Go Pro + Phantom help

beyond the blue

beyond the blue

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Neil
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I am planning on buying a Go Pro Hero 3 Plus as a present for my son. Also if I can afford it I would like to buy a second hand DJI Phantom Quadcopter to use with it. Can any of you guys in the know tell me what to look out for? I believe the later ones have an easier battery connection system and battery life. Another of the family members will probably buy a gimball mount for the Go Pro (new) but again I don't know which one to get. My son lives in Australia so we will be buying the Go Pro and gimball over there for warranty reasons.

Now for probably the daftest question of the week, bear in mind I am very old...... If these quadcopters use GPS would it be the same system used in Australia as is used here? :exit:
 
GPS is satellite based and global so you're sorted there:)

I would look out for obvious crash damage, propeller condition and would be wanting to see if it could maintain hover, return to starting position. Not really sure how you would check condition of motors other than a flight check.

Most people seem to go for the Zenmuse gimbal to use with the Phantom and either the 2 axis or 3 axis one. 3 axis being better.
 
Phantom 2 has the better battery system, H3-2D Gimbal is exceptional value at the mo, H3-3D obviously has advantages but whether its worth the extra is the million dollar question! Personally I would get the H3-2D and use the saved money for FPV, its a nightmare trying to figure out what your GoPro can see at a distance...
 
I have had a Phantom 1 which I sold and bought 2x Phantom 2's. The Phantom 2 is a much more stable platform than the 1 and the battery life is far superior at about 20 mins compared to about 6mins allowing you to travel much further and do far more. Right now I would buy the new Phantom 2 with the H3-3D gimbal if you can stretch to it. The old H2-3D gimbal suffers from slight yawing created by the GPS repositioning the quadcopter and it is quite difficult to stabilise well in editing.
 
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Neilc28 said:
Phantom 2 has the better battery system, H3-2D Gimbal is exceptional value at the mo, H3-3D obviously has advantages but whether its worth the extra is the million dollar question! Personally I would get the H3-2D and use the saved money for FPV, its a nightmare trying to figure out what your GoPro can see at a distance...
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Thanks for your help although I'm a little confused. You say with the money saved by buying the H3-2D gimbal instead of the H3-3D it could be put towards FPV (which I assume is short for First Person View) but isn't this feature provided free by the GoPro app?
 
The GoPro App can do this, but it is HIGHLY recommended not to have the WiFi on the GoPro active whilst you are flying. The reason behind this is that both the GoPro Wifi and the TX/RX of the Phantom<>Controller run on 2.4GHz. Any interference on this band could potentially cause fly-away, which is quite commonly documented. The Phantom documentation also states not to use the WiFi.

And to be honest, the WiFi link to the GoPro from the App is ok, but the range is so limited it'll disconnect in seconds!
 
Ah! I wasn't aware of that problem, thanks. As you can tell this is not my field of expertise. At the risk of being a PITA can you elaborate on this FPV you recommend or a link to somewhere with info about what it entails.
 
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