 antenna is not housed like the CGo3 series. You will have to cut some glue to get the housing off. I have permanently damaged the housing every time I ever tried to cut one apart.
However, the antenna connection is just under the rear arm cover and could be inspected for corrosion without much risk.

I currently doubt the antenna is the problem and would not think even a small risk is warranted until all other possibilities are exhausted.

 

[Crazy Crow]

I would advise not until it is proved necessary.
The C23 antenna is not housed like the CGo3 series. You will have to cut some glue to get the housing off. I have permanently damaged the housing every time I ever tried to cut one apart.
However, the antenna connection is just under the rear arm cover and could be inspected for corrosion without much risk.

I currently doubt the antenna is the problem and would not think even a small risk is warranted until all other possibilities are exhausted.

Ok thanks for that advise. I will leave it as is.

The cards I was using were indeed no class 10 cards but I found one that is so that’s worth testing tomorrow.

 

[h-elsner]

I have really bad experiences with Intenso card. I will never use it again. The write speed is insufficient. This may be the case for all Class 10. For 4K and 60fps all recommend SDHC U3 cards because the write speed is much higher thus buffer overflows in the camera shoud no more happen. Slow card may cause the above described problems with unreadable video files instead of power supply. At the end the effect is the same: The camera processor cannot write the buffer to the file at the SD card and the file ends up corrupted.

Edit: There is a tool called Check Flash (currently 1.17.0) for Windows to measure data transfer speed.
I have tested 2, both U3
Verbatim Pro: write 43 MB/s, read 86MB/s
SanDisk Ultra Extreme: write 73MB/s, read 86MB/s (read seems to be limited by SD card reader USB 3.0).

 

[Crazy Crow]

I have really bad experiences with Intenso card. I will never use it again. The write speed is insufficient. This may be the case for all Class 10. For 4K and 60fps all recommend SDHC U3 cards because the write speed is much higher thus buffer overflows in the camera shoud no more happen. Slow card may cause the above described problems with unreadable video files instead of power supply. At the end the effect is the same: The camera processor cannot write the buffer to the file at the SD card and the file ends up corrupted.

Edit: There is a tool called Check Flash (currently 1.17.0) for Windows to measure data transfer speed.
I have tested 2, both U3
Verbatim Pro: write 43 MB/s, read 86MB/s
SanDisk Ultra Extreme: write 73MB/s, read 86MB/s (read seems to be limited by SD card reader USB 3.0).

Just ordered these 2

 

[WTFDproject]

Just ordered these 2

Those are U1 cards. I'm pretty sure they need to be U3. I hope someone will chime in that can address what you can expect from the cards. If you can cancel the order and wait for someone more knowledgeable in photography, it might be worth the wait.

CGOET not recording on camera sd card

Hi everyone, I will make it simple as I can. The problem is SD card on CGOET is empty of files of data, MP4 or JPEG's. after 4 flights and 80 min flight time, not one of my stills or videos were recorded, why didn't they record and store on the camera's sd card. The controller screen tell me...

yuneecpilots.com

 

[Steve Carr]

Just ordered these 2

Those cards might work for camera settings 1080p-30fps or below.
You must have a U3 card for higher resolutions and frame rates.

In any case I avoid using a frame rate of 60fps. That rate requires everything to be perfect and there is very little benefit to be had. Many people use 24-25 fps to get a more cinematic video.

 

[Crazy Crow]

I will find a purpose for the cards in my other cameras but thanks for pointing that out. Didn’t break the bank on ‘em so no harm there.

Class 10 U3 cards it will be then.

I just inserted an Intenso class 10 card that had come with the drone and managed to shoot 8:30 minutes of uninterrupted video while doing a stationary test before stopping it manually. Resolution set to 4K 4096x2160 60fps. No problems there so that definitely helped.

Next up is a flight at 1080 30fps.

Fingers crossed

 

[Crazy Crow]

Typhon je ztráta času. Vyhoď to a kup levný dron jiný. Já jsem měl hodně problémů. Typhon NE!

I previously had the Typhoon H plus with CGO3 camera.
I flew it for over 5 years on a regular basis. Without any problem. I sold it because I had too many RC aircraft and I wanted to focus more on fixed wings.
It was the worst mistake I ever made. I missed it ever since so I decided to buy the H Plus with C23 camera.
It flies like a dream and takes beautiful videos and photos.
I would opt this drone over any other consumer drone on the market. Especially for the second hand price of €600.

So I guess it comes down to what you prefer. Too bad upu had a bad experience with yours.

I had that same experience with a DJI Phantom III and a mavic 2 pro so I would never go for a DJI product again.

It comes down to preferences and experiences you had.

 

[Crazy Crow]

I will find a purpose for the cards in my other cameras but thanks for pointing that out. Didn’t break the bank on ‘em so no harm there.

Class 10 U3 cards it will be then.

I just inserted an Intenso class 10 card that had come with the drone and managed to shoot 8:30 minutes of uninterrupted video while doing a stationary test before stopping it manually. Resolution set to 4K 4096x2160 60fps. No problems there so that definitely helped.

Next up is a flight at 1080 30fps.

Fingers crossed

Well gentlemen. It seems like my problems are solved.

Just had a very smooth 24 minute flight without a single hickup.
Took 2 shots of over 10 minutes at 1080P 30 and not a single glitch.
Checked the resception at a distance of 200 mtr and altitude of 120 mtr and everything stayed crisp. Also behind trees the reception was still good.

I would have never thought the SD card would cause the issue.

Thanks for all your help and happy flying!!