Warning: Phantom 4 pro (P4P) lands at the end point of mission instead of home point

PIX4Dcapture PIX4Dcapture Questions/Troubleshooting
1

This is an important issue at the end of a circular mission

2

There are actually some settings in DJI GO (4) to define, like the remaining battery percentage and distance to the home point that will trigger the drone to automatically come back if the connection is lost after 3 seconds (fail-safe). This option can for instance be disabled. Therefore to override the function, you should change it in the DJI app and tweak the fail-safe / return-to-home (RTH) settings.

Note that the following behaviors can happen when signal is lost with the remote controller (and so with Pix4Dcapture):

  • If you have enough battery it comes back to the home point.
  • If the drone is within a radius of 20 m from the home point it will land immediately.
  • If the drone is far from the home point and there is not enough battery to return to home it will trigger vertical landing.
  • If the signal is not lost but the battery is lower than the minimum threshold set in the fail-safe settings, the fail-safe actions are triggered.

That being said, could it be that the battery was too low and/or that you lost the connection at the end of the mission?

3

I have a Phanton 4 Pro and I am having the same problem battery on 60% but still it starts to land at the end point of the mission rather than returning to home? This is an issue when I am surveying as it is trying to land on properties roofs!

Regards

Bradley

4

I experienced the same problem.  Based on Julie’s reply in the past and also from one of her colleagues PIX4DCapture contains the logic that when a drone is within a radius of 20 metres (Julie) or 30 metres (other colleague) it lands immediatly at the end point of the mission. 

My client, who wants to use PIX4D for traffic analyses and traffic accident analyses, can’t take this kind of behaviour.  Because of safety reasons, he must be able to decide exactly where the drone goes up and comes down.  Can PIX4D solve this problem ?  Or is their already a solution available ?

Thanks in advance, and,

Best regards,

Dietrich

5

This can happen on other drones too but it seems random so from my experience it isn’t a consistent bug.  I adopted the procedure a long time ago that I manually fly the drone home at mission end or battery change as it just seems safer that way.

6

Julie,

Could you please advise as this the decider between Dronedeploy and PIX4d, in your comments, you say it will automatically land if it’s with 20meters of the land zone, but I assume you mean if it has lost the signal or is low on battery?

I need to be sure that the software will allow it to complete the mission and land at the original home point if the battery is within the limit and it has not lost signal? Surely you would not allow your software to land the drone at the finish point, as like Dietrich Heiser I too can not allow this land at a random place on a construction site.

Could you please clarify your point, alternatively as per Adam Jordan reply can the software settings be changed to ensure that the drone hovers at the finish point once the mission has finished allowing you to take over and land at will?

Regards

Bradley

 

7

Any drone pilot should easily be able to take manual control with the flip of the switch to fly/land without an app. If somebody can’t do that then hire those of us that are certified and insured.

There are even some cases where I want the drone to land at the finish to do the next mission so there are all kinds of situations that an app can’t meet the need perfectly every time.

8

Yes, I agree Adam, the option to land manually should be at the pilot’s request and like you say any decent certified and insured pilot should be capable enough to be able to land themselves. I personally only really require the app to carry out the actual photography part of the mission, so would be quite happy to take control at any point up to or after this part of the mission.

I have seen other threads to this on PIX4D forums which shows it is an ongoing fault in the app and experienced by a number of members, it would be interesting to know what PIX4D are doing to tackle the problem.

9

I too have noticed inconsistencies about going home but I am far more concerned about being grounded because the app is now useless for a custom camera because the forward speed is no longer controllable.

10

I wonder if this is what is happening to me. In tree diferent circular missions my P4 pro tried to land in a different spot than the take off point. I manually landed each one as I noticed the error.A friend of mine told me as a joke that my drone became dizzi because of the circular mission