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Greetings from South Africa. Outdoor Flyaway Gust surfer DJI Ryze Tello First Flight..FAIL

InHumanForm

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Greeting from South Africa.

just got the tello recently and had my first outdoor test flight yesterday, it didn't go the best as I ignored the conditions cause I wanted to fly so badly, the conditions where not great kinda grey vibes and wind was building, And as a avid kitesurfer and instructor I know the wind, and how it works and like the wind gradient which I totally ignored and well here is the story.. also I was monitoring my home anemometer and it was avg 15kmh and gusts 32kmh. But this was only at like 4m height.

Wind was building towards mid day and on our small holding the wind is super gusty with really long lulls. So I took off and pretty much went to 10m. Then it was flying perfectly and cool. So I unlocked 15 and it just hovered while Im in telloFpv settings..

All good so I go to 20. A gust hit it and it just flew off. Return to home I tried and I actually think it did get the command because it was 20m high and where it crashed onto a roof its like 6m or so. And it was set return to home at 5m. Or other possibility is it coulda tried to land itself? Anyways it ended up flying into the complex next door, and somehow the video kept recording till like maybe 5m from where it crashed. So I had a screenshot also of the last frame that the app saw.. I can't remember if I screenshot it or maybe the app somehow does. It was also in the last video frame. But I used this and kinda figured the path etc. And knocked on doors and went in peoples yards and on walls and found the exact location as per pic. Searched and searched and couldn't find it.. so wanted to send a message on my phone and realized wait im connected.. couldn't see exactly where it is but figured eventually its a roof. And then I got on a wall and saw it. Here I wish there was a emergency override to start the motors at the lower percentages or at tilted angles. I coulda even if it crashed offthe roof gotten it off. @volatello. Also Is it possible to have VGPS on the IOs version. I bought both your apps. Didn't use tellome yet.. gonna try make it follow my daughter on horse.
So after a huge mission getting it off the roof it wasn't even damaged. What an amazing little thing. But lets be honest Tello FpV really makes it special. I wonder what more we can expect. Wish they could rewrite the firmware to have some kinda rth when loses signal. But I mean for the price and what it can do, this is an insane drone. Im a little scared now after yesterday.
Im excited to take the tello on hikes and lil missions. The camera photos really are pretty cool.

oh for future missions I did order a small 7g drone keeper device that has a battery and speaker to make noise when it stops moving. Anyone have any experience?

I have read so many posts on this forum the last weeks that inspired to get a tello.




please feel free to watch the video of the drone surfing the gust

Check out the fly away


Im using Iphone 11ProMax with TelloFPV And Xoami MI2 repeater. (Wondering If I can get a even more powerfull extender that plugs in and then I can plug it in there outside ? Because the lil mi2 doesn't have physical aerials. So thinking it can boost the performance and reliability alot? ThoughtI need a physical controller but don't know what non Bluetooth IOs options are available. T1s doesn't otg to
Ios. ? Sorry to say the onscreen sucks because finger slips off the block or its difficult to control the yaw without changing throttle etc.

Greetings . Happy Friday

InHumanForm
 

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Sounds like a gust took Tello with it, and it lost VPS so it started to autoland - or maybe just crashed.
RTH only climbs to minimum RTH altitude, but never descends for RTH (only when at home, it descends to 1.5m or lands depending on settings).

You can start when tilted to some degree but its a well kept secret: One-button start doesn't work, but you can use the CSC (both sticks in & down) to start the motors and then throttle to take off.
There is no override for takeoff with low battery, the flight controller doesn't allow that.

Sorry, no vGPS on iOS. It's a little fun add-on tracking flights on a map but never lived up to my expectations in terms of precision and flight repeatability. It was some effort to implement and causes way too many service requests, maybe a too complex feature for many users. Based on what I learned since releasing vGPS I would actually not release it again.
 
Just watched the video:
Just too much wind. Wind increases significantly up in the air.

You can see this in the little telemetry indicator in the center (called birdy ), or in this case if the video stabilization "jumps" between flat and angled. These jumps indicate that Tello's video stabilization mechanism is overwhelmed by the tilting angles that tello needs to hover in place.
 
Sounds like a gust took Tello with it, and it lost VPS so it started to autoland - or maybe just crashed.
RTH only climbs to minimum RTH altitude, but never descends for RTH (only when at home, it descends to 1.5m or lands depending on settings).

You can start when tilted to some degree but its a well kept secret: One-button start doesn't work, but you can use the CSC (both sticks in & down) to start the motors and then throttle to take off.
There is no override for takeoff with low battery, the flight controller doesn't allow that.

Sorry, no vGPS on iOS. It's a little fun add-on tracking flights on a map but never lived up to my expectations in terms of precision and flight repeatability. It was some effort to implement and causes way too many service requests, maybe a too complex feature for many users. Based on what I learned since releasing vGPS I would actually not release it again.
I see so technically its not even worth my effort to run my tello on a android device? what would be the performance difference between using this older android as in pic below or my pro max iphone? Or maybe due to the t1s? Just flew my tello inside with a ps4 remote just to try(a treat vs touch screen)... it had two hectic crashes,, the one caused by the iphone saying no internet connection, keep trying wifi or use mobile data.. I think its cause my phone was not in airplane mode, and then a while after suddenly the drone shot up from 3 feet straight into the roof with much more power then I can apply in the normal mode.. I think however this was due to the low ambient light sensor and flying over tiles in low light. so having a wired control would definite be a treat.

Im excited to try Tellome once the wind dies down.. I just came back from kitesurfing and today its blowing 30knots.. so no outside flying... I would like to see if Tello me will track my daughter on a horse. TelloFpv is such a great app really,,, i think the tello would kinda suck without it,,, its also so much more customizable.
 

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With the android you can try the free TelloFpv demo and decide for yourself, but I think it's on the edge of being too old/slow. For TelloMe these devices are far too slow, it does performance tests and thesee tests will fail. S8 is the minimum hardware spec for TelloMe.

The only benefits going to Android IMO is a) sound recording using the phone's mic and b) wired USB OTG connection for the controller so a little less interference compared to BT controllers.
If you don't need that I'd suggest to stay on iOS.

There are two reasons for Tello to shoot up into the air :
1) Using an old cracked version of TelloFpv on Android. Happens only right after takeoff.
2) If using another app, or this happens midflight this is most likely an indicator that your Tello has issues with the altitude sensor. Nothing an app can fix.
 
With the android you can try the free TelloFpv demo and decide for yourself, but I think it's on the edge of being too old/slow. For TelloMe these devices are far too slow, it does performance tests and thesee tests will fail. S8 is the minimum hardware spec for TelloMe.

The only benefits going to Android IMO is a) sound recording using the phone's mic and b) wired USB OTG connection for the controller so a little less interference compared to BT controllers.
If you don't need that I'd suggest to stay on iOS.

There are two reasons for Tello to shoot up into the air :
1) Using an old cracked version of TelloFpv on Android. Happens only right after takeoff.
2) If using another app, or this happens midflight this is most likely an indicator that your Tello has issues with the altitude sensor. Nothing an app can fix.
Thanks for the response and useful info/
Ok best I stay with my Iphone then for now.

just wish could get a controller for ios. Maybe practice will make perfect with TelloFPV?
Is there a manual for tellofpv and tellome? If I screenrecord my phone will
It have any influence on the app or performance or video quality recorded by tello?

is there a way to service and calibrate the sensor?
Check the floors here, don't you think the floors with the low light caused it to shoot up?
Excuse the floors are a tad dirty. 059387D2-CC17-479D-98FE-AFDA85DEB3DB.jpeg
DA96765F-0459-4DE7-B64C-088EB2ABD4CE.jpeg

I found the video, you can see it starts to spin then flies straight up. Also the quality sucks using bt control

video here @volate!lo
 
You can do screenrecordings no problem.

Supported controllers for TelloFpv on iOS are all MFI controllers, T1d, t1s, Parrot Flypad plus whatever iOS considers a gamepad these days. TeloMe does not support any controller (same on Android), since controllers are not required and possibly ruin the video.

Normally when VPS is confused it will just switch off, and tello will start to drift and finally auto-land. Itshould not shoot into the air.
Based on the video this looks like a malfunction of Tello's flight controller. I don't know what causes this, so far I always suspected the altitude sensor but maybe this can also be triggered by a confused VPS camera. None of my tellos ever had this, but I have seen one screen recording of aTello that did exactly this, and lost wifi signal at altitude 55m / 160ft.
This happens only on some tellos, but those that show this habit seem to do it frequently. If its a new device I'd try to return it.


Sensors can't be serviced, maybe clean the little pinhole camera at the bottom with a fine brush or some pressurized air.
Gravity calibration is available in the app but should not have any effect on this.
Or maybe just try a fresh set of OEM propellers, these can also cause all sort of troubles if vibrating too much.

TelloMe has a little Help section in the app, TelloFpv has a PDF file included in the app so you can print it or send it by email to read on PC.
 
Check here I managed to catch it again on screen. It was right after a vps error. So im pretty sure the problem must be the low light. It will be a few days till the wind is calm enough to fly outside and test... If I have the geo fence and altitude limit set can it fly completely away? Only thing stopping it is the crash now. Look at the controls as it flies up. I counter it but it continues to fly..
Hope you don't mind the questions, just trying to figure.
 
It can and will fly away, even past the 30m altitude limit that is hard coded into tello. It's a bug inside tello and no limit or geofence in the app can override this.

The ONLY way to ground tello again is by activating the emergency stop feature in the settings first and when it happens rapidly tap the Stop sign at the top of the screen five times. Tello will fall down a second later.

Practice that a few times over some soft ground indoors to make sure you know how that works.
 
Thank you,

and what do you think of the previous video? Its the low light and vos caused it to fly into roof?
 
Hard to tell. I have never seen such problems. For me low light only causes drift and sometimes autolanding.
 
@volate!lo check
Here is the last flight.. look how it forces itself down and sometimes shows -on vps.

must be the tiles and low light right?

this time it had one freak out you will see in the video where it shot off powered to side.

I wanna try outside tomorrow morning before the wind comes..

please take a look at the video if you don't mind..

Also if I fly outside with a geofence, if it freaks out will it stay within?

regards and thanks again Full flight. 1 freak out and many forced push downs
 
@volate!lo check
Here is the last flight.. look how it forces itself down and sometimes shows -on vps.

must be the tiles and low light right?

this time it had one freak out you will see in the video where it shot off powered to side.

I wanna try outside tomorrow morning before the wind comes..

please take a look at the video if you don't mind..

Also if I fly outside with a geofence, if it freaks out will it stay within?

regards and thanks again Full flight. 1 freak out and many forced push downs
 
The geofence is a limit within the app only and requires functional VPS. If tello freaks out it will ignore anything the app does, so it will do whatever it wants.

This is not tiles or low light. This is NOT normal behavior even with low light and VPS errors. Low light just reduces position accuracy, VPS error should just give some drift an after 60s autoland.
Your tello is not auto-landing (it would give a message "landing..."), it is just going down for whatever internal reason. The VPS errors appear only when already very close to the ground, which is normal (VPS needs ~40cm altitude to work OK)

At 9:53 for example tello goes down, and the IR sensors correctly report lower altitude (AAG Altitude above Ground). Baro & VPS still say 1.20m, and the "merged" altitude that Tello seems to use for holding position is also off. When taking off again AAG is correct but all others are way off.

I can only repeat: Your Tello has technical issues (most likely the baro but I'm no expert) and your best bet is to return it for replacement. Otherwise it will sooner or later fly away.

Your second best bet is to practice the emergency stop procedure. But if tello is out of Wifi then this won't help. Also this tello won't be fun to fly, with this bad gut feeling all the time.
 

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