Take off issues

Phantom 3 Standard
1

Hello everyone, I am hoping someone will be able to help with my issue.

I have tried searching for various terms which describe the issue I am having, such as;

Phantom 3 won’t take off
… extract take off
… negative altitude on take off

But I can’t seem to find any information with the same problem

I have calibrated the compass, calibrated the controller, reset the IMU settings and I still have the same issues - the drone is very erratic on take off, it essentially doesn’t take off and sort of hops about, and the altitude on the display goes negative.

I have uploaded a video to YouTube which I hope will be helpful to better show what I am trying to describe

Thanks so much!

2

A few questions:

  • Did this Phantom ever work as expected?

  • If it did work at some point, what changed between then and now? For example, did you crash it?

  • Do any of the props appear to be damaged?

  • Are you using OEM DJI props or 3rd party props?

  • Are the props installed on the correct motors?

1 Like
3

Thanks for taking the time to reply!

Yes it has worked fine in the past, no problems the last time I flew

No changes between last flight and this attempt

Brand new 3rd party props as I could not find genuine props replacements

Yes props are installed on the correct motor, because as far as I can tell it’s impossible to put the props on the wrong motor as the threads are different?

I’ve just uploaded a slow motion video to YouTube of attempted take off to see if there are any discrepancies in the motors etc, and I’ve annotated the video where I think there maybe issues. At the end of the video the drone flips/falls over :cry:

4

Are you saying you changed nothing between the last successful flight and these from your videos? Or are you saying you attached brand new 3rd party props and now you cannot take off?

5

Thanks again for replying :slightly_smiling_face:

I suppose the answer is both.

The reason I have 3rd party props is because the last flight attempt was with genuine dji props, the drone behaved exactly the same as in the video (perhaps worse) because it flipped over completely and the props broke - So now 3rd party props are now fitted and the drone behaves the same as it did with genuine props on

I hope that makes sense. Essentially what you can see on the video happened with genuine propellers

6

Bad battery? Is it swollen, fully charged? How long since last used successfully. It acts like it need power.

7

WOW that is ODD. Never have seen that one.

Are you doing manual take off or the auto one?

I think you did this, but did you re-calibrate IMU - and if so was it on a flat surface away from any metals etc etc

8

Yes, that makes sense.

Are you sure you didn’t do anything else? Like maybe remove prop guards?

9

No, I haven’t ever had the prop guards on…

10

I will try IMU calibration again tomorrow, and it was on auto take off

11

I’m guessing you have a faulty ESC/motor.

12

New motors are £12.50 I think, might be worth a try considering it’s fairly cheap?

Or is anyone aware of a good reliable repair shop?

13

Soldering these motor wires are tricky. They are coated. You may try soldering the wires of the new motor right to the ESC board.

14

Hope you get sorted. When you do, perhaps taking off on a suburban street is not the best of places…

15

Altitude reading on a Phantom equates to a difference in atmospheric pressure while the drone is parked on the ground and while it is in flight. On take off the rotors are increasing the atmospheric pressure and so you get a negative altitude reading.
Its best to forget the auto take off feature and just push the left stick up after the rotors are idling. Just raise it a couple feet and the irregular texture of the ground will not be a factor. Just be sure the ground is level or the drone till slip sideways until it corrects the drift. Have you performed the IMU calibration on a perfectly level surface? This is important.