Over anxious to get out and try my new Iris, I was out flying today and had a rough landing in about 6 inches of snow. Camera and gimbal were covered with snow. brushed everything off and when restarted, the iris sync’d right up, GPS lock, and flew without problems. However the gimbal made a high pitch noise and then the motors stopped working. GoPro camera (Hero 4 silver) works fine, and transmits live view to monitor on controller. Gimbal PCB board has a blinking blue light and green light on. when power (bat) is connected Gimbal PCB shows yellow light briefly then green plus blinking blue. Did I short out the PCB board, the motors? any thoughts would be greatly appreciated.
also, any idea why my video’s are taking 20-30 minutes to download to my computer? Seems a bit long to me?
Not sure, hopefully leave it indoors in a dry climate and give it time to completely dry out will get things back to normal. Otherwise, not sure what to tell you.
What means are you using to download the video/image files? Shouldn’t take that long. Can you “read” the micro-sd card once plugged into your Mac or PC? Wonder if it got some snow into the card bay of the gopro and “shorted” perhaps corrupting some of the data?
I’m going to let it dry out overnight and try again. I did dry everything off and even used some warm air from a hair dryer to help out. Any idea on how to test if power is going to the Gimbal motor from the PCb
I’m using a PC to download video and yes I can “read” the SD card. When I try to play the video from the SD card the video plays really choppy like its streaming live video with a bad connection. (not sure how else to describe). I did download a video a few days back and had same issue so I don’t think it has anything to do with the snow. More likely, I’m just a nube and don’t know what I’m doing.
PS Sorry, I hit “accept answer” and now it shows “SOLVED” This is my first post here
Not sure how to test for power but if you know what you’re doing with a voltmeter you should see something.
What software are you using to playback the video? I assume you’re using a GoPro camera? If so, use the free GoPro video editing software “GoPro Studio”, available from goPro.com . You should copy the video file to your local disk (desktop or other folder) then try playing. If you have a slower USB bus, you will have performance issues playing directly off of the SD card. Also, if you’re recording 4k or 2.7k video, you will need to process the video with software such as GoPro Studio before it will play smoothly.
Well, I think I really messed up. I was checking voltage to the Gimbal PCB at the + & - ON the PCB board and believe my voltmeter probes crossed the positive and negative. I heard a crackling and a tiny puff of smoke? come from the PCB and then I heard a ticking noise from inside the Iris. I unplugged everything and when I re-connected the bat I don’t even get a status light (on outside of battery cover door) blinking green or any color on the iris.
I’m totally bummed out right now and I don’t know nearly enough about electronics to know where to begin. is there a potential fuse that could have blown? Does 3dr do service work?
and…yes, I am now using the gopro software and yes it does go much faster.
Well, I think I really messed up. I was checking voltage to the Gimbal PCB at the + & - ON the PCB board and believe my voltmeter probes crossed the positive and negative. I heard a crackling and a tiny puff of smoke? come from the PCB and then I heard a ticking noise from inside the Iris. I unplugged everything and when I re-connected the bat I don’t even get a status light (on outside of battery cover door) blinking green or any color on the iris.
I’m totally bummed out right now and I don’t know nearly enough about electronics to know where to begin. is there a potential fuse that could have blown? Does 3dr do service work?
and…yes, I am now using the gopro software and yes it does go much faster.[/quote]
Sorry to say Mark but most likely you have blown the PDB (Power Distribution Board). Unless you are strongly proficient in board analysis and soldering you will need to contact 3DR about sending the IRIS+ back for repair and/or seeing if you can purchase a new 4into1 board.
I’m inclined to agree with you. I don’t have the skill set or the tools to be tinkering around with such an expensive investment. If the PDB did get fried, would the IRIS still send telemetry data to my comp when I connect to Mission Planner. When the iris is connected to MP by the USB only, the iris goes through start up and I do get a blinking green Status light as well as a green light on PX4. all lights go out when I disconnect from the comp.
When using the USB connection you are simply delivering a small amount of power to the IRIS+, it does not take the place of the battery itself.
So while you can still see the PixHawk come on and data from the IRIS+ via MP it is because you are supplying enough power for those systems nothing more because the USB sends power though a separate connection.
The issue with your PDB is that the battery can no longer give power to the board because of the incident earlier crossing the positive & negative.
hi Todd, yes I sent I sent a request to 3 Dr. I suspect I’ll hear from them tomorrow and hear them ask me to send it back for repairs. as soon as I hear from them I’ll post a reply
just an update. I had to send my IRIS back to 3dr. It took a week to ship to CA and they had it for a week and another week to ship it back.
I received my IRIS back, there was a screw loose in the Tx. There were no notes or emails from 3dr. it just arrived via fed ex one day. No mention of what was repaired. They did send me a new gimbal and it powered up right away. Unfortunately, it was doing back flips upon take off. I have a new post to address this, and I believe its a Tx issue.
Still haven’t resolved the problem. I’m really bummed out right now…I’ve spent a ton of cash on this thing and I’ve only had about 8 flights. the rest of the time I’m reading the Arducopter manual trying to figure everything out. I will say I’ve learned a lot by reading these posts and the people on here are awesome. I wish there were some people close by to fly with. Anyone in Dayton, OH??
Mark,
Try reaching out to Bret Givens: bret.givens@yahoo.com
He was the coordinator for International Drone Day in Dayton and may know of some other IRIS+ owners near by.
I have no idea what your correspondence was with 3DR. However, that was pretty nice of them to replace the gimbal. I’m assuming for free. Sounds like you tried to fly it and it flipped. You now have a log to review to see what’s going on. Take a look at it and see if anything is abnormal.
You should definitely send an email to 3DR support about the flipping. I know you feel like you had a bad experience with them (ie. not communicating well), but I have always found their email support to be super responsive and helpful.
For the flipping, they are probably gonna tell you to start with an IMU calibration and then go from there. You may also need to trim your TX. There are youtube videos on 3DRs youtube channel that show you how to do both. I don’t have the links handy, but again, if you email 3DR they will get right back to you - and probably include the relevant links.
P.S.
I had a lot of snow landings this past winter. In every case I pulled the battery, blew out as much snow as possible, then took the Iris+ indoors and placed it over a warm air heating vent. Same goes if you fly in the rain, which I’ve done a few times (not recommended). Before you reconnect the battery, always make sure it totally dry.