# Cold weather drone flying! The video will make you cold!



## trackerputnam (Dec 21, 2014)

All my kids and grand kids spent Christmas together in Star Valley Wyoming. I took my drone along to fly. The weather was for the most part outside of the drones operating parameters but I flew it any way! Some of the technical flight info is below if you are interested. If not just watch the video. Watch closely, and you will see a kid jumping on a trampoline in the soon to be sub zero cold. They build them strong in my home state.

The starting temp at the beginning of the flight is 7 Degrees F. The flight is 15 minutes long, with a missing minute and a half because of forgetting to push the video start button. The flight is 18031' long with a rise of 1642'. I was 7740' away as I turned to return when the max elevation is reached. The drone is never more than 400' above the ground.

Just after turning for the return flight, there is a time where the drone does not move forward at the speed I expect it too. An unexpected wind is encountered causing the forward speed to drop to 1.5 to 2.5 mph. I lowered elevation and raised elevation in an attempt to help forward progression. I was thinking of moving to sport mode soon in an attempt to get some better forward progression. As the drone finally gets over the lip of the ridge below, I am able to drop it and that gets some forward movement. Speed gets back up to 17 to 21 mph where I was able to start breathing again.

I got the drone back overhead with enough battery left to do a run over the frozen landscape before me. The temp had fallen to 0 degrees F in the 15 minutes of the flight as the sun was setting. My daughter, my landing assistant, was complaining about the cold and asking me to return so she could get back in the warmth of the truck. So I cut short the rest of the flight so as not to freeze my landing assistance support. I landed with 42 percent left in the battery.

I sped the video up 2x so as to help with video duration. That increases perceived yaw movement. But I am getting better at that with help from forum members and others. As to the cold hindering battery endurance? I see no effect other than making sure the battery is warm to start with. I used a couple of methods for this. Keeping the battery in an inside pocket or next to the skin under your shirt, or on the dash with the heat blasting. Both methods worked well but a cold battery next to the skin takes some getting used to.


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