Questions and Considerations concerning my DJI Spark: I would like to be able to hook the charger sled to a 12v battery for field use. I have a small inverter I could use but would prefer a direct connection for better battery runtime . The connection to the sled is a custom connector although it may only put out one voltage. The pack is rated for 13.5 and 5v outputs, but it has two USB ports on it for device charging also so I don't know if it sends 5v to the sled or not, it may just be 13.5, and 12v alone may be enough for the sled to run. I would also like some way to keep my phone charged while using it via the direct data hookup, but I don't know if that is technologically possible to do. Running the DJI app on the phone as a video receiver does warm up the phone but I don't know how much of the drain is the app, how much is the video feed, and how much is the wifi activity. So I don't know how much of an improvement turning off the wifi will make to the battery life of the phone. It may simply end up being far in excess of what I have for batteries for the quad itself and the point of battery life on the phone may be irrelevent. I see they have lightning Y cables, but that will also require two more cables. Walmart carries DJI products and I noticed I could have saved around 10% (around $70) if I had bought from them instead of Amazon. So if I do get another battery it will probably be from Walmart. I have already ordered some other accessories (usbmicro/lightning cable, different landing gear, phone light hood, camera lens filters, stick transport protectors) from them. (cable I had to get from eBay, Wamlart doesn't carry all the accessories) I may eventually get some decals also. The lenses were expensive, and it's doubtful whether or not they will be worth the purchase, will have to wait and see how they affect the video quality. The gimbal guard looks like a good permanent installation. I did notice in high wind when facing into the wind, the spark has to pitch forward quite a bit (15-20 degrees) somtimes and while the gimbal was keeping the camera level it was starting to get blocked by the top lip on the guard. I may trim that down a bit. Oh wait, that's not its primary purpose, I just found out that's a SUN SHIELD for the camera, to cut down glare. So it needs those overhangs. OK I will either leave that alone or get another one and trim one of them down to be only a gimbal guard. I may remove the prop guards soon, they are probably only needed indoors. I have yet to actually hit ANYTHING. The landing legs I bought originally fit into the same place as the prop guards anyway so I can't use both at the same time and I think I'd get more out of the legs when outdoors. The loop gear I have on order looks like it also fits into the same place so it won't solve that problem. I wonder if the lightning end of the cable is going to interfere with the phone wings on the remote? Will see when the cable gets in I suppose. I might also be in the market for a used ipad mini. (will need to verify it can run the iOS the DJI app requries) I notice the batteries have power pads on the bottom. I assume this is for autonimous self-charging. I'd like to have some way to attach and control little accessories on the spark. It doesn't look like it has any sort of accessory connection on it, however I may be able to strap on an arduino (especially under the loop legs?) and tap power from there. My motieno should have no problem with wireless control. Can't fit the spark into its foam box or bag if the prop guards are installed. And they don't go on/off very easily. I see someone is selling a nice prop guard set with retracting landing legs, DJI should change to that design. What is the purpose of the USB Micro connector on the charging sled? I tried to power it to charge batteres but it turned the sled on and changed the lilght to an odd color. (normally yellow when in standby and pulsing green when charging any batteries, but it turned RED when I plugged in the USB micro to a USB power source) I was NOT expecting the drone to have built-in cooling fans. The lights under the motors are really bright and i wasn't even expecting there to BE any lights there. Would be nice if they could be controlled or adjusted from the remote like my v868 can do. They seem to be the Spark's way of communicating with the user though so maybe they should be left alone by the user. How much weight can it transport? I know there's not going to be a hard number since it's going to be a gradual battery-to-weight tradeoff, but I wonder what the "official line" is? I know the prop guards and landing gear will affect wind load and thus battery runtime but I wonder by how much? I did notice that the symas appear to be a lot more agile with the prop guard removed. (possibly better runtime even when just hovering due to lower quad weight?) It would be nice if the user-defined buttons on the remote could trigger something on the drone electrically that the user installed. I have attached a sticker with my name and phone number and "REWARD" on it in the off chance I lose it and a white-hat finds it, but I'm accepting (and have been reminded by others) that the first thing a majority of people that found my Spark would do is to peel off and throw that away. (being a $600 quad by itself without the remote) Since it has to be activated, I wonder if DJI could help me recover it if someone finds it and tries to claim ownership of it? I would REALLY prefer to use a clear acrylic gimbal/camera cover permanently, but all the covers I see are made specifically for TRANSPORT protection, and are either completely non-transparent or are opaque / smokey. This is in strange contrast to optically-clear covers made for the DJI MavPro and many other quads. Not that the gimbal can MOVE when the semi-clear cover is on it. I wonder if the camera works with IR light? Attach an IR light source maybe for night time? But then again, it's VERY noisy during the day so it'd seem much worse at night, and with those psychadellic lights under the motors, I don't know how useful that would be. May as well just attach some regular white LEDs on it for lighting I suppose, there's no way to covertly fly a quad. When attaching the battery to the Spark, for me it's an automatic behavior to position my fingers opposite the device and squeeze with the battery to pull it into place. This of course places my fingers ON THE GIMBAL and right on the lens of the camera also. I have yet to apply any force to it but have had to clean off fingerprints once or twice. I'm worried that eventually I'm going to mash the camera into the body of the Spark by accident when changing the battery. I don't know what you could do to change this, maybe nothing. Is it possible to tell if the Spark has GPS lock or is still in ATTI mode if not using a phone? Maybe something in the pattern of lights on the Spark itself? I could use a "cheat sheet" to decode the lights. My blades are fairly smooth but the leading and trailing edges are a bit rough. would smooting them help? is there anything else that can be done to improve blade efficiency or lower noise without changing the blade's shape? It looks like the Spark will charge its battery over USB at only 250mA, regardless of source. Is there anything I can do to improve that? A battery takes an hour to charge via the sled, how long does it take by USB? When auto-landing (for whatever reason?) it appears I can override it with sticks but it will always continue to try to do its own thing while the remote howls. It doesn't look like I can completely cancel the landing? One way or another it looks like it's going to land once I let it by releasing the sticks. warning label: - make sure RTH height is set appropriately for your current environment - verify the RTH battery percentage - make sure any gimbal cover is removed - make sure bluetooth is disabled on the phone - power on drone before controller - wait for GPS lock before taking off best video on warnings to new pilots: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Os650wokQWs I see 3.14 - 3.25v on the bottom pads while charging over usb, which is drawing 1.9A at the moment. (this starts slow, picks up, then slows down) 3.25v a 0.25A. I see the voltage drop maybe 10% briefly every second or so, I assume it's checkng to see where the battery is floating at. it's charging at maybe 90-95% duty cycle 3.22v (with lower pulses to 3.15v) on the pads, battery lights not flashing, 0.25mA (5v) "Spark" Xiao in chinese, "the first light of the day" ("dawn" ?) Akatsuki in japanese uses an almost identical Kanji character, which also means "dawn" ISSUES ENCOUNTERED WHEN OUT FLYING PROBLEMS I CAN'T DO ANYTHING ABOUT: - annoying battery updates, convoluted/ill-described/ineffectve process - OTG cable must be plugged in after Go4 app is launched - plugging in OTG cable seems to reset controller defaults for user-defined buttons - ac cofrd on sled charger is very stiff PROBLEMS I NEED TO SOLVE: - OTG cable winds in strange way around controller - frequent OTG plugging may be wearing out USB micro connection on controller - have to replug OTG cable if Go4 app is relaumched - have to relaunch Go4 app and replug OTG cable if controller is powered off - may want to get a second charge sled or something that charges off 12v I've got a lot of experience with radio tracking, and will chime in to say this is a 2-step process. First is to "get in the area" and second is the "terminal search". GPS is great for getting in the area because it's got infinite range and good enough resolution to get you into terminal search distance. It has problems with coverage though, may not return good or any information once it lands, and usually has to be able to reach a cell tower to get you its location. Depending on the design, you may be able to look up its "last known position" cached online, OR you may only be able to get live data while it is transmitting and so could miss out on getting info from it. Bluetooth and other direct-transmission systems are for terminal search. Think like how they use collars to track bears in a park. Those transmitters don't know where they are, they just constantly send out a ping that you receive with a mobile receiver. Most (but not all) of them have directional antennas you can turn around as you hear the ping, to get a good idea of what direction the ping came from. If you're skilled with the receiver, finding a pinger is trivial and fast, and will allow you to quickly find a transmitter even when buried deep in brush or covered from sight. While they can be interfered with, they're much harder to block than a cell phone connection, and when you're close enough there's almost no amount of shielding that can block them completely. But they're limited range, and in some cases very limited. (bluetooth for example) I've never seen a directional bluetooth antenna, but it's possible to do. The problem with bluetooth usually then is you don't get the benefit of a direction to the ping. It's more of a hotter-colder readout. You have to walk the area and narrow down the reading as the signal gets bigger and bigger. You may have problems with the last few feet because your receiver won't go up beyond a certain number even if you get closer. So you may be left scouring a 20x20 ft patch of bushes for some time to find a fallen drone. "I know it's in here somewhere..." So getting back to your question regarding bluetooth... it's NOT useful for getting in the area, unless you get lucky. If you saw your drone go down several blocks from where you are, you'll probably have difficulty walking around that area trying to pick up any signal from the fallen drone. Bluetooth range varies, but I wouldn't trust it to work much beyond 90 feet, and that can be MUCH less if conditions are poor. If it falls into a ditch by a road, you may not get a signal at all even 30 feet off the road, and will have to get lucky and drive down that road right past it to pick it up at all. You could probably walk past it at 60ft with no signal if it's behind a building. But once you get a signal, you should be able to find it if you have any skill in using your finder. It may take you awhile, but terminal searches are almost always successful. The best system would be some combination of the two. One to get you into terminal search, and the other to DO the terminal search. 30ft resolution with GPS could be incredibly frustrating to know that you're within spitting distance of it but have no way to close the final few feet besides combing the same area over and over again. Finally my 2c worth, for DJI: WHY do you NOT have an audible pinger on the Spark??? It would cost you very little to add (and it's a one-time-cost!) since it's a simple software change, adds no weight since you already have speakers on it, and would be SOOOOO incredibly useful for terminal search! So what if it doesn't always help? It could help some of the time and is free, so why not? If the Spark does an emergency motor shutdown or lands after RTH or emergency landing, start beeping, that's all there is to it. Why is that so hard for you to add when it adds so much value to your customers?? I'd also like to point out that there's already a terminal search ping of sorts built into the Spark that we all know about but few actually realize is useful. The Spark has a wifi access point. Your cell phone can list access points in your area, with signal strength. Get it? It would be pretty trivial for DJI to make a little sidecar iOS app that had only one feature... you plug in the SSID of your Spark, and it makes a sound and displays a number indicating the signal strength. Faster sound = bigger strength. (sound is very helpful in addition to the visible signal strength number because you don't have to keep your eyes glued to the phone, you can use them exclusively for searching, and that's not something you can get with the wifi prefs on any phone I've ever seen) That would make it sooo much easier to find a Spark that's landed in the weeds in a field. Again, very low development cost, no ongoing expenses, already existing hardware support, why not?