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front leg wobbled out of position during flight, almost sawed off the rear one

BenTheCAflyer

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I had my Evo2 8k out this weekend and about 5 minutes into my flight the front leg somehow wobbled itself back towards its rest position, and when it got close enough to the rear blades they just started chopping away.
I landed it and thought I'd just been absentminded about opening the legs fully, so I replaced the rear propeller (which had ground down), checked everything and sent it up again, and the same thing happened after a few minutes. When I landed it this time, the front leg was darn near sawed off.
I didn't see it happen either time -- it was too high up and I was monitoring the controller more than the drone.
I am impressed that I was able to land it either time - at one point it was wobbling so bad on descent that I was worried it was going to fall out of the sky.
Anyone ever had this happen before? Would it impact the stability of my flight if I just patched the leg up (like with some Bondo), or should I have it replaced?


PXL_20220814_172935731.MP.jpgPXL_20220814_173024246.jpg
 
wow, never seen that! glad you were able to recover. are you sure your front arms were fully extended and "snapped" into place?
 
wow, never seen that! glad you were able to recover. are you sure your front arms were fully extended and "snapped" into place?
I can't say with certainty that it was fully snapped into place on the first flight, but it most likely was - it's pretty noticeable when they're not fully extended, and i wasn't rushing my setup. It is possible though, I didn't explicitly double-check that. Maybe it got snagged on a patch of grass or rock while taking off? Or I thought maybe a bird whacked it when I wasn't looking, especially since it was flying fine for 5 mins before the trouble started. I wasn't shooting video at the time so I can't check.
On the second flight though, I did explicitly check the legs, but at that point maybe the first flight knocked some screws loose inside and lowered the 'snap' resistance.
Still, wild! Not a problem I was anticipating.
 
If you look closely, The antenna inside the damaged leg has been cut. Plus, the mounting portion of leg is missing at least two of the three screws. That's probably why the leg is folding over, check the screw's see how many are missing. Replace them if possible, fly out a good distance see is reception is affective. As much visual damage the antenna show, it's still possible the antenna will function without loss of signal.

However, Play it safe send it in back to Autel they probably will cover this issue.

Keep us posted, Boy this is a terrible incident first time I've seen this on an Autel.

Goos luck!
 Paul
 
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If the three screw's are present, then as you say it snapped out of place? I would definitely send it back to Autel, thanks for sharing!
 
I had my Evo2 8k out this weekend and about 5 minutes into my flight the front leg somehow wobbled itself back towards its rest position, and when it got close enough to the rear blades they just started chopping away.
I landed it and thought I'd just been absentminded about opening the legs fully, so I replaced the rear propeller (which had ground down), checked everything and sent it up again, and the same thing happened after a few minutes. When I landed it this time, the front leg was darn near sawed off.
I didn't see it happen either time -- it was too high up and I was monitoring the controller more than the drone.
I am impressed that I was able to land it either time - at one point it was wobbling so bad on descent that I was worried it was going to fall out of the sky.
Anyone ever had this happen before? Would it impact the stability of my flight if I just patched the leg up (like with some Bondo), or should I have it replaced?


View attachment 14765
Definitely, don't just patch with Bondo and fly. Since it happened twice, it's likely to happen again. Find and fix the cause first. Or send it to Autel.
 
If you look closely, The antenna inside the damaged leg has been cut. Plus, the mounting portion of leg is missing at least two of the three screws. That's probably why the leg is folding over, check the screw's see how many are missing. Replace them if possible, fly out a good distance see is reception is affective. As much visual damage the antenna show, it's still possible the antenna will function without loss of signal.

However, Play it safe send it in back to Autel they probably will cover this issue.

Keep us posted, Boy this is a terrible incident first time I've seen this on an Autel.

Goos luck!
 Paul
thanks so much for all of this info! I hadn't thought about that being the antenna, I just figured it was reenforcement mesh.
All the screws seem to be in place so I don't think that contributed, but I'm going to send it back to Autel and have them look it over anyways, just to be safe - I'd rather not risk this happening again when it isn't as easy to bring back home. But I'll take it up this weekend just to hover and see if I can tell what's going on by eye. I'll report back if anything helful comes of it!
Thank you again
 
Definitely, don't just patch with Bondo and fly. Since it happened twice, it's likely to happen again. Find and fix the cause first. Or send it to Autel.
agreed, I decided to send it back to Autel and have the pros look it over.
 
thanks so much for all of this info! I hadn't thought about that being the antenna, I just figured it was reenforcement mesh.
All the screws seem to be in place so I don't think that contributed, but I'm going to send it back to Autel and have them look it over anyways, just to be safe - I'd rather not risk this happening again when it isn't as easy to bring back home. But I'll take it up this weekend just to hover and see if I can tell what's going on by eye. I'll report back if anything helful comes of it!
Thank you again
You're welcome, Yes most likely the antenna was damaged enough to interfer with signal. The antennas are molded to slide into the foot, glad to hear you're sending it in for repair.

I once damaged a front foot antenna and foot on a Mavic 2 Pro, in order to correctly repair this type of damage on Mavic 2 maybe including yours, is to open up housing, remove and replace entire arm with harness, Resolder everything back. Instead, I cut off the antenna leads from outside and resoldered to a good antenna, replaced the foot and remounted antenna and foot back together. It was a tight fit due to the solder, luckily all went together can even tell it was damaged.

Keep us updated when your Evo 2 is returned, please don't attempt to fly again the next incident may be it's last.

All the best!
Paul
 

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