What do you mean by "fly away". The Karma will not fly away due to a lost connection; it will either return to launch, return to you, or even land in place if you also drain the battery. You should have no issues with lost connection as long as you are within FAA restrictions, meaning line of sight being able to see the drone and not flying behind objects. Another reason is flying in congested areas such as buildings or other populated areas where interference can occur from radio towers, cell towers, power systems, etc. This Karma range is about 2 miles and you should be nowhere near to that. I have never had a lost connection in flight, well, other than when I purposely shut the controller off to confirm how the Karma would react so if I had this in a real world situation, I would be confident in what was happening...
Glad that it did not happen to you. But apparently I'm not the only having these issues. I know it shouldn't fly away but it did.
Glad that it did not happen to you. But apparently I'm not the only having these issues. I know it shouldn't fly away but it did.
@BPRescue -- So, what did happen when you did that test and turned off the controller? Did you get a Return to Launch or Land in Place?
@BPRescue I appreciate your input. It verifies my understanding of what is supposed to happen during a lost connection. But, as discussed in the Disappears ... and Runaway... threads, that is not what has been happening.
@emm I don't think a wifi repeater will work. If I recall correctly (my drone is currently in KIA status, so I cant verify this), the link between the drone and the controller is WPA (i.e., can't intercept or remote into the network) and there's no access (UI pathway) to tell either device to use a 3rd party (the extender) device as a go between. (Note: you can tell the controller what WiFi AP to use, but that's just to get to the internet for downloading of maps, uploading of flight logs, connecting to your gopro acct -- this is not the connection the drone uses to communicate with the controller)
I simply do not believe that the Karma can do 2 Miles. I know that is not line of sight, but I have never been able to get to 3/4 mike much less 2. A week ago at a huge Fun Fly out in the country I went to take video/pics. Was at about 300-ft and 2000 feet away when everything froze up on controller screen. I could still barely see the Karma. I got pop up saying signal lost and Karma was landing in place. I kept pushing return button and did get the pop up for returning to me or launch site. Came back to launch site but was exciting. I have had othe instances of loss of or freeze up of video at short range. I have all software updates in place.
Is anybody aware of anybody doing longrange mods to the Karma.
I simply do not believe that the Karma can do 2 Miles. I know that is not line of sight, but I have never been able to get to 3/4 mike much less 2. A week ago at a huge Fun Fly out in the country I went to take video/pics. Was at about 300-ft and 2000 feet away when everything froze up on controller screen. I could still barely see the Karma. I got pop up saying signal lost and Karma was landing in place. I kept pushing return button and did get the pop up for returning to me or launch site. Came back to launch site but was exciting. I have had othe instances of loss of or freeze up of video at short range. I have all software updates in place.
Is anybody aware of anybody doing longrange mods to the Karma.
This was out in country, but a lot of RC planes opposite direction from where I was headed and they were racing drones, 4 at a time is all, in direction I was headed to.
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Glad that it did not happen to you. But apparently I'm not the only having these issues. I know it shouldn't fly away but it did.
Thanks for such a good post about Karma tests.Multiple tests for lost connection as I also test after updates. Powering the controller off has the Karma hover a few moments, then return to my launch area. In testing this, I have also tried to bury the controller in my vehicle, in ditches out of line of sight, and even in an underground water utility connection and could not get it to lose connection until I powered it off.
Similar with battery drain testing I have ignored the first low battery warning as to let the Karma take control, and like losing connection, it would return to launch. I have taken it a step further and walked 50 yards from the launch site as to simulate what would happen with battery drain if I was in my boat, and it did return to me, rather than launch.
As I said, I also tested this after new updates which BTW reflect the change from return altitude of 100' vs. the original 66'. This is where you also saw many people making claims of losing control and smacking into a building or mountain, when the reality was they made multiple mistakes, one being not setting the appropriate return altitude, so they ran into the building or mountain they flew behind.
I really started this testing because there were so many complaints on YouTube or other forums on the Karma losing control, but since I already had and loved the GoPro products, I wanted to try and stick with it for the best value. So, I purchased the Karma, and the additional protection, then started to get familiar with it and begin these tests so I knew what it would do in given situations. At first it was tough because it is just wrong to toss a $1000 camera in air and shut off the controller, but I felt better to crash now than while I was on vacation, and again why I purchased the GoPro Care. It was then I started to get more confident in the Karma and also test other limits such as wind, distance, etc. BTW, at 2000', the Karma is a dot and you cannot tell the direction unless looking at the video, so I think that is effectively what the FAA deems "line of sight", and the limit.
Either way, closing in on 6 months now flying just about every weekend and not one loss of connection, or loss of control. Whatever the reason it seems people are quick to assume, or attack the Karma but from experience, once you know how it reacts to a given situation, you can immediately tell in video or explanation and most I have seen are user error, or just a lack of understanding what is happening. Also keep in mind that prior to the most recent update, you could not control the Karma once it forced auto return and could only cancel the flight, and at the time many did not even understand the Karma was returninging home hence claiming they lost control. They didnt even know you could cancel the return and take full control. With the new update you can now steer it around obstacles while in return mode, but it still forces the landing unless you cancel it.
But here It also seems like in this instance to be honest, people are falling in line when the reality is the OP has provided no detail of the flight other than he had a "fly away due to a lost connection", so we are attacking the symptom rather than the sickness. Again, I say "maybe" it did fly away, but nobody can make that assessment without having details of the flight. I also said it is possible given a hardware failure, or interference, but at this point I don't think so.