A2 2.2 Upgrade Guinea Pig


surfab

Member
for some reason there wasnt enough info in my first email, so filled in a crash report(actualy 3 crash reports) so I guess I wait another month to hear back
 

Droider

Drone Enthusiast
Heres another fine example.. Reports are all over the web. more proof its not safe

 
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surfab

Member
Sent problem report e-mail to my DJI vendor and haven't heard a thing. Sent e-mail to X-Aircraft to talk about their stuff and received a return e-mail AND a phone call within 12 hours. Amazing difference.

to me the x aircraft stuff looks like dji but with a different name...
 

sk8brd

Member
Droider--when that drift occurred in your vid i was afraid it was going to lead to a lockout. from the vids i seen of crashes the past week on 2.2-first version they start to drift then lockout and pitch themselves into the ground. good thing you caught it! your tests help us no doubt thats why i went with wkm instead of a2..lol
 

Droider

Drone Enthusiast
Can anyone anywhere post any info on the mysterious 2.2B FW? I have seen the thread on RCGroups but nothing to prove it actually exists.

dave
 

Droider

Drone Enthusiast
Droider--when that drift occurred in your vid i was afraid it was going to lead to a lockout. from the vids i seen of crashes the past week on 2.2-first version they start to drift then lockout and pitch themselves into the ground. good thing you caught it! your tests help us no doubt thats why i went with wkm instead of a2..lol

I have had that happen on pervious versions, well actually come to think about it on ALL the versions. I cought it in time as it was just in a hover, other times though its gone into the bushes at my flying field.

Dave
 



Droider

Drone Enthusiast
To Dave,

holy moly, mine does the same thing as yours but just not in gps it happens to me in ATTI mode :/

It seems to NOT to go into ATTI (which I fly in a lot on my WKM) but somewhere in between ATTI and MANUAL, ok if you can fly manual but still very disconcerting

Dave
 

shyfx003

Member
I have a nice new Vulcan BW frame that's sat on my desk with a new Dji A2.. Now do I take the A2 out of the packaging,go out to my garden and see if I can make it fly any better by updating it with a baseball bat? Put the damn thing on eblag and move over (shudder) to xaircraft? Wished to hell I kept my wookong now..
Guess there's been no change since we talked last Dave?
 

Droider

Drone Enthusiast
I have a nice new Vulcan BW frame that's sat on my desk with a new Dji A2.. Now do I take the A2 out of the packaging,go out to my garden and see if I can make it fly any better by updating it with a baseball bat? Put the damn thing on eblag and move over (shudder) to xaircraft? Wished to hell I kept my wookong now..
Guess there's been no change since we talked last Dave?

Not as far as I am concerned. I may revisit the A2 when the vast majority of posts are positive. Until then as the WKM will eventually be unavailable I am going to try the SuperX

Dave
 

surfab

Member
I thought that zero uav dual redundancy looked pretty promising. not cheap tho. but if its the price to pay for reliability I will do it. thats what I thought I was getting with the a2 tho. think I might just buy a cable cam... or a blimp on a string
 

shyfx003

Member
Seems like Dji and Xaircraft have swapped places,all the bad press Xaircraft had 2years ago,to all the bad press Dji are making for themselves right now..my A2 can stay in the box for a bit longer,going to try out the superx!!
 

rilot

Member
Let us know how you get on with the SuperX guys.
I want to see someone fly the SuperX on an S800 EVO but I'm not aware of anyone who's done it yet.
 

surfab

Member
just emailed x aircraft had a reply in 10 mins... and there is a nz distributor already impressed! dji needs to lift their game
 

Old Man

Active Member
I spoke with X-Aircraft yesterday. I have a very large quad getting set up and after exchanging some info to get the him up to speed on what the controller needed to do he said something I have never heard before from any hobby vendor. If I bought it and sent some pictures of the rig to him, and if the controller was not capable of doing what I need it to do, he would accept it back for a refund. Nobody, and I mean nobody, offers that. I've also received good words about the unit from Addictive RC, and they seem to understand multirotors pretty well.

OTH, this morning I received an e-mail with questions relative to my A2 issues from DJI. We'll see how things go after I reply. They didn't respond to my other inquiries but now that I've posted in a couple of forums they appear interested.
 

Robwik

Member
Well, sorry to say that the grass ain't Always greener on the other side...

I had a ZeroUAV YS-X4 on a quad, and it flew well. Then I moved it to a Tarot 810, resetted the FC, did SERIOUSLY MANY test on the bench, motors, props, motor balancing, FC, you name it. I did magnetic calibrations many times, as well as the "dance", getting perfect circles on the GC for it. Then I went to the summerplace, did the Magnetic calibration and the "dance" right on the spot for liftoff. Waited a long time for the FC to get many satellites, and then a semi-auto liftoff. The hexa lifted off perfectly, then veered to the left uncontrollably and went for the directly for some trees. I had to cut the motors off, there was no chance of getting control. It was the trees or some stones with moss and brush, I took the latter as the moss and brush seemed softer. Some motors lost, battery lost, cabling, arms... I did buy some new motors, arms and cabling, but too late I saw that the frame was even more damaged.

I gave up on that frame, bought a DJI Winter sales F550 to get a cheap Naza V2 with a Zenmuse GoPro HD-2D gimbal. (I owned a V1 since before). I then bought two S800 Evo clones.

The crashed YS-X4 went back to China and I got a Gemini instead. They said it was not faulty, but I have a hard time to believe it after all my benchmark tests. Just days after my crash report a new firmware came out where it said that it fixed some issue with the GPS that could make flyaways happen...

After some weeks I got the Gemini and put it on the S800. The F550 Naza I put on the other S800. On the F550 I put a Pixhawk. The Naza flew great on the S800! I have only done 2 test flights in Atti mode, but it feels stable. I installed the Gemini on the other S800, and it worked well on the bench until I did the ESC calibration. It made the motors run uneven. I then did a manual calibration and the motors ran well. After that, I connected everything to the Gemini, and it was fracked. It did not enter calibration, only a steady green light. I could not power on or calibrate it.

ZeroUAV told me to send it back to them...

So far the COSTS with Products from ZeroUAV have been skyhigh for me. One expensive frame crashed. Weeks and months Before getting the Gemini, then buying a new frame, building, testing, only to find it unusable. AND, that means lost commercial works and more money lost.

The GOOD thing with ZeroUAV is in fact their support. Many say it is bad, and I guess you need to find the right people there first, then they answer quickly. I have only GOOD things to say about their people. I've tried to help a lot on another forum, and I've worked on translating the ZeroUAV manuals. I do think ZeroUAV has a good thing going, but the runway is long Before liftoff... We've had a lot of language problems. I try to ask a question, for instance, in making the manual better, but I get no answers... The software/firmware updates are not in sync, and most of all, the INFORMATION to the users are nearly 0 about the software and firmware. The manual is over a year old.

So, I bought an DJI A2 while my Gemini is shipping. I thought it would just "WORK". Now I'm reluctant to make the jump for a testflight after seeing every negative post...

So, don't I look like a fool? I bought ZeroUAV, and DJI, only to find that the reliability is 0? Well, I got a Pixhawk, that is also unmature... The FC makers are really making Money on this hype...



I thought that zero uav dual redundancy looked pretty promising. not cheap tho. but if its the price to pay for reliability I will do it. thats what I thought I was getting with the a2 tho. think I might just buy a cable cam... or a blimp on a string
 

Droider

Drone Enthusiast
Well, sorry to say that the grass ain't Always greener on the other side...

I had a ZeroUAV YS-X4 on a quad, and it flew well. Then I moved it to a Tarot 810, resetted the FC, did SERIOUSLY MANY test on the bench, motors, props, motor balancing, FC, you name it. I did magnetic calibrations many times, as well as the "dance", getting perfect circles on the GC for it. Then I went to the summerplace, did the Magnetic calibration and the "dance" right on the spot for liftoff. Waited a long time for the FC to get many satellites, and then a semi-auto liftoff. The hexa lifted off perfectly, then veered to the left uncontrollably and went for the directly for some trees. I had to cut the motors off, there was no chance of getting control. It was the trees or some stones with moss and brush, I took the latter as the moss and brush seemed softer. Some motors lost, battery lost, cabling, arms... I did buy some new motors, arms and cabling, but too late I saw that the frame was even more damaged.

I gave up on that frame, bought a DJI Winter sales F550 to get a cheap Naza V2 with a Zenmuse GoPro HD-2D gimbal. (I owned a V1 since before). I then bought two S800 Evo clones.

The crashed YS-X4 went back to China and I got a Gemini instead. They said it was not faulty, but I have a hard time to believe it after all my benchmark tests. Just days after my crash report a new firmware came out where it said that it fixed some issue with the GPS that could make flyaways happen...

After some weeks I got the Gemini and put it on the S800. The F550 Naza I put on the other S800. On the F550 I put a Pixhawk. The Naza flew great on the S800! I have only done 2 test flights in Atti mode, but it feels stable. I installed the Gemini on the other S800, and it worked well on the bench until I did the ESC calibration. It made the motors run uneven. I then did a manual calibration and the motors ran well. After that, I connected everything to the Gemini, and it was fracked. It did not enter calibration, only a steady green light. I could not power on or calibrate it.

ZeroUAV told me to send it back to them...

So far the COSTS with Products from ZeroUAV have been skyhigh for me. One expensive frame crashed. Weeks and months Before getting the Gemini, then buying a new frame, building, testing, only to find it unusable. AND, that means lost commercial works and more money lost.

The GOOD thing with ZeroUAV is in fact their support. Many say it is bad, and I guess you need to find the right people there first, then they answer quickly. I have only GOOD things to say about their people. I've tried to help a lot on another forum, and I've worked on translating the ZeroUAV manuals. I do think ZeroUAV has a good thing going, but the runway is long Before liftoff... We've had a lot of language problems. I try to ask a question, for instance, in making the manual better, but I get no answers... The software/firmware updates are not in sync, and most of all, the INFORMATION to the users are nearly 0 about the software and firmware. The manual is over a year old.

So, I bought an DJI A2 while my Gemini is shipping. I thought it would just "WORK". Now I'm reluctant to make the jump for a testflight after seeing every negative post...

So, don't I look like a fool? I bought ZeroUAV, and DJI, only to find that the reliability is 0? Well, I got a Pixhawk, that is also unmature... The FC makers are really making Money on this hype...

Unfortunately we all seem to be BETA testers for them all. I will wait to see where DJI go with the A2. I really think the only way back for them is to release a totally new FC, A3 maybe but have it fully up and running and build a customer support system worthy of the claims. IF they did it right and supported the products then they would clear up more than they are doing now, unfortunately I doubt that the share holders at DJI would want that as the Phantom market is their only short term cash cow. Long term the high end market / commercial sector is dying on them fast. Nothing short of a miracle FW update is going to save the A2.

I have been banging on about this since last september, now hopefully it will be resolved and all of you out there worrying about your A2 machines will be confident to go out and fly. For now Mine are hung on the wall going no where.

Dave
 

R_Lefebvre

Arducopter Developer
Well, I got a Pixhawk, that is also unmature...

How exactly is it unmature? I have 5 of them going, and they all just work. I have one machine that I use for mapping that has more than 5 hours of airtime, and 50+ km in full hand-off auto mode flight, without a single issue.


Another one is flying a 17lb AUW 600 size helicopter with a Nex. Another is on a 450 heli, capable of acrobatics, and Tx-off RTL.

The system does require a higher level of knowledge for the user, but I don't think it's fair to call it unmature.
 
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