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Drone Went Rogue. Crashed Twice. Don't know what to do.

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Hello, I don't know what to do.

I got a Typhoon-H for my 37th birthday this past Sunday. I'm not new to flying drones. Have piloted several over the years without any issues. But my problems with the Typhoon-H started with the first day of flight.

First thing I did was spend the entire first night reading the enclosed user manual cover to cover and all included literature, to ensure I was familiar with the controls, startup, take-off/landing, etc.. I wasn't even worried about dealing with taking photo or video yet. Didn't even insert the sd card. Spent time examining the controller. Powered it on to familiarize myself with the interface. But never tried flying the drone. Too dark in the evening.

The next day (yesterday), I took it out into my cul-de-sac, where I've flown several drones. Plenty of clearance above and around the street to do basic navigation tests. No breeze. Clear conditions.
First thing I always do when taking off is let it hover and settle. Then press up on the right thumbstick to ensure that up is forward and there isn't some weird orientation issue. Then I check backwards for the same. Just a couple feet to make sure I'm oriented correctly before trying to pilot it. Always do that.

I kept the flight control on simple mode, speed down on turtle, all settings on default. Only wanted to take off, hover a little off the ground and get a feel for it. No problems. Flew to about 10', standard box pattern around the street, controls were perfect and fluid, had total control of the drone. Even a perfectly soft landing, right where it took off. Total flight was about 3 minutes. Landed, powered down the propellers. My son was out with me. I also got the recommended SkyView FPV Goggles along side it, so I connected it to the controller and let me son look through it as I took off and flew to a little above the tree line. Straight up and hovered so he could see and be amazed. Came straight back down and landed again no problems. Maybe 5 minutes flight time. Turned off props. Disconnected headset.
Took off and flew straight up again to about 10'. Let it hover. Press up on the thumbstick to check orientation. Drone moved towards me, instead of away from me, so I let go of the thumbstick to let it settle. Tried press down to see if it was just backwards, but it came towards me again. Let off the thumbstick and tried to descend to land. As soon as I hit down on the left thumbstick, the drone dipped towards me and started flying directly towards me and climbed to about 20' and started veering left. I tried to adjust altitude up and down, but it would not respond to any controls. right thumbstick had no bearing on the direction at all. So I let go of both to let it settle itself. But it never even tried. It was at a constant 45 degree angle and going too fast to stop and landed in the top of a bush across the cul-de-sac. No damage done. But I had no control. It was like it went rogue.

Freaked me out because I had zero control over it. Felt I needed a larger area to try again. So, I got the controller and the drone battery fully charged and the next day (tonight) we went up to the school. Huge open field, not a tree for 300 yards in any direction. No breeze. Perfect evening. Ready for a beautiful flight. Again, not worrying about taking video/photo. Just wanted to fly and get used to it.

Powered up the controller and then the drone. It synced connection, no issue, could see the camera just fine. I took off, went to about 10', checked orientation. Up went forward, down went backwards. So I spent about 5 minutes flying in a typical box pattern, fly up to around 30', let it hover and admire the view from the camera screen on the controller. Flew it back, landed it perfectly flat. Zero problems at all.
Powered up the props and lifted off to about 10'. Press up on the thumbstick and again it tilted towards me, so I let off the controls, but this time it didn't settle at all. It kept coming towards me. I tried descending with the left thumbstick and it again tilted to about a 45 degree angle and flew out of control. I didn't press anything on either stick or the screen, or any other buttons/switches this time since there was a ton of space for it to self correct. It sped up and was flying incredibly fast, about 15 feet off the ground. After about 50 feet, it wasn't changing directions or slowing down. I tried anything on the sticks to get it to respond. Wouldn't do anything at all. All I could do was watch in horror as it flew out of control. My wife and my son were by my side watching the whole thing unfold.
Crashed into a tree at max velocity. Broke the camera off completely. broke one of the prop arms and 3 of the propeller blades. Shards of plastic all over the ground. Again, I had zero control.

I don't know what happened. As I said, I've piloted several drones. wasn't doing anything fancy at all. Still getting used to it. With it in simple mode and the speed on turtle, it shouldn't have been even able to get going that fast, but with it tilting at that angle and not correcting, there was nothing I could do. The farthest I ever had it from me was maybe 75' in a straight line. Flat ground, no obstructions. Take off was about 30 feet from where I was standing.

I believe the person that got me this as a gift got the warranty when she bought it, but of course they are going to blame pilot error. Is there any way to view flight logs from the controller that I could use to show them what it did? This is the most advanced drone I've ever piloted so I don't even know if that type of feature is available or not.

But I'm at a loss and don't know what to do. I've had the drone for less than 48 hours and it is destroyed. Not from pilot error, but from something that has to be a malfunction or something. I don't know.

Any help is appreciated.
Thanks
 
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Would contact yuneec and send them the flight logs .

Question , did you perform the compass calibration , did you perform a accelerometer calibration .
Did you have enough satellites in gps and did you let the aircraft idle on the ground for 15 to make sure the gps was stable . And where you in gps mode . Did you have it smart mode .
 
That's why I wrote in here. I don't know how to access any flight logs.

I didn't perform any calibrations. I followed the instructions in the included guide, which I just looked over again, and has no mention of calibrating a compass or accelerometer. No idea how to do that, or that it was even a thing. There is nothing included in this box that has any of that info.

I had it in smart mode and all the settings were default. I didn't change anything. once it said it was sync'd, I didn't know anything else was needed. It doesn't say that in the instructions anywhere.
 
Turn on the ST16 and connect it to your computer using the USB charging cable. It will appear as an additional drive. Open the FlightLog directory and then the Telemetry folder. Copy the two files with the highest number to your computer. Those will be the last two flights. Add and .txt to the end of the file name and then you can upload them here using the Attach files button below.

Files on ST16.jpg
 
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When you first turned it on, did it beep constantly until it gave the final "ready" tone after it sync'd with the controller?

I was trying to take some photos with mine this weekend but I kept having problems with it drifting. Come to find out, my control gimbals needed a good cleaning. Once I sprayed them good with plastic safe contact cleaner and gave them a good stir, my problems were fixed.

Compass calibration and accelerometer calibration is the first thing I did though. Then I did them again before my first flight.
 
Videos covering calibrations were on the included SD card, along with some other documentation. Set that card aside and save it. Don’t use it for videos, it’s to slow and too small.
 
i think the fault lays with the fact that you failed to perform a compass calibration and a accelerometer calibration. what other types of drones have you flown , most drones that are not toy grade require a compass calibration .

hope you are successful in getting the drone repaired . if you can pull the flight logs and post here others will let you know what happened .
 
i think the fault lays with the fact that you failed to perform a compass calibration and a accelerometer calibration. what other types of drones have you flown , most drones that are not toy grade require a compass calibration .
hope you are successful in getting the drone repaired . if you can pull the flight logs and post here others will let you know what happened .
I would not presume to find fault with the pilot without seeing the logs. Thousands of these fly everyday with no calibrations. Let's withhold comment.
 
That's why I wrote in here. I don't know how to access any flight logs.
I didn't perform any calibrations. I followed the instructions in the included guide, which I just looked over again, and has no mention of calibrating a compass or accelerometer. No idea how to do that, or that it was even a thing. There is nothing included in this box that has any of that info.
I had it in smart mode and all the settings were default. I didn't change anything. once it said it was sync'd, I didn't know anything else was needed. It doesn't say that in the instructions anywhere.
Andy, lets take this one step at a time. Are you able to follow the instructions above to access the flight logs?
 
Ok attaching files here.

I followed the instructions on the fold-out about it powering up, it did the power-up scale sound. Then the screen showed it was reconnecting to camera, which it did successfully.
I did not know there were any videos on the included SD card, since the instructions only indicated inserting it directly into the drone to be able to save video/photo. I just re-read the instruction book. It said nothing about the SD card containing any video, or any mention of calibrating anything.

Sorry for the delay. I couldn't even get the ST16 to be recongized on the computer as a drive. Had to try multiple cables and USB ports, even rebooted the device and the computer before it finally showed up.
 

Attachments

  • Telemetry_00011.txt
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  • Telemetry_00012.txt
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Thank you Steve,
I'm heading to bed, so if a quick response is needed from me, I'll get to it in the morning when I get to the office. Hopefully you see something useful in there.
Got a knot in my stomach even thinking of telling the person that got me this as a gift that it's been destroyed tomorrow. :\
 
Ok attaching files here.
I see nothing in the telemetry of either flight for any obvious fault. No compass errors, good GPS signal with 20 sats. Everything appears normal except that it had an auto emergency shutdown at the end of the flight.

If you're up for it, I would like to see the controller files to see if there is a problem with the sticks. Those are in the FlightLog directory under the Remote folder. It would be remote_00011.csv and also 12.
If it's too late in the evening upload them tomorrow.

Don't let this upset you. It happens. There very well may be a malfunction.
 
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Thank you. Here are the Remote logs.
 

Attachments

  • Remote_00011.txt
    194.7 KB · Views: 11
  • Remote_00012.txt
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Okay, the sticks appear to center correctly. A quick look and I nothing jumps out as a malfunction.
Lets take this up tomorrow. I will need to spend more time with the telemetry to get a better look.
Obviously something was happening. It will just take some time to narrow it down.

You will need to open a ticket with Yuneec and they will send you instructions on how to submit the flightlogs.
Talk to you tomorrow.
 
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I also think that the solar variations play an important role important for the flight Personally I verify this site before every exit
N3KL
 
Did I read that you were flying in smart mode when you had this mishap?
 
Can you send the RemoteGPS files too? You have flown in Follow me mode/Smart mode all the time, the crashes happen. So it follows the movements of the ST16 in addition to your stick commands. This may be disturbing. Also thgis is a smart mode where the safe circle avoids to come closer and this also looks like there is no reaction on the sticks.

What happens to the time settings at you first flight? I don't believe that you acting at night on 3h.

Best to use Angle mode for the first flights. Smart mode is hard to understand if you have moved yourself.

br HE
 
Last edited:
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I would recommend following the experts here and their advice and watching Utube videos (series on the H ) from beginners to intermediate to advanced. I picked up a wealth of knowledge from both.
 

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