Bricked Spark during update?

[gdanas87]

Hello guys, I already own a Mavic Pro, Mavic Air and Phantom 4 for work, and didn't want to risk flying them for personal use so I got a used DJI Spark. Sparkie worked great, I even bought a remote for it. And then one day after only 5 flights, it starts doing the bunny hop problems!!!! after trying imu calibration, compass calibration, flying at other locations and different times of day etc countless times I realized my only choice was to do a fw update in hope of fixing the issue
I decided to do a fw update to the latest firmware (a process I am no stranger to, since I have done it many many times with my other DJI drones I listed above). During the update, it got stuck at 80%. I knew not to mess with it (turning it off during an update would be a terrible idea) so I let it be.an hour passed and it was still stuck at 80%!!! It turned off by itself due to low battery after about 2hrs! I plugged in my second battery and started it up, and lo and behold, now its bricked!!!!

1. Assistant does recognize it (and I can try to update but it fails at 80%) and i can see the contents of sd card
2. The fan doesnt spin
3. ESC's dont beep upon initial startup or at all
4. lights never come on
5. charging the battery through the usb port is no longer working
6. when I try to connect to it through wifi my phone doesn't connect anymore

I already sent it in to my local dji repair shop and wasted money for shipping, since they basically have no special diagnostic tools etc, they basically used dji assistant to update the fw... complete douches!!! maybe i should open a "dji repair shop" like that too!

it is ofcourse out of warranty, and i am not willing to send it to dji in germany (I am located in EU) since I am sure they will charge me an arm and a leg to "fix it". I am sure its only a fw problem and with the right tool it can be fixed. Overall the spark experience has only been sour for me!!! Only had a chance to do 5 flights and now this!!! I am willing to spend up to 70-80Euros to get a replacement mainboard and see if that fixes the problem... Can anyone help? has this happened to anyone else?

 

[Doulela]

I have one you can try. Bad crash, pretty sure the MB is good. Where I send it?

 

[Doulela]

Here photo

 

[gdanas87]

wow! Thanks! That would be sweet, pm you with details!

 

[tomchipps]

Let us know how it turns out for you, good luck!

 

[gdanas87]

First of all, I owe a big big thanks to Doulela!!! Thanks to his help I was able to get my sparkie back in the air again. Let me recap, from the start of the story

A month and a half ago I added a used spark to my dji collection (mavic pro, mavic air, phantom 3 advanced, phantom 4 Standard). I know the little spark is not anywhere close to all these drones (video quality-wise) but it has quite a lot of advantages to all of them, one of them being the small form factor and second the fact that it is nowhere close to being annoying and obnoxious to people around you... I only had a chance to fly it 2-3 times (without the rc) before getting the bunny hop problems. It would lose and gain height spontaneously (a thing which drove the motors crazy and made them really really hot), and it once even crashed from about 20-30ft down to the soft grass of a soccer field, thankfully nothing broke... I felt so cheated, since the previous owner never mentioned of this "feature" and I felt even more stupid and unlucky that on the "demo" flight prior to me purchasing it, the problem didn't appear!!! I contacted him about this and he of course knew nothing of this and didn't want to have anything to do with me...
I decided to try to refresh the firmware -to no avail - and the bunny hop persisted. I used the DJI assistant for this. Then I used another 3rd party open source software and downgraded (a tool I have used many times with my mavic for various mods) in hopes of getting it fixed... Nothing!!! Still the problem persisted! Things only got worse and sparkie was bricked after having an update to the most recent firmware stuck at 57%, hilariously enough while using DJI Assistant 2 (and not the "shady" open source tool)!!! Through all these troubles, I only had a chance to fly it twice, and even worse than that, I had already invested on a controller which was now on its way to me in the mail... Oh man what a bummer... Such a bad experience!

Thankfully, user doulela read my story here and sent me his crashed spark for a really really low price to use the mainboard from. I transplanted the mainboard to my spark and wow it works and flies again!!! My gimbal stays tilted a bit (an issue that was not present with the original mainboard which is now bricked) and I had to use the adjust gimbal option to get it a bit straight since the 3 succesful imu calibrations didn't fix it, but other than that spark is all is good (for now). I have found an alternative way of calibrating it but won't try anything for now since I just want to enjoy the spark and fly it... I never believed that I would be able to repair it, since spark mainboards are neither cheap nor easily found available online... An official DJI repair was already out of the question since I ended up spending as much as the drone sells for lately that DJI has lowered the price...
I want to thank doulela once again and I am happy that there's still good trust between good people in this world, and thanks to this forum and him I am now (once again) a happy spark owner!!!

Looking back on the whole ordeal, I am starting to believe that my spark's original mainboard (or a part on it) was on its "way out" since I strongly believe the hopping issue and the way it so easily got bricked were connected. Who knows? The bricked mainboard's symptoms are as follows:
-no esc/motor beeping upon startup
-the fan doesn't spin up anymore after startup (an issue that appeared after the failed update) and it gets extremely hot, so you always have to have the spark's cover off and an external fan blowing air on it to keep it relatively cool (the external fan blowing air on the craft is my method of keeping all my drones cool during fw updates and static work anyway)
-wifi does show and you can connect your phone to it (but you can't switch to controller mode to connect a remote controller), and you get a camera view but the gimbal is powered off and you get "aircraft disconnected" red message
-usb connection to the Assistant 2 DJI software on a computer shows it up as "SPARK" as it should and connects just fine, but if you try a firmware update it always gets stuck at 57%. The same happens if I try with my trusty old open source software...
-it does not charge the battery through the usb port anymore

I believe a part on or of the bricked mainboard is dead (but not shorted) because it smells a bit fishy, but just a bit... it doesnt wreak of burnt electronics smell which I am sure all of us are accustomed to when the "magic smoke" departs an electronic component lol...
Oh well, the bricked mainboard will now rest in my desk's drawer and if anyone needs it for testing or perhaps any good electronics components from it they can have it!!!
happy flying to all

PS. I have only two questions which I am sure have probably been answered many times on sparkpilots but I chose to attach it to this post anyhow, so I will remove them from here if that violates the rules.
question: Is it normal for the spark to get warm during battery charging through the usb port? I avoid charging the batteries this way anymore, and I use my typical hobby grade lipo charger (used in my rc planes and diy drones) to supply 12V constant to two of the battery's several + and - terminals. From what I understand this is all the spark's smart battery board needs to charge the cells inside, since it takes care of the balancing automatically. I have succesfully been charging the two batteries I own in with this method. I want to avoid exposing the spark itself to prolonged periods of heat, except from when it flies which is unavoidable (the 24 cores needed for the spark's processing power, do dissipate quite some heat).
question: is the possibility of a spark being so easily bricked, extremely high? after googling (through my brick troubles) I found many many instances of sparks being bricked through fly map updates or necessary firmware updates. I never had such update or brick woes with my other dji drones. And I have updated many many times and gone through these update processes quite a lot. I always avoid upgrading anything through the dji go app, I instead always use my computer with the trusty dji asssistant 2 and I always try an update with a full battery.

 

[Spark 317]

I enjoyed reading your post gdanas87.

Glad to see you are up and running again.