Iris+ Random Crash In Flight - Lost In Water

Hey DIY Drones,

This is my first post here, but I felt I would share my story and log with the community. Today I was out for a rather routine flight of my Iris+ from 3DRobotics that included an Auto Flight followed by some manual flight in Loiter mode directly after. No heavy wind or outside weather factors to worry about. A nice 70 degree evening here in St. Pete, Florida. Normally I fly the Iris+ with the Tarrot 2D gimbal and a GoPro but thankfully today I did not. I was getting my flight plan ready for a filming I was planning next week and was getting down the flightpath before mapping out the angles of the shots.

After flying in auto mode for the duration of my flight plan, I took over in loiter mode to do a short flight around a fountain I planned to shoot. I had just had the aircraft fly the same path in auto mode and I like to practice my flights manually incase I have to assume control in the middle of a shoot. About halfway through the maneuver the Iris+ started to wobble and descend like it was losing power suddenly. I kicked the throttle to full power and directed the drone away from the water (knowing a crash was almost imminent) but the drone failed to react to the controls and crashed in the lake I was flying over. About 20 feet from shore too. *Insert sad face* The drone now sits at the bottom of the lake in about 10 feet of water. I was unable to recover the aircraft today but and hoping to in the morning. 

Attached is a link to the log of the flight. So far looking at the data I cannot see anything to explain the sudden loss of control. The only thing I have really notice was a drop in battery voltage at the end of the flight, but I am unable to tell if this is because of the loss of the aircraft or there really was a sudden loss of battery voltage. The HUD never told me I had less than 70% battery during the flight and even so a loss of battery should have caused a return to launch. 

If anyone out there has idea what might have caused this crash, I'll take any input. With all luck I will recover the aircraft in the morning, but with the craft sitting in 10 feet of water for around 18 hours I am assuming a total loss. Sad. This craft seemed so stable in all other flights I've done with it (30+) and it was becoming a workhorse for me. 

Thanks to any who help! 

Justin

Logs: https://www.amazon.com/clouddrive/share/PwyrQYD00ZBWvlpKhlYyRDWkvPBX0Kr1tOmXrtkxm54?ref_=cd_share_link_copy_flash

2015-03-28 19-09-14.tlog

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Replies

    • Developer
      Even without checking I usually work on the rule that the reported battery voltage on the GCS while flying is key. If it falls below 3.5V/cell I'm landing ASAP. Depending on how far you fly from your location that battery failsafe my need to be higher to have enough energy to return to home.

      Best of luck with your next multi rotor :-)
  • Your log on exmaps: http://exmaps.com/b82b97

    • Good thing I don't live where I was flying right? Lat and Long would get you right to my front door! ;)

    • Very true. Not that it would matter since most of the people on this site are pretty upstanding folks who will fight for your privacy ;). I pulled the link but I enjoy posting to exmaps as it is a quick way to share my flight data. Good luck on your next flight. I'm transitioning from a fixed wing (electric) to building a quadcopter in the next month, so I'm sure I'll put up a post about a some horrible disaster too. 

    • Developer
      I don't think it's cool to post other users logs to external sites. I know this is public, but out of courtesy you should ask the owner if they are ok with that. It just seems respectful of privacy, and still allows people to analyse and offer help. It's not 100% private, but we don't need to go randomly posting data to other sites.
    • I respect your comment about privacy and would certainly take the comment down if asked by Justin. I am a bit put off that you think I "randomly" posted it to another site. I just thought that since he posted the log file, and asked for help, some people may want to take a look at what he was talking about who didn't have access to mission planner or whatever software they want to view the log in. 

      Is there a better way to get a look at someone's log file when you don't have software on your machine (like mission planner)?

      Hmm..if privacy is a concern (and it sounds like it is) and the community wanted to keep logs in house (but not require someone to be a member to see the log as is the case right now) maybe there could be a built in log viewer that would open log files in a dedicated format but would not allow users to save or export them off site. That would be pretty cool. That way we could better help each other without running into privacy concerns.

    • Developer
      Sorry, for using the more incendiary 'randomly' word.

      I don't think there is a solution. Posting data to other sites always as it issues. I think getting permission first just means it's clear, it only requires to send a PM. Or ask the owner why they don't post to the suggested site.
    • I pulled the link. Maybe if there was a way to view logs on diy that would make it better. 

    • I would take it down. I think the original poster is long gone. This was his first post. Early on somebody replied with a somewhat bizarre personal attack. He hasn't been back since. Seems like he's written off this community. We don't even know if he ever recovered the Iris. Anyway, I doubt he knows you posted his log with what looks like his home shown on the map. Bill is probably right. So I'd remove it. Not a huge deal, but definitely a minor violation. If this were a football match (soccer game), and I were the Ref, I'd probably award a foul, but not even give you a yellow card. Definitely not a red. ;-)
  • Sorry about you loss.

    if is fresh water, you can use Isopropyl alcohol to clean. Chances are pretty good.

    Btw mate, i have some markers on batteries that you can switch between green and red label. After using it, i never mixed out batteries again.

    its like this:

    36110-3(1).jpg?width=200

    Cheerz!

This reply was deleted.