- Joined
- Feb 8, 2016
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- 37
This past weekend I had an incident where my q500 g had a crashed into a dock, and it flipped over and went underwater, about 9 feet down.
The copter remained powered on while I dove in and retrieved it (in about 50 degree water, 40 degree air, brrrrrrrr). It was making the "flatline" sound (I believe this means it has gone into failsafe mode) when I got to it, and the LED's were still operating. As soon as I got it back on the dock, I turned the power switch off, pulled the batter out, drained any water I could find anywhere, and immediately ran up to the house and dried it off with a towel, then put it in front of a heater (low heat) AND dehumidifier for 14 hours. This was at about 6 pm.
The next morning at about 8 am, I checked it for moisture thoroughly, then hooked it up to my computer via the USB api cable. Everything seems to be working as expected! I recalibrated the accelorometer, then recalibrated the gimbal. Once it was off and detached from the computer I took it outside for a test flight.
Remarkably, it still flies!!!!! and the gimbal still works! WOW!
However, not as perfect as it used to. I have 2 questions:
1) There is a slight / medium vibration of the body of the drone (especially pronounced on the landing gear) when it is hovering, almost as if something is not balanced right. Any ideas on what this could be? (One note here: I did put two WHITE blades on that were for the q500 on as replacement blades, which is all I had, so there are two black q500 blades and two white q500 blades on the drone, maybe this has something to do with it?)
2) Are there any precautions or worries I should have about any parts failing due to taking on water? Everything appears to run just fine, exactly how it should, but I would hate for a motor to fail when it is 100ft up and that be all she wrote. Or a GPS unit to fail and to watch it go to the heavens forever...
Any help answering these two questions or giving me any more information about things I should look out for would be awesome! Thanks!!!
P.S. I can provide a video of it going under and coming back up if you want
. The GoPro and the Memory card survived as well!
The copter remained powered on while I dove in and retrieved it (in about 50 degree water, 40 degree air, brrrrrrrr). It was making the "flatline" sound (I believe this means it has gone into failsafe mode) when I got to it, and the LED's were still operating. As soon as I got it back on the dock, I turned the power switch off, pulled the batter out, drained any water I could find anywhere, and immediately ran up to the house and dried it off with a towel, then put it in front of a heater (low heat) AND dehumidifier for 14 hours. This was at about 6 pm.
The next morning at about 8 am, I checked it for moisture thoroughly, then hooked it up to my computer via the USB api cable. Everything seems to be working as expected! I recalibrated the accelorometer, then recalibrated the gimbal. Once it was off and detached from the computer I took it outside for a test flight.
Remarkably, it still flies!!!!! and the gimbal still works! WOW!
However, not as perfect as it used to. I have 2 questions:
1) There is a slight / medium vibration of the body of the drone (especially pronounced on the landing gear) when it is hovering, almost as if something is not balanced right. Any ideas on what this could be? (One note here: I did put two WHITE blades on that were for the q500 on as replacement blades, which is all I had, so there are two black q500 blades and two white q500 blades on the drone, maybe this has something to do with it?)
2) Are there any precautions or worries I should have about any parts failing due to taking on water? Everything appears to run just fine, exactly how it should, but I would hate for a motor to fail when it is 100ft up and that be all she wrote. Or a GPS unit to fail and to watch it go to the heavens forever...
Any help answering these two questions or giving me any more information about things I should look out for would be awesome! Thanks!!!
P.S. I can provide a video of it going under and coming back up if you want