Mark Your Gear...

limesqueezy · Mar 21, 2018

The incidence of fly aways and other losses is increasing here on the forums. Not a good feeling. I can't stress enough to MARK YOUR GEAR. Your Spark should have your FAA Registration number on it (somewhere), your phone number, and "Reward if Found". If you experience a fly away, you'll wish you had your contact information on the drone. I also labeled my controller in case I have a brain fart and leave it somewhere, and my entire hard case and taped my FAA registration card to it. I also label the batteries sequentially so I can rotate their use and charges appropriately.

Unfortunately, my drone malfunction happened over water, and unrecoverable. Maybe Neptune will call me so I can recover it!

limesqueezy · Mar 21, 2018

limesqueezy said:
The incidence of fly aways and other losses is increasing here on the forums. Not a good feeling. I can't stress enough to MARK YOUR GEAR. Your Spark should have your FAA Registration number on it (somewhere), your phone number, and "Reward if Found". If you experience a fly away, you'll wish you had your contact information on the drone. I also labeled my controller in case I have a brain fart and leave it somewhere, and my entire hard case and taped my FAA registration card to it. I also label the batteries sequentially so I can rotate their use and charges appropriately.

Unfortunately, my drone malfunction happened over water, and unrecoverable. Maybe Neptune will call me so I can recover it!

Of course, my post assumes you're flying in the US. Bad assumption, but still mark your gear!

msinger · Mar 21, 2018

limesqueezy said:
I can't stress enough to MARK YOUR GEAR.

Great suggestion! This is an easy step anyone can take to help ensure their drones (and drone gear) can be returned if lost and found.

If anyone is looking for stickers, I sell these tiny 1/2" x 1" FAA registration stickers and lost & found stickers:

GearHead83 · Mar 21, 2018

limesqueezy said:
Unfortunately, my drone malfunction happened over water, and unrecoverable. Maybe Neptune will call me so I can recover it!

As an avid scuba diver I'd be happy to have a go at looking for it

On a serious note, good tips and sorry to hear sparky went for a dive. Hopefully you identified what caused it.

Sparkbart · Mar 21, 2018

As with all my drones that have an SD card. I have a text file named "Owner Information" on the SD card. In the Text File, I have my name, FAA number, phone number and statement about a reward if returned....

Spark 317 · Mar 21, 2018

GearHead83 said:
As an avid scuba diver I'd be happy to have a go at looking for it

Love to have you in my emergency speed dial for an aquatic rescue.

Do have any leads on an Arborist or rock climber?

They are good to have on hand as well.

limesqueezy · Mar 21, 2018

GearHead83 said:
As an avid scuba diver I'd be happy to have a go at looking for it

On a serious note, good tips and sorry to hear sparky went for a dive. Hopefully you identified what caused it.

We know what happened. The drone became paralyzed when we moved out of the set safe fly range and refused four RTH requests. Which DJI calls operator error which is total crap.

Lastrexking · Mar 22, 2018

Actually, I think the number of flyaway incidents has reduced quite a bit. Here and on the official DJI forums.

Alastair · Mar 22, 2018

limesqueezy said:
The drone became paralyzed when we moved out of the set safe fly range and refused four RTH requests.

Good heavens, is that something that will happen if you move away from the drone so it's beyond the max distance you've set? That's bonkers if so and in serious need of a fix.

limesqueezy · Mar 22, 2018

Alastair said:
Good heavens, is that something that will happen if you move away from the drone so it's beyond the max distance you've set? That's bonkers if so and in serious need of a fix.

Yes, that is my understanding. Support is ignoring me at the moment so I can't advise more, but that is what they told me, I shouldn't have moved out of the safe flight area. They didn't explain the lack of responding to RTH requests, that just makes no sense. The hovering if out of safe flying range or flying on a screwy vector if you're out of safe flight range is not documented anywhere I can find, hence my warranty request.

limesqueezy · Mar 22, 2018

I think the appropriate behavior is to RTH, just like a battery emergency or lost signal connection. In my case I triggered four RTH with dynamic home point and the Spark ignored them all as far as I can tell.