Question How long until you feel at ease with your drone

brucemiranda

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I bought a DJI Phantom 2 on here. I didn't realise at first how much I would land up spending on it. Anyway, I am totally loving the flying. But after having spent so much on it, I feel scared to fly it. Also since I am looking to sell it on (as soon as I can find a buyer), in the same perfect condition I bought it, it puts more pressure.

So how long did you guys forget what you paid for the drone and started enjoying it!

Or lets ask this question another way. How many hours of flying would you say you needed till you thought you could fly.

Having used RC toys in the past the controls were no issue for me whatsoever. Even on my first flight I managed the hover and grab landing and some pretty tight tree avoids.
What I find most confusing is the orientation of the controls after a yaw.
 
Few weeks of flying and I'd forgotten the amount of cash I had airborne, and properly started enjoying it. The market is so saturated you may well loose a lot if you just sell it, even in mint condition. I'd keep it and try and get used to it.

Keep it in the default GPS mode to begin with, and you will soon get used to it. Having a camera with FPV and an iOSD helps with orientation at further distances, but modes like course lock and home lock along with the failsafe should mean you can always get it back if you have let it set a home point.

Before I had FPV on mine I wuld sometimes become disorientated with it, but you soon get used to keeping a mental log of the direction it is facing after yawing :)
 
It is all realtive.
I only paid £50 for my X8C in the first place. I havn't been able to find it for that price since, popularity must be driving the price up.
Anyway, from the off, I flew it quite high and far from where I was and was getting some stunning shots, even with the crappy 2MP camera.
Typically, it was the first time I flew it over water that it failed and resulted in a total loss.
Before it went down it was squealing pretty bad so I suspect that it was a motor or a gear that was failing (not brushless) but I'll never know.
So was it the cheap construction that led to it's demise? Probably.
Would I have been much much more careful had it been a multi £££ machine? Probably.
 
I don't know if it's age or what. I've never been so scared of using something because of the amount I paid for it. When I use it, its great fun. But I look for every reason not to use it. And that's the bit I don't get.

Is it the inexperience or the money I haven't worked out. I feel like I've bought an Aston Martin but won't drive it because I might scratch it....really stupid.

Back to the question. How many hours of flying did you need before you felt comfortable with it.
 
Back to the question. How many hours of flying did you need before you felt comfortable with it.

I spent the first couple of flights (10 minutes per battery charge) practicing hovering, landing and manouvering round the garden.
I got quite good in the end, and was able to fly under and through the legs of my kids' trampoline and land on the top.
I could tell that they were well impressed. :p
Then I took it out to a large bit of open ground and started doing circuits, getting wider and further each flight.
I don't think I ever got near the limits of the transmitter range and I was alway line of sight. You would need FPV to go any further.
One thing I started practicing in the open ground was quick decents into a controlled landing.
I smacked it a couple of times, but it was a fairly robust model and took a fair bit of abuse.
 

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