Been flying drones for 4 years I thought a small drone with all the latest bells and whistles would be a practical solution for spontaneous flights.
It turns out the spark is way over engineered and has proved to be so over complex to be useful.
I live in a city and have flown numerous aircraft where and when I like.
I regard my own sensible flying to be safety enough.
Several times I had a near loss of aircraft due to unreasonable fly away
So along comes nfz on riding on an update and the result is can't fly local...so I get no limits for 35 usd and hope that fixes it...it does ...but not completely.
Loss of control on one occasion and frquent reports of weak GPS with 10 or more locks.
Plus it seems the basic accelerometers are less functional than with earlier non GPS drones...no GPS and inertial guidance is virtually non existent.
So conclude that I can't trust this quad not to disappear any day soon.
Anybody else had similar experience?
I had a Spark disconnect and flyaway after 3 months of use last Nov. DJI covered it under a warranty and replaced it with a new one.
I don’t know technology like a lot of people, particularly younger people do. I didn’t grow up with it. But I take the time to learn how to use something.
Only my opinion but I somewhat agree. Maybe they’re trying to pack too much into a small drone.
But I sometimes wonder about advances in technology itself, like with the latest tec in smartphones, seems they put it out before it’s ready, or even tested thoroughly enough.
Before I got the new Spark that dji replaced I bought 2 Mavic Pros, one of them a Platinum, and started flying the Platinum.
After flying the Platinum the Spark seems incredibly small. I finally activated it, thinking I’d still use it. But after flying the Mavic with its flight distances and times, I don’t see myself using the Spark much anymore.
The fly away was on Long Island in NY, population almost 8 million, so it’s a signal heavy place, and my Platinum acted oddly the one time I’ve flown it there.
Where my girlfriend lives is an odd place about signal. It’s an older wealthy village where they don’t want cell towers, so a lot of the neighborhoods are dead zones for cell service, yet the air seems saturated with other signals and interference.
So with the Platinum, I flew it at a harbor there, and the coastal wind must have been a lot stronger just a few hundred feet up and pushed it away from me, into the neighborhoods, and it literally didn’t have the power to get back.
So I had to jump in the truck, drive to my girlfriends close by, and get her to drive and chase it. Only I couldn’t use the corner maps because of the deadzones and could only guess where it was through the drone’s view.
It was eventually landing in a wooded, hilly neighborhood, but disconnected, and I couldn’t tell where.
My girlfriend said maybe you just shouldn’t buy anymore drones.
I was so pissed after the last time I flew there the Spark has flown away I just ss fk it, if it’s gone it’s gone I’ll just give up drones till the technology is better.
Fortunately back at her apt I cooled off and when I was able to get service on my phone through her apt wifi I was able to look at the flight record and see the location of where it last was.
Went there but no one was at the house it showed it at and it was fenced and wooded and it was night by then. I was skeptical it couldn’t have made the landing.
A neighbor gave me the guy’s phone number and I called the next day his kids found it the next day right on their back patio sitting perfectly. He said it landed about 8 feet from their pool.
So I got it back 100% as it took off, but never flying it there again.
I’ve never had any real problems with the Spark in the country where I fly most of the time, it goes into atti mode for a few seconds at a time, but that’s it. The platinum is flawless in the country.
I have a friend who flys s Spark on Long Island who has never had a problem. He’s even foolishly flown it from a rooftop restaurant high above Manhattan, so who knows.