Landing Malfunction? CRASH!

[Sage I]

Flying today, conditions were good. Light breeze but nothing I haven't flown in before. Still a relative newbie but I'm not doing anything too crazy. Few obstacles, clear day, lots of satellites etc.

I experienced something similar on my last flight about 2 weeks ago. Usually, as soon as my gear hits the ground, the props slow to idle automatically whether its in smart or angle mode, and thats what I have found to be the norm. During this flight when I was landing, I touched down and not a second later it took off again. So I landed again, hard, and I had to fiddle with the altitude lever and somehow finagle it to stop in combination with the start/stop button.

Today I was not so successful. It was making sporadic movements without my control, I was only changing altitude and it started to move side to side, back and forth. I then tried to compensate it back into a safe landing zone. Upon landing, the gear was flat on the ground for a split second. Then it started to lift off, but at a tilt, as if the front props were accelerating and the rear props weren't. So it dragged itself back and smashed into a rock wall. HUGE. BUMMER.

I lost 3 props, battery flew out and the gimbal broke. Thankfully I had a filter on and that took the beating as opposed to my CGO3. So the lens looks ok from the outside, but I obviously can't check if it still works.

Has anyone else experienced something similar?
Thanks
-Jenna

 

[KBflyer]

Well yes that is a bummer for sure.
Two possible reasons I can think of off hand is the accelerometer on very hot and humid days can be a pain. Sometimes its best to bring your bird outside 10-20 minutes and let it adjust to the temps of the day. The other thing that might have happened is some Typhoon H's have a bum GPS module and it caused your crash. Hard to say but I would send in the telemetry files to Yuneec and see if they can see any problems from them.

 

[Sage I]

Well yes that is a bummer for sure.
Two possible reasons I can think of off hand is the accelerometer on very hot and humid days can be a pain. Sometimes its best to bring your bird outside 10-20 minutes and let it adjust to the temps of the day. The other thing that might have happened is some Typhoon H's have a bum GPS module and it caused your crash. Hard to say but I would send in the telemetry files to Yuneec and see if they can see any problems from them.

Thanks for your input! I will definitely be contacting Yuneec. Just looking over the footage now, at least I got some nice shots to hold me over until we get it all sorted out.

 

[Sage I]

Well yes that is a bummer for sure.
Two possible reasons I can think of off hand is the accelerometer on very hot and humid days can be a pain. Sometimes its best to bring your bird outside 10-20 minutes and let it adjust to the temps of the day. The other thing that might have happened is some Typhoon H's have a bum GPS module and it caused your crash. Hard to say but I would send in the telemetry files to Yuneec and see if they can see any problems from them.

Also, we had been flying closer to the shore about 45 mins to an hour before the crash. It was much hotter there and it had been working fine. I actually completely forgot, now that we have more batteries, I did land successfully between the "2 weeks ago" flight and the crash. Both were today. One successful landing was at the first take off down by the shore and it landed fine in the parking lot. The second success landing was a catch-landing, so I don't know if it would have done the same thing trying to re-take off.

And now that I am looking over my footage, the final video file that captured the crash is corrupted. Another error we have encountered before.

A few flights ago, I turned off the ST-16 before stopping the video, so the final video file was corrupted. I had read that if you stick the card back into the CGO3 and take even 1 second of video it should repair the file. However, the whole card got compromised on an improper ejection. So I have no idea if that actually works. And I can't try it again with my CGO3 since it is broken. So I don't know what to do now. I assume the telemetry files are stored on the SD card, right?

 

[KBflyer]

Also, we had been flying closer to the shore about 45 mins to an hour before the crash. It was much hotter there and it had been working fine. I actually completely forgot, now that we have more batteries, I did land successfully between the "2 weeks ago" flight and the crash. Both were today. One successful landing was at the first take off down by the shore and it landed fine in the parking lot. The second success landing was a catch-landing, so I don't know if it would have done the same thing trying to re-take off.

And now that I am looking over my footage, the final video file that captured the crash is corrupted. Another error we have encountered before.

A few flights ago, I turned off the ST-16 before stopping the video, so the final video file was corrupted. I had read that if you stick the card back into the CGO3 and take even 1 second of video it should repair the file. However, the whole card got compromised on an improper ejection. So I have no idea if that actually works. And I can't try it again with my CGO3 since it is broken. So I don't know what to do now. I assume the telemetry files are stored on the SD card, right?

If you have a site like google drive that you can upload the cards files to I can repair most videos that are corrupted. I have done this for a lot of people with the same problem. Just let me know and I will be happy to help out.

 

[Sage I]

If you have a site like google drive that you can upload the cards files to I can repair most videos that are corrupted. I have done this for a lot of people with the same problem. Just let me know and I will be happy to help out.

That would be awesome!! Thank you so much. I will do that now and I will let you know when its up.

 

[KBflyer]

No problem, give me a PM just in case I miss your post for the link to the file.

 

[KBflyer]

I have uploaded your video and PMed the link. Looking over the end of the video it landed perfectly and there was no crash landing. Are you sure you sent the right one

 

[Hunter_Michael]

I had one of the H's with a faulty GPS's and had similar issues and its on its way back from Support however I have heard that if you do not do the Accelerometer Calibration completely level it will cause flight issues. When I get mine back I'm going to use a small level and get it as close to level as possible. Then Calibrate the compass - Face north when you spin your bird during calibration ina middle of a field away from any electronic disturbance, leave your ST16 aways back from you when you do the spin. I'm going to leave my ST16 atleast 20' away which might be an overkill but cant hurt. Good Luck.
Credit to Flying J for the assist!

 

[PatR]

I would very much like to see a video of the operators fingers on the controls during these events before making any judgements. I go from over water to over land in a great many of my flights, regardless of what copter it is, and never have problems with a landing, even in winds over 20 knots...unless I fat finger it or horse it.

 

[Sage I]

I would very much like to see a video of the operators fingers on the controls during these events before making any judgements. I go from over water to over land in a great many of my flights, regardless of what copter it is, and never have problems with a landing, even in winds over 20 knots...unless I fat finger it or horse it.

I totally doubted myself at first too, I felt like it was my fault, that it was my error as the operator and felt like a dummy. But in hindsight, you can't (to the best of my knowledge, and I don't know why you would want to) control the props individually, and since only one side was going it seems to me more like a system error. Though I may be wrong and it could have been my fault. I guess we will find out when I get the repaired file of the crash back, as it was corrupted from the recording being interrupted.

And I wouldn't even classify the air movement as a "wind," it was definitely a "breeze" at best.

 

[glider]

The K Index was up to 5 today.

 

[banned user]

Also, we had been flying closer to the shore about 45 mins to an hour before the crash. It was much hotter there and it had been working fine. I actually completely forgot, now that we have more batteries, I did land successfully between the "2 weeks ago" flight and the crash. Both were today. One successful landing was at the first take off down by the shore and it landed fine in the parking lot. The second success landing was a catch-landing, so I don't know if it would have done the same thing trying to re-take off.

And now that I am looking over my footage, the final video file that captured the crash is corrupted. Another error we have encountered before.

A few flights ago, I turned off the ST-16 before stopping the video, so the final video file was corrupted. I had read that if you stick the card back into the CGO3 and take even 1 second of video it should repair the file. However, the whole card got compromised on an improper ejection. So I have no idea if that actually works. And I can't try it again with my CGO3 since it is broken. So I don't know what to do now. I assume the telemetry files are stored on the SD card, right?

The telemetry files are stored in the ST16 controller, so I would if you've not already contacted Yuneec, contact them already, there are so many things that could be a weak link in the chain causing the effect you experienced, the logs should show if there were any abnormalities in the flight controller.
I myself though I had a bad compass, my H was drifting, but only sometimes and when it did always in one direction. In the end I discovered the problem was the ST16, that one of the sticks was not returning to centre every time.

Keep us up to date on if Yuneec or your dealer is looking after you or whats happening, it sounds like a hardware fault somewhere along the line, and hopefully you wont end up paying for it.