I flew my quad into the river, camera kept rolling 8-)

[Chris G]

I started up my X-Bird250 with 3s 1800ma batt and contourHD 1080 camera, no FPV cam or trans. Took Spike for a trip through a tree, then proceeded towards the river, lost my bearings, and splash. Completely pilot error, my bad.
I pulled it out of the water in about 15 seconds or so, unplugged the battery, and was able to turn off the camera and hear it power off, so I have the footage,

I have not yet turned on anything, as this just happened Monday, I'm still drying him out.
I'm guessing my ESC's, CC3D and my receiver are all possibly blown. I'm hoping the lower voltage 3s might
have given me some extra hope
I also broke the buzzers on the new voltage alarm I added that morning. Figures,
The battery was and is still fine, just a little wet inside the clear shrink wrap.

 

[dirkclod]

That hurts .

 

[DroneNut]

I started up my X-Bird250 with 3s 1800ma batt and contourHD 1080 camera, no FPV cam or trans. Took Spike for a trip through a tree, then proceeded towards the river, lost my bearings, and splash. Completely pilot error, my bad.
I pulled it out of the water in about 15 seconds or so, unplugged the battery, and was able to turn off the camera and hear it power off, so I have the footage,

I have not yet turned on anything, as this just happened Monday, I'm still drying him out.
I'm guessing my ESC's, CC3D and my receiver are all possibly blown. I'm hoping the lower voltage 3s might
have given me some extra hope
I also broke the buzzers on the new voltage alarm I added that morning. Figures,
The battery was and is still fine, just a little wet inside the clear shrink wrap.

View attachment 48View attachment 49

I watched my 270 Robocat do cart wheels and frag parts today...

 

[Chris G]

Hey DroneNut, Spike is an expert cart-wheeler too, but this is the first time I've toasted all 4 props in a crash, and only the 2nd time i've run triple blade 5030's.

 

[Jack Ley]

That's so weird I came across this thread, had a water crash today also... See this HUGE, DRY field? Ok, if you zoom in and look in the area of the yellow arrow, you'll see a small pool/puddle of water, it's about 3ft wide maybe 12ft long and about 10inch deep. I finally pulled off my first 360, tried a second one and guess where my 250 landed? Yup,
kur-plunk...LOL. Got it in a bag full of rice overnight, keeping my fingers crossed!

 

[Waylander]

Hi Chris G
My full sympathies dude, loosing orientation is a bummer.

A couple of weeks ago I went to a new field where an RC club I had just joined had a meeting, weather was good with about 5 - 8 knot winds and no gusts.
My Walkera F210 does not have video recording so can't show you anything.

Anyway I had mapped a softer set-up into the RC, giving 50% power on all sticks, (except throttle) and a more curved linear response (50%) to stick input, ie less response in the initial stick movement going up to full response at the end of the stick travel. (still just 50%)

So practising combined yaw and roll turns at about 10' height ( without FPV ) she was caught by an updraught or something, and climbed really quick, next thing she was out of the field and heading towards a small housing estate, I tried all of the tricks for establishing nose direction, but could not work out what was happening, off she went further and further away, until I lost sight of her.
I knew she was beyond my control so I gently gave her throttle inputs to descend.

Also knew by line of sight roughly which direction she had gone, so my pal and I set off with our Headplay FPV sets to see if we could get a video signal. Through the housing estate we took different paths, I had given up and resigned myself to the loss, when my pal called my mobile and said he had video, very broken up but he was getting something.

I joined his location, and by walking around we managed to triangulate the signal. I eventually got a very good image of a tree, and was able to narrow down the location to one single house.

I knocked on the door but no one answered, so went to the next house and talked with the neighbour, and told him of my predicament, and asked if he would mind if I looked around in his garden, we both had a quick look around and I established that the signal was much stronger if I pointed the antenna towards his neighbours house. Anyway lonnnng story shorter, the low voltage battery alarm started to bleep and I located the drone over a fence in a small woodland area behind the house, and managed to retrieve the drone.

My Error... flying with reduced power in a wind which at ground level seemed to be nothing at all, but at the 50 -60 foot height the drone shot up to it must have been much stronger, and with so much reduction in power I could not get her back, that combined with lack of care in an area I had not flow in before, and was not used to.

I was very lucky on several counts, she was within 1/2 mile of home point, my friend thought of using the Headplay to search for video signal and did not give up, and the low voltage battery alarm started to bleep when I was within hearing distance......

Regards
Waylander

 

[Chris G]

Jack: Its always that small puddle that takes it's toll on our poor little quads.
Way: I have lost Spike in many trees, just like yourself> In this incident I underestimated the power I would need once up a little higher, I had Spike set to Granny mode( ~50%Power/yaw/pitch), when I felt lack of movement, I flipped it up to Mode2 (~60% Yaw/pitch and 100% throttle), and that's when I reacted too fast.

And I agree, a Low Voltage alarm beeper is the most effective $10 item to help find and save our UAV's. Noting that they don't work well under water

 

[Jack Ley]

That's so weird I came across this thread, had a water crash today also... See this HUGE, DRY field? Ok, if you zoom in and look in the area of the yellow arrow, you'll see a small pool/puddle of water, it's about 3ft wide maybe 12ft long and about 10inch deep. I finally pulled off my first 360, tried a second one and guess where my 250 landed? Yup,
kur-plunk...LOL. Got it in a bag full of rice overnight, keeping my fingers crossed!

View attachment 52 View attachment 52

Well I am glad to report after 24hrs of being submerged in rice, my 250 quad is flying with no problems!!!! Well, except the occasional piece of rice being spit out from the frame here and there..lol.

 

[Chris G]

I'm glad to say that Spike survived his swim in the river with no damage other than all four props, and my $10 battery voltage alarm stopped beeping. Pretty dang lucky, if you ask me, and my Contour Camera survived the swim too.

Phew.

 

[Chris G]

Now that Spike can swim, I learned yesterday he's not particularly good and digging in the dirt. So he broke an arm. And it figures that you can't buy just the arm, but whole new frame kit for $45, So I'm thinking maybe I build another 250 frame model, or just get the same and have spares...hmm.
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