Hello Fellow Yuneec Pilot!
Join our free Yuneec community and remove this annoying banner!
Sign up

Would you please give me some advice on survey programming with my H520?

slw74

Part 107 certificate
Premium Pilot
Joined
Sep 5, 2018
Messages
124
Reaction score
107
Age
72
Location
Matthews, North Carolina
I have been flying Typhoon H 480's for a couple of years which has been lots of fun and only 3 crashes. Fortunately, I can typically fix everything myself. I have ended up with 3 working H's over those couple of years. I have been able to gain confidence and experience through successes and failures. I got my part 107 certificate in October in order to expand my options. I purchased an H520 about a month ago. It works very well for me as I have gradually worked through its options. I have done some relatively short photo surveys in Data Pilot and those have gone well. They have all been short enough to be completed with one battery. My next undertaking is a bit more ambitious, so I would appreciate your advice about the actual sequence of events with a multi-battery photo survey. Here are my key questions:

The Data Pilot survey is at 46 m AGL at 5 m/sec over a total distance of 24620 m; max telemetry distance 945 m; 5 batteries over 1 hour 24 minutes (1270 images); E90 camera

1. I understand from the manual that the H520 will return when the battery needs to be replaced. Does that occur when the battery reaches 30%? Is the estimate of batteries needed in Data Pilot fairly accurate, provided that conditions aren’t too demanding?
2. I don’t know how long the ST-16S battery will last in this situation. Since this is for a mission programmed in the H520, will the controller battery last for the time needed to complete the 90 minute mission and return safely? Do you ever need to have the ST-16S plugged into a 5 volt source for longer survey missions? Is there a way to change out the ST-16S battery during the mission in this situation?
3. Anything else that you can share from your experience that I might not have considered.

Thanks so much for your help,
Stephen
 
I have been flying Typhoon H 480's for a couple of years which has been lots of fun and only 3 crashes. Fortunately, I can typically fix everything myself. I have ended up with 3 working H's over those couple of years. I have been able to gain confidence and experience through successes and failures. I got my part 107 certificate in October in order to expand my options. I purchased an H520 about a month ago. It works very well for me as I have gradually worked through its options. I have done some relatively short photo surveys in Data Pilot and those have gone well. They have all been short enough to be completed with one battery. My next undertaking is a bit more ambitious, so I would appreciate your advice about the actual sequence of events with a multi-battery photo survey. Here are my key questions:

The Data Pilot survey is at 46 m AGL at 5 m/sec over a total distance of 24620 m; max telemetry distance 945 m; 5 batteries over 1 hour 24 minutes (1270 images); E90 camera

1. I understand from the manual that the H520 will return when the battery needs to be replaced. Does that occur when the battery reaches 30%? Is the estimate of batteries needed in Data Pilot fairly accurate, provided that conditions aren’t too demanding?
2. I don’t know how long the ST-16S battery will last in this situation. Since this is for a mission programmed in the H520, will the controller battery last for the time needed to complete the 90 minute mission and return safely? Do you ever need to have the ST-16S plugged into a 5 volt source for longer survey missions? Is there a way to change out the ST-16S battery during the mission in this situation?
3. Anything else that you can share from your experience that I might not have considered.

Thanks so much for your help,
Stephen

Hi Stephen. I cannot advise you on data pilot survey side of things. I have read that you can use a portable mobile phone battery backup supply. I believe you can just plug the power brick into the transmitter and flyaway away as normal. No need to change out the tranny's battry and risk loosing the mission settings.
Cheers.
Mike
 
Stephen,
The controller battery is an issue but you can use a cell phone charging brick to help keep the charge on the controller up. I recommend starting with a full controller battery and plug in the cell charger before you start because I've noticed the controller will still drop some voltage even while plugged into a charger while being used
I have been flying Typhoon H 480's for a couple of years which has been lots of fun and only 3 crashes. Fortunately, I can typically fix everything myself. I have ended up with 3 working H's over those couple of years. I have been able to gain confidence and experience through successes and failures. I got my part 107 certificate in October in order to expand my options. I purchased an H520 about a month ago. It works very well for me as I have gradually worked through its options. I have done some relatively short photo surveys in Data Pilot and those have gone well. They have all been short enough to be completed with one battery. My next undertaking is a bit more ambitious, so I would appreciate your advice about the actual sequence of events with a multi-battery photo survey. Here are my key questions:

The Data Pilot survey is at 46 m AGL at 5 m/sec over a total distance of 24620 m; max telemetry distance 945 m; 5 batteries over 1 hour 24 minutes (1270 images); E90 camera

1. I understand from the manual that the H520 will return when the battery needs to be replaced. Does that occur when the battery reaches 30%? Is the estimate of batteries needed in Data Pilot fairly accurate, provided that conditions aren’t too demanding?
2. I don’t know how long the ST-16S battery will last in this situation. Since this is for a mission programmed in the H520, will the controller battery last for the time needed to complete the 90 minute mission and return safely? Do you ever need to have the ST-16S plugged into a 5 volt source for longer survey missions? Is there a way to change out the ST-16S battery during the mission in this situation?
3. Anything else that you can share from your experience that I might not have considered.

Thanks so much for your help,
Stephen

Stephen,
The ST16 controller will get low on battery especially with that long of a flight. I've had good success in plugging in the controller to a portable power brick (battery) for phones. Just start off with it plugged in from the start.
I'm not sure on the battery swap, I've always programmed my missions to fly in 1 battery and if I needed longer flights I run multiple missions at the same elevation and same starting point. You may check the settings of your flights in datapilot, I think there may be some settings to control when it comes back for batteries, not sure though.
Other advice: If you're mapping terrain for elevations and accuracy, you're going to need to establish some control points (with known coordinates and elevations) to make sure the photogrammetry software can level the site properly. Probably 10 for such a large site if not more.
 
Both answers are very helpful. I am going to order a power brick for starters. I am not very sophisticated on the mapping at this point, just trying to get a successful set of photos for starters. Later on when they start to clear the property, I will need to be more precise. At this point, I'm just doing it to learn, not for hire. Your advice as to the appropriate software to consider for photogrammetry would be a big help and will set me on a path to learn the requirements and details in order to support accurate imaging. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks for all of the advice,
Stephen
 
Hi Stephen,

looks like you are up to a really big piece of survey as for a copter. I have no experience with such big areas (probably sth. exceeding 40 ha) using h520 but did a smaller - 2 battery one and it worked well. Any time I need to fly big areas I rather use a fixed-wing. Having said so I can see that your desired AGL of 46 m could be of a problem for flying f-w.

I would agree with previous comments and would advise using a power bank plugged in to ST16S right from the start of your mission. This is what I did and therefore noticed that the ST16S battery drainage was significantly slower.

Regards,
Pawel
 
1. I understand from the manual that the H520 will return when the battery needs to be replaced. Does that occur when the battery reaches 30%? Is the estimate of batteries needed in Data Pilot fairly accurate, provided that conditions aren’t too demanding?
2. I don’t know how long the ST-16S battery will last in this situation. Since this is for a mission programmed in the H520, will the controller battery last for the time needed to complete the 90 minute mission and return safely? Do you ever need to have the ST-16S plugged into a 5 volt source for longer survey missions? Is there a way to change out the ST-16S battery during the mission in this situation?

1. The 30% that you can program is only to give you a warning, it does not depend on that parameter that activates the RTL or battery change. It depends on the size of the mission and is already calculated by DataPilot.

2. I answered in another post today, in principle for now, several versions ago could be changed, the default action in the failsafe rc loss is an RTL. So it is better to power the ST16S and not let it shut down so it would activate the RTL.
 
Congrats on beginning with the H520. I have done a ton of mapping missions with it and am very happy with my current setup. I use this brick, but try to plan my flights accordingly and do have an extra oem just in case. I can get about 90-100 minutes or 300-400 acres on the RC at my usual flight parameters. Pretty much double that with the brick. It fits perfectly in the back pocket. It is better to attach the brick straight away so it maintains the RC rather than charging as it will get warmer if it has to boost to charge. Of course it all depends (including the aircraft)

 
I appreciate all of your comments and experience. I ordered a power brick to address the ST16s battery issue. So if I understand correctly, the Data Pilot will determine when to return for a battery change, so it's not a programmable value. The plot that I listed is 165 acres. Chascoadmin, you indicated that you are doing larger tracts in a more timely way. What parameters do you use for this type of photo survey? And what about the software that you are using? Just trying to get educated!
Thanks to you both,
Stephen
 
I appreciate all of your comments and experience. I ordered a power brick to address the ST16s battery issue. So if I understand correctly, the Data Pilot will determine when to return for a battery change, so it's not a programmable value. The plot that I listed is 165 acres. Chascoadmin, you indicated that you are doing larger tracts in a more timely way. What parameters do you use for this type of photo survey? And what about the software that you are using? Just trying to get educated!
Thanks to you both,
Stephen
You can set the warning value by clicking the 3-bar menu, General and it is at the bottom. If you are flying smaller sites you could bring it down to 25%, but I have experienced that when these batteries (in particular) hit 25% they can go down very quickly.

I use DataPilot. Example would be a 125 acre project I did with 75/75 overlaps at 250ft AGL. It took about 1.5 batteries on an OEM. The trick to getting better efficiency is looking at the Photo Interval value at the bottom of the Survey pane and checking and adjusting the flight speed until that value hits 2.0 seconds. I can usually run about 20mph. The logic of the program can be pretty conservative. I have run 1.5 seconds with good success. Of course it depends on altitude, ambient light and camera settings. When I get down to 200ft is more like 16-17mph. It can seem a little tricky, but they are static values that you will figure out. I figure that by making sure that an object is captured 4 times on each pass I know I am getting about 75-80% overlap.
 
Perhaps I could give my recent experience. The last large survey I did was using 7 batteries. It was in August time (I tend to do infrequent but very large or intensive surveying). I found ther ST16s controller picked up the remaining survey once the drone rebooted after every battery change without fail.

You just have to ensure once you switch the drone off that you dont select any options and just wait for it to fully reconnect. Only then select fly-from-last-waypoint. I also have a spare St16s battery and I fist swapped the drone battery, rebooted and fully reconnected then switched off the controller and switched that battery. Once the two reconnected you just have to select the 'Fly from last waypoint' or something similar to that. Sorry if thats a little woolly as I can never remember the exact terms that come up on screen.

Also in my experience the Datapilot app crashes frequently, like every other flight. However stick with it as it will re-acquire the survey from the drone telemetry, and show the remaining flight plan.

Lastly definately remember Arruntus' advice that the drone does not auto-return to launch at your battery low setting. It will only return at 10% (I beleive) and that may not be enough power to get back, at which time it will autoland where it is ... and autocrash. Its quite the flaw but all software.
 
  • Like
Reactions: arruntus
Also in my experience the Datapilot app crashes frequently, like every other flight.
I think the last firmware is causing this issue. I have been running beta software that will hopefully get approved to fix this, but I too have been running the latest release on one of our H520's and noticed this behaviour.

As for the RTH (RTL) I agree that it should for a return earlier, but that is kind of what the alert is for. My recommendation would be to set it to 25% and when you get it use the RTL icon to initiate it. I will make sure that they are aware and will update when I hear something on these issues.
 
Unfortunately DataPilot crashes since the first version. The difference is that depending on which update it does many or few times. It also depends on the hardware of the ST16S which is not the same in all stations. There are people who only happen to it from time to time and to other people it happens many times. In principle keep in mind that you never lose control of the drone, with the sticks you can continue to control the drone without any problem and you can avoid compromising situations.

Normally after a failure, the drone starts by itself and everything returns to a normal situation.
 
  • Like
Reactions: chascoadmin
I don't want to overstep my bounds and if I do I will deal with it. I have been beta testing for almost two years now and have always wondered what public H520 users were doing and what issues they have been experiencing. I have come across things that make the bird almost unusable for surveying, but I can say that they have been working hard behind the scenes to create functionality and fixes that will make mapping easier and successful. I have two H520's that I kept on different configurations. Release and beta. Both instances with DataPilot have never crashed until the last update. I agree with @arruntus on the ST16(s) hardware front that there seem to be several versions of each and they all have their own characteristics. I have a list of bugs personally experienced in to the Team that are being worked on and I can assure you that they are aware of many of the issues I have seen on this forum, but seem to be crippled by corporate and/or manpower. This leads to lack of communication, that is if they are even aware of the importance of this forum. There are a few of us trying to push and I think we have a good program again. I am open to receiving any PM's, but please keep them straightforward and detailed as to what you are using and the workflow of the problems. I do not work for Yuneec and do not get paid by them. I am just a user that sees the potential of the platform in the arena that I work and will help you any way that I can.
 
@chascoadmin supposedly a Yuneec sales manager visited us a few months ago, asked about the expos and was never heard from again. It's been a while since I joined the Facebook groups because I don't have time but I also know that apart from this forum, there are also responsible for Yuneec in different areas, not necessarily Chinese, but a bit of everything.

It's nice to have the perception of what customers say about your products, but if you don't do anything about it then you're wasting your time and you're wasting your customers, and to that I add the money.

I am the first to say that the hardware, the base of the drone, is a success, is a sure winner, but if you do not accompany the hardware you have a banana, orange and nice, but not stop being a banana.

Unfortunately, we have been talking about this issue since before the H520 was released, many promises, they sold it to us very nice but today, more than 2 years later, it is still limping in many basic aspects, but very basic.

I'm sorry, but I like to say things clearly, when we have to give praise I'm the first, but we've already lost many companions on the road given to broken promises and I don't think, that we'll be one of the veterans, that we'll have hope that this is going to solve. We simply navigate trying to make the most of a purchase, which hurts me to say, was a fiasco looking at it with perspective after so long :(

This doesn't mean that we don't help our new and old colleagues, but we make it clear to them what they buy, that it adapts to what they need? perfect :)

P.D.: Thank you very much for the offer :D
 
@chascoadmin supposedly a Yuneec sales manager visited us a few months ago, asked about the expos and was never heard from again. It's been a while since I joined the Facebook groups because I don't have time but I also know that apart from this forum, there are also responsible for Yuneec in different areas, not necessarily Chinese, but a bit of everything.

It's nice to have the perception of what customers say about your products, but if you don't do anything about it then you're wasting your time and you're wasting your customers, and to that I add the money.

I am the first to say that the hardware, the base of the drone, is a success, is a sure winner, but if you do not accompany the hardware you have a banana, orange and nice, but not stop being a banana.

Unfortunately, we have been talking about this issue since before the H520 was released, many promises, they sold it to us very nice but today, more than 2 years later, it is still limping in many basic aspects, but very basic.

I'm sorry, but I like to say things clearly, when we have to give praise I'm the first, but we've already lost many companions on the road given to broken promises and I don't think, that we'll be one of the veterans, that we'll have hope that this is going to solve. We simply navigate trying to make the most of a purchase, which hurts me to say, was a fiasco looking at it with perspective after so long :(

This doesn't mean that we don't help our new and old colleagues, but we make it clear to them what they buy, that it adapts to what they need? perfect :)

P.D.: Thank you very much for the offer :D
It is indeed a sad situation that public moral is allowed to get this low. Honestly and it may sound rude, but I could care less about the other platforms and the teams that support them. I am in this professionally for my company and my focus will be on the H520 and successor and will poke until I am told to stop.
 
Last edited:
Wow, you guys have provided a wealth of information. I feel better prepared to expand to larger surveys, although with appropriate caution. I'll be taking a bunch of batteries and and external battery pack for the ST-16s, so I am hoping for the best. With input from chascoadmin, I have been able to manage a .plan that will require less time (and fewer batteries) while providing what I expect will be a thorough survey. I will get back to you guys when I do the survey which won't be until January. Let me know if there is an option to access the beta firmware/software in the near future.
Thanks so much to all of you,
Stephen
 
  • Like
Reactions: chascoadmin
It is indeed a sad situation that public moral is allowed to get this low. Honestly and it may sound rude, but I could care less about the other platforms and the teams that support them. I am in this professionally for my company and my focus will be on the H520 and predecessor and will poke until I am told to stop.

That is precisely why many of us are here. A professional platform that did not depend on the purchased opinions of DJI (a world reference without a doubt and on its own merits it must also be said). Something that was supposed to revolutionize this sector again and make it grow even more with a valid alternative to the "king". Unfortunately time puts us all in our place, and the number of missed opportunities is too great. Yuneec is still late and wrong................

Well that, I don't want to discourage anyone. We'll keep exploiting what we have by making it work as hard as possible ?
 
  • Like
Reactions: Pawel_(PL)
That is precisely why many of us are here. A professional platform that did not depend on the purchased opinions of DJI (a world reference without a doubt and on its own merits it must also be said). Something that was supposed to revolutionize this sector again and make it grow even more with a valid alternative to the "king". Unfortunately time puts us all in our place, and the number of missed opportunities is too great. Yuneec is still late and wrong................

Well that, I don't want to discourage anyone. We'll keep exploiting what we have by making it work as hard as possible ?
Ha, just realized I type predecessor instead of successor, but I fixed it. Yuneec wasn't late on the product, they failed to market properly. They even came out to one of our jobsites and shot a movie going through the unit and what we are doing in construction and it landed on their website, but that's it... Unfortunately the support that people have received on other models carried the sour grapes over.

 
they failed to market properly

I totally agree, that's indisputable by anyone, including those who sell fumes that work directly or indirectly for Yuneec.

Yuneec wasn't late on the product

Here I do not agree, in fact, I totally disagree. Why? Because they got a very good base with a hardware that gives very big possibilities at a very tight price which allows to lower the price of the set. The base is called H520. A machine, 1.6 kg, hexacopter, that hardly any other drone faces for example fighting against the wind. Everything is perfect.

Here come the payloads, the queen camera, the E90. There are still people pulling their hair out because of the crap lenses they were carrying, many camera bash made the distortion so terrible that you could compare a 1200 euro camera with a 3 euro camera bought from the Chinese. Customers are repeatedly cheated, refused to exchange a defective product, even to fix in warranty failures that make it useless for photogrammetry. To fix this they take out other cameras that are similar but not the E90 to the point that you can't even put in the same filters because the thread has been changed. Who knows how many different hardware versions there are of the E90 (the main reason why updates cause so many problems). At the time I said it, it's like playing bingo, if you're lucky you get a good one (it was my case), otherwise you were lost and without support from the company. They released a kind of software patch that minimized the problem in many and caused new problems in others called lens correction. I will not comment on the false and clearly misleading statements made by some of Yuneec's leaders, especially the more visible face of Yuneec in North America.

They take out the E50, it seems that there are not so many faults in the camera itself, a mirage because the fault is the gimbal that I have seen flanks in an earthquake shake less. In many cases they refuse to exchange the defective products again, even in other cases they charge you to fix something that is their fault. And in the end the customers have to find out on their own that the best solution, if the problem is not completely serius, is to change the dumpers that put the drone full of oil, for others.

The CGOET came out, a dual thermal camera, whose idea is very good but with some laughable specifications for that time and at the price of a much bigger one. In fact, the specifications that it should have had are not yet met by the E10TV which must have been lost along the way. A clear example of selling wood at the price of gold that has to be said, I don't have it, but it seems to have fulfilled quite well despite its limited possibilities.

The latest payload in discord seems to be the new one they've announced with zoom. I think it's a great idea but they've been selling cameras with those features for years now. And who knows what they get, and at what price. So again late and we'll see if it's good.

In this case, Yuneec does not determine whether it is late or early, it is determined by the rest of the market. Everyone's bringing out cameras with zoom and you haven't brought out... it's late. Everyone has 640 thermal radiometry cameras and you don't have them? it's too late. The logical tendency is to bring out cameras with interchangeable lenses, some are already doing it, and you have lost the opportunity to do it? Well, you're too late.

For now I've only talked about payloads, I don't want to talk about how after two years you can't even do a simple movie shot because the H520 moves like a robocop, it moves like a beat. A simple expos or implement waypoints with tangential trajectories is something basic that have the 100 euro drones. Yunnec again is not that it arrives very but very late, is that it has not yet arrived and that despite the fact that before going to market we were promised, despite the fact that some cheeky later denied it, that the H520 would have those basic features.

And I don't want to continue writing but not everything has been said and it's not just an appreciation on my part, I think I'm saying what many of us around here think.

@chascoadmin It's nothing personal mate, I'm just giving my opinion and I'm being sincere, all this and more is how we have lived it from the beginning, putting here and for many sides hours and hours with illusion and not having received more than blows.

My H520 is still on the shelf and will remain so. I use it from time to time but being aware of its many limitations and virtues :D

In case you previously didn't understand the bad perception that exists of Yuneec, now you understand it a little more? ?
 

New Posts

Members online

No members online now.

Forum statistics

Threads
20,952
Messages
241,578
Members
27,284
Latest member
csandoval