Yuneec Q500 to submarine

Reijo Lintula · Jul 28, 2017

Could someone explain, what did I do wrong? After 56 s from takeoff drone sinked to sea. It was out of control. I had low battery warning and started to take drone back to pier. But I had to go around my boat since drone was flying quite low. I could not get it back.
I would upload telemetry files, but I could not upload either *.xlsx or *.csv files.

GPS data + Telemetry + RemoteGPS + Remote

Dropbox - Drone

Jafo · Jul 28, 2017

Try adding ".txt" to the end of the Telemetry file and see if it will upload here for you.
If not.... make it a Zip file and it will upload okay.
Right off the bat, it sounds like your battery was weak,old or no good and died on you.
When you take off.... Climb to about 20' and have a look at your battery voltage before flying off.
A weak battery bleeds voltage pretty quick and you'll see that in the voltage display.
Try to get that Telemetry file uploaded so we can have a look.

Added: Finally got the link to work for me.... No doubt. Bad battery.
Note the voltage dropping off right away.

Added: Any time I'm flying over water (We have a boat too) I attach some cut off water noodles to the landing gear in case it goes in the water. So far I haven't had the sad experience of needing them.

Reijo Lintula · Jul 28, 2017

Jafo said:
Try adding ".txt" to the end of the Telemetry file and see if it will upload here for you.
If not.... make it a Zip file and it will upload okay.
Right off the bat, it sounds like your battery was weak,old or no good and died on you.
When you take off.... Climb to about 20' and have a look at your battery voltage before flying off.
A weak battery bleeds voltage pretty quick and you'll see that in the voltage display.
Try to get that Telemetry file uploaded so we can have a look.

Added: Finally got the link to work for me.... No doubt. Bad battery.
Note the voltage dropping off right away.

They should be able to see behind that Dropbox link...

Jafo · Jul 28, 2017

Got it... See my first my post.

Rayray · Jul 28, 2017

Jafo said:
Added: Any time I'm flying over water (We have a boat too) I attach some cut off water noodles to the landing gear in case it goes in the water. So far I haven't had the sad experience of needing them.

Good idea. There is also a small, lightweight device called "Getterback" which is ideal for water recovery. Mod Steve put me on to it. Check it out (Amazon, others).

Reijo Lintula · Jul 28, 2017

If you see timestamps, voltage drop took place right after I flew over water and it collapsed. Although I got warning, altitude was only three meters and I had to go around my boat. Obviously it took A few seconds too much...
I often fly with low battery so that I bring it back, land and check voltage. Then take off again and hovering again about 1 meter to find out when battery is in final (in which voltage). Never crashed inspite of this.

Wingshooter · Jul 28, 2017

You saying you intentially fly with a Low Battery? Am I reading that correctly?

Reijo Lintula · Jul 29, 2017

Of course. How do you find out real limits anyway?And I suppose also LIPO's should be used sometimes as long as possible. BUT I said take down, take up hovering etc. I also know that LIPO's die with out further warning, but it varies a lot, what that voltage is. Anyway, it seems that this battery lost it's voltage in seconds while I tried to take it back.

Steve Carr · Jul 29, 2017

Not good news. It appears you launched with less than a fully charged battery. By the time you started the motors and took off the battery voltage had already dropped to 11.2 volts. Your first battery warning was about 30 seconds after takeoff at 10.6 volts.
It's simply a bad decision to take off with anything less than a fully charged battery. Even worse is flying over water with not enough gas in the tank to make it to shore.

Reijo Lintula · Jul 29, 2017

I agree. So far first warning has meant max 60 feet altitude, but there has been minutes time to land safely. So, it is possible that I missed first warning. Since it was bright sunny day, I checked battery voltage, satellite etc. one time short... Only good thing with this is that I have a good reason to update my gear.

Steve Carr · Jul 29, 2017

Reijo Lintula said:
I agree. So far first warning has meant max 60 feet altitude, but there has been minutes time to land safely. So, it is possible that I missed first warning. Since it was bright sunny day, I checked battery voltage, satellite etc. one time short... Only good thing with this is that I have a good reason to update my gear.

If you get a new copter remember to always fully charge the battery before you take off.

Reijo Lintula · Jul 29, 2017

Sure, but I have to charge battery always right after last use, since needs for footage come often suddenly. I shoot for instance fire scenes as fire investigator. So planning next footage is not possible or practical.

Steve Carr · Jul 29, 2017

Reijo Lintula said:
Sure, but I have to charge battery always right after last use, since needs for footage come often suddenly. I shoot for instance fire scenes as fire investigator. So planning next footage is not possible or practical.

I understand that problem. I have the same situation. I bought several batteries and I keep a couple charged all the time. After a few days I discharge those with the charger and recharge another set. I just keep rotating them between flights.