ydqa ep 30

John Dickow: [00:00:00] hello and welcome back. Another episode of your drone questions answered. I'm John Dicko here to find the answers to your drone questions that you submit.

Today's drone question is a very, very common one. The original question was, how do you avoid crashing your drone? But I'm already going to sort of re swizzle that into, how do you avoid or minimize the chances of crashing your drone? And there are even some more nuances to that. But with me today is Dusty Jolly.

He's community manager at Drone Launch Academy. He's going to help answer this question. Thanks for joining me, Dusty. Sure, John. Thanks for having me here. No problem. I'm just going to throw the question at you and we can kind of just go from there. in your opinion, how can you minimize the chances of crashing your drone?

Dusty Jolley: I think that if you're flying drones enough, it's just really a matter of time just throughout the, your journey. of getting better and improving that you're going to end up crashing a drone at some point in time. And so maybe it's on the front end when you're starting off with a cheaper drone or something that doesn't have a GPS capabilities or something that doesn't actually have some sort of a location or altitude hold.[00:01:00]

And so those are definitely going to be a little bit easier to crash, especially when learning. but I feel like. With any drone, there's a few things that you could probably do even before leaving the house. just from, from my experience, I've been flying drones for several years and I can tell you that I've crashed my fair share, uh, uh, pretty much every drone that I've owned at some point in time.

And so the main thing is, is when something like that does happen is to be able to take away, uh, you know, what did I do wrong or what could I have done differently to, avoid this outcome in the future. And so one of the things to make sure it's very easy, a lot of times when we're trying to get things ready to go and can get out of the house is to maybe, uh, there's been times when I've been charging batteries and, uh, maybe thought that I had the other ones plugged in, right.

Or something and was charging two or three at a time and get to the building and realize that I've only got one fully charged battery and the other two are not, the same goes with your remote. So that's one of those things before you leave the house. Making sure there's double check, you know, even as your pre flight checklist before you load everything into the car to make sure that you're double checking, battery levels on everything, even, you know, your tablet or your phone device, whatever you're going to use to, connect.

John Dickow: That's a [00:02:00] good point because that's probably a pretty common cause of a drone crashes. You're dead in the air because a dead battery been there. Yeah. You mentioned, just beginner drones. You have any just off the top of your head suggestions of a good beginner drone that may not like to burn a huge hole in your wallet.

You know,

Dusty Jolley: honestly, for me, not so much super cheap drones. I've had the cheap, you know, 100, 200 drones and you know, from my experience, none of those really do a great job, even if they do advertise that they have some sort of an altitude or, or some sort of a, location hole that they really don't compete with some of the GPS drones, like DJI and I'll tell, some of the other more expensive drones.

Now, I do think that you can get in, to some of the DJI drones, such as like the. The DJI minis, you know, and you can also look, for some refurbished or used units. If you're just trying to get your foot into the hobby to see if it is something that you wanted to try out, to see if it is something that's for you, without breaking the bank that you're probably still going to spend anywhere from three to 500.

on something that would have, decent enough GPS capabilities to where you're, it's not going to just fly away from you, or just drift off in the [00:03:00] wind. That makes

John Dickow: sense. let's just say, okay, I crashed my drone. Are there, and I guess it always just depends on the scope of the damage that's done to the drone.

When you think about these kinds of drones, are there replaceable parts? Is that a common solution sometimes, or is it? only so many replaceable parts you can get a lot of times if it's, if you've really totaled your drone,

Dusty Jolley: whenever you purchase, you know, if you purchase one of these drones from Amazon or something, it's not really going to come with any sort of a warranty or anything.

So if it does end up crashing into a tree or hit the ground, it's, it's pretty much one and done. Now, when you do buy a new DJI drone or like a lot of these other companies, you can either purchase kind of a warranty or what they would call their refresh program. So if you do end up, I think I believe if something happens, the drone gets stolen or if you crash it into the lake or you do end up just totaling out the drone.

There is some coverage there. and dj, I, from my experience, I have crashed an Air two s sematic to zoom, a Phantom four Pro. and to be honest with you, they have a very reasonable repair program. So what you typically do is you kind of write in, submit a ticket With d I get on with [00:04:00] support.

They send you a U P SS level, you send up your drone, no cost to you. They assess it. I'll write you back, tell you what the estimated cost of the repair is going to be. And then you can make the final decision, uh, whether or not you want to move forward with the repair or just have them send you back, you know, your, your broken drone.

But for the most part, it's pretty reasonable. You know, I think when I had a broken arm on my Air 2S, it was about 75, which is, pretty reasonable for something for the repair. The majority of the time, I mean, anytimes I've had issues, whether it be a remote or whether it be actually with a drone, they actually send you back a, it's, it looks like a brand new refurbished unit.

I mean, it's something that, it's not always the drone that you submitted in the first place for repair. They just send you back, a new unit to begin with. And so, yes, it is expensive, but I feel like, if you're going to be flying these things enough, you're going to end up crashing them.

And so it's just part of it. You can pay for the refresher, you can pay for insurance on these, but typically you're going to, at some point in time, have to come up with either there's enough damage done to the drone that it is totaled and it's not worth paying for the pair, but my experience, a lot of times the repair, as long [00:05:00] as it's not too significant is somewhat, reasonable for the most part.

John Dickow: That's nice to know at least that some of these companies offer some kind of repair program that, that makes sense beyond just buying a new drone and just knowing that so many beginner drone pilots have that anxiety. And when you're making that kind of purchase, it would be so nice to know that there's, there's maybe something they've got that in mind, at least that's something that can crash.

Dusty Jolley: You know, the best part is when you crash in front of a client. And so that was what happened with my Phantom 4 Pros. I managed to put it into a tree when we were filming a new roof going onto the house. we managed to get it out of the tree, but it was actually when we knocked it out of the tree, it was the fall then that damaged the drone.

And so that, that repair alone was probably more on the higher end, but I think it was around 370, but they did, you know, two weeks later, I had a brand new drone. And so it's just back at it. it doesn't matter how experienced you are. It still hurts every time.

John Dickow: Yeah. Well, you mentioned that too.

I mean, it's something that is going to happen or likely to happen, as to the pilot, I'm sure over time you, learn things, you get better at flying the [00:06:00] drone in general. do you have any tips for like a beginner drone pilot who might be listening or watching if you're going out there the first few times, just some real basic tips to avoid.

Dusty Jolley: Sure. Absolutely. Anytime before I'm, if I know that I'm going somewhere, whether it be a job site or if I've just got somewhere in my head that I want to go fly, you know, typically what I'll do is get on Google earth and just kind of go ahead and just figure out and get some sort of an idea of what the, uh, the lay of the land is going to look like.

You know, and figure out if there's going to be trees or buildings or power lines, something that I need to go ahead and kind of be aware of. the good thing about Google earth is that you can kind of get that bird's eye view without necessarily having to put a drone into the air. So you might be able to pick up on some things that you wouldn't necessarily see if you're just driving around in your, in your truck.

then at that point, when I usually, when I get on site somewhere, I'll go ahead and take a second look at all my surroundings, make sure that everything's powered on, make sure that I've got, again, full battery on the drone, the remote and on my tablet. And then, it's always important, especially with the drones to make sure that before you take off or do anything that you go ahead and, get your home point recorded and that you do a, go ahead and acquire all the satellites.

for that to go ahead and take [00:07:00] place. And so a lot of times people get there, kind of take off and it's important though, that the home point is recorded, you know, to wherever you want that home point to be set, whether it's by, by you as the pilot, or it's kind of where you want the drone to, come and acknowledge as a home point to come and land.

but it's always good to make sure that you've got the connection with the satellites at that point to make sure that you're not going to lose connectivity. Then at that point, when I've. Kind of got connection. And I know that the drone is holding its place. I'll go ahead and we'll take a look and figure out and identify around me what's going to be the highest altitude object that I need to be worried about.

So whether that be a building or a tree, so then I'll usually take the drone, up to about what I feel like is the altitude of the same altitude as that object. And that'll kind of give me my floor as far as, you know, how low I Or how high I need to be to avoid hitting anything at that, altitude.

So that'll kind of give you a floor as far as you know, that you can always fly above that and not necessarily have to worry about hitting a tree or anything because you've already done the due diligence of kind of go ahead and just assessing your surroundings as far as like, what's the, the highest altitude obstacle that you've got to worry about.

Then other than that, [00:08:00] especially a lot of times, like I'll fly FPV and so with FPV, you know, even when you're fine, traditional line of sight drones, it's important to have always helps to have a visual observer. Uh, so there's a lot of times where you're looking at the screen and you're trying to get the shot either you get distractions or maybe there's a.

a tree behind you that you're not seeing and a lot of times different drones have different, obstacle avoidance systems on them. And so, like, I know, like, the air to us lacks the obstacle avoidance on the sides, whereas some of the other drones do have those. And so. you know, keep that in mind.

If you are flying an air two S backwards, you're flying it sideways, that it's not going to pick up on, on this pantry. Maybe that's over here. Uh, I can tell you that from experience. So, uh, that's where a visual observer does come in to play to where they can kind of help you get close in those shots, but also make sure that you're not going to get so close that you're going to run into something.

when flying FPV, you know, you're flying into a fixed camera. So your field of view is hundred percent fixed at all times. And so your peripheral vision. you don't have any peripheral vision outside of what you can see there. So being aware of your surroundings when you're flying, you know, if you're flying [00:09:00] into new surroundings or flying into a building, always kind of keep in mind when you're passing stuff, try to remember, you know, how far away is this for me?

So when you're maybe you're orbiting something. You're not going to blindly fly or blend back into somebody or something else at that point. So, always just kind of being aware of your surroundings and not necessarily getting so focused on the shot that, that you're losing the side of the big picture and what's necessarily around you.

Cool.

John Dickow: That, no, that's, that's fantastic. And I'm glad you brought up FPV too, because we've actually talked about FPV and just how that opens up a whole new, you know,

Dusty Jolley: swath of opportunities. That's a whole nother episode. Yeah. Yeah. FPV, you will crash.

John Dickow: Yeah. And I, I highly recommend anybody who's interested in FTP, go back and listen to that episode.

it was really good conversation. Uh, I learned a ton, but yeah, crashing is a, is that you're up in the risk there. You mentioned something else going back to home feature or the, the return to home, uh, function on your drone.

And that one really spoke to me because that was one of my first. Crash experiences. And it kind of, the lesson was just understand the features of your [00:10:00] drone and take the time to learn, and take things in kind of baby steps because I got my drone, took it out of the box, charged it up, sent it up into the air.

And really just thought that little home, you know, return to home button was just going to bring it back. And I, I did not know that I had to actually calibrate it. get the settings, right. And so my batteries are running out. I needed to get it, get the drone landed. I press return to home and it just dropped into a tree.

Luckily it wasn't like it didn't explode or shatter into a million pieces, but there were propellers everywhere. So, that spoke to me. Well, no,

Dusty Jolley: and, and, and on that note too, you know, it's always good to make sure that you get your home point recorded, but you also within the app, you know, like John was saying, as far as knowing the drone and the capabilities of the software, the app and everything, you can go in, you can actually change.

Okay. So whenever the drone is experiencing low battery, you know, so you can tell the drone whenever we do want to be notified of a low battery. So typically I keep it, you know, fairly conservative to 25 percent somewhere in there, you know, to give myself plenty of [00:11:00] time. that's another thing to be mindful of, especially if you're kind of flying out and you're getting, pretty long distance away from where you're at, always be mindful of making sure that you've got enough battery to bring your drone back. but also one of the settings that you can set within the remote itself is, uh, so if there is a low battery warning, what is the drone going to do?

You know, do we want it to sit still into the air? Do we want it to come back to the home point? Or do we want it to actually come back to the remote to where the pilot's at? And so those are different. Things that you can go in and change and set, depending on whatever your situation is, but it's also, you know, it's one of those things that you want to have all this kind of worked out in your head before ever taking off, you know, and to kind of go ahead and play out that worst case scenario.

Like if, if this does happen, if I do start to run out of battery, or if I do lose connection, what I want that drone to do, where do I want it to fly? And then how high does the drone actually need to be flying on the way back to avoid any of those obstacles that we were taking a look at before.

John Dickow: That's a really good point, I wanted to ask you this just because I feel like this is kind of a big component of just the question in itself is to sort of speak to the anxiety and the fear [00:12:00] of crashing a drone. What would you say to somebody who really wants to get into flying a drone?

Wants to make the investment, purchase the drone, but that's what's holding them back is just kind of this lack of confidence, this anxiety of, I'm going to destroy this thing and I'm going to be, you know, a few hundred dollars, maybe more short after that.

Dusty Jolley: I would say don't let the fear at all hold you back from this.

I think it's one of those, you can always take this in baby steps. the good thing is I know like with a lot of the DJI drones, they, I don't remember the exact mode, but it's kind of a beginner starter mode to where it limits how high, how far the drone can get from you. and for the most part, a lot of these drones do have really good obstacle avoidance systems.

I just have learned to never really trust them. I think that's going to make you a little bit better of a pilot, to not always be trusting, the sensors to be picking up on stuff because there's a lot of times that things, do get by, uh, the sensors. with that being said, I feel like, don't let it be the end of the world.

If you do crash, also always be mindful, like if you do crash to kind of before you start to panic or something to kind of take a deep breath and to just, to go ahead and kind of think things through in your head. I [00:13:00] think a lot of times it's easy to panic, whether you lose video or something all of a sudden, just kind of freak out.

And, really to stop and be thoughtful about, okay, what am I going to do now? What should the drone be doing at this point? and a lot of times, 99 percent of the time things always work out. But, crashing is just part of it. So I feel like as long as you're kind of putting into practice and just taking the steps necessary to, get to the point where you're flying a little bit more aggressively or, or, uh, you know, over water or whatever, to kind of.

Eventually get to the point where it's not as intimidating. it's just one of those. The more you get out and do it, the more that you'll see how capable these things are.

John Dickow: Well, that's great, Dusty. Really appreciate having you on again here and talking about this subject. I think it's such a common, question we get. And I think we're going to probably be revisiting it as time goes on. And it's a great refresher, takeaways being, you know, minimize your financial risk by just investing in a beginner drone, look into warranties and in repair programs before you buy the drone.

understand that crashing is part of it. And so just internalize that and in some ways accept that as well as just get to know your drone and take the time it really takes to learn [00:14:00] it and understand the features that will help you minimize that chance of crashing it

Dusty Jolley: so within the Drone Launch Connect community, you know, we've got just members of DronePolish from all around the world. within the community, we've got a forum, of course, just focused on different things. But we have a space in there to where you can share your successes. You know, whether you've got a new client, you've, you know, you just passed your 107, whatever.

my favorite space is we have a share your fail space in there. So this is like for the days that you do go out and crash, or you do cut your hand in front of your client. Or something like that. This is where, people can come and share those stories as well. And so it is a great, way to kind of put yourself out there on the line, but there's some really good, some really funny stories in there.

the more that these stories are being posted, the more that people are less hesitant to, share them. So I feel like it's just another cool feature of the community is, people being willing to share these stories and to know that, you know, we're all human and we all make mistakes and these things are going to crash at some point in time.

Oh, thanks for having me on though,

John Dickow: John. Yeah, no, that's, that's awesome. Tell me one more time where you could find that community where you can learn more about other people's experience scratching.

Dusty Jolley: Sure. So this is drone launch connect. You can go to, drone launch [00:15:00] academy. com backslash DLC, and that'll take you to our landing page to where you can go ahead and learn some more about the community and get signed up.

John Dickow: Good to know. That's, that's an awesome idea. And Drone Launch Academy is an educational organization just here to help all drone pilots, especially beginners. And so that's a really cool feature. Thanks again, Dusty for being on. This was, this was a sweet conversation.

In the meantime. You can submit your own questions about drones and we will find the answer to them. Any question you have, we'll look for the person who can answer them. You can go ahead and submit a question over ydqa. io or going back to that drone launch, connect private community. If you're part of that, go ahead and type in a question through there.

We'll see it and we'll find the answer. In the meantime, we'll see in the sky.