Grandson took his Christmas gift out to fly without reading all the directions. Drone flew away out of sight (and I'm guessing out of control range) and was lost.

How to find it again?

My best idea is to go out early in the AM when traffic noise etc. is at a minimum. Go to most likely landing area and turn on controller. If drone battery still has energy it may start up and rotors may be heard.

Any other good ideas out there?

I don't know the model or manufacture of the drone, but could find out if it would help.

Did he have it paired with a smartphone (as many drones would)? If so, he should be able to get a lat/long from the footage.

Also, if it was a drone that uses GPS it is likely that it tried to fly "home" and because it's likely that he didn't set home it tried to fly to the last known home "where it was tested). So, if you know the direction it went you could search that straight line and likely find it if someone else hasn't already.

I don't know any details about the drone. He lives in another state and I have not seen the drone.

I will check on that.

If it was paired with a phone, take a good look at the videos. You may see a landmark to give a hint where it is. Just depends on the brand and type of copter it is.

Even if it still has battery left, the drone likely won't start via the controller; it probably has a power switch of its own that you turn on before you pair it with the controller.

Knowing more about the drone might help. If it was an expensive one that's GPS capable and controlled by an app, it might have gone into hover mode after losing connection and either returned to home or just auto-landed. They're pretty smart.

But if it was a cheap one that's more toy than drone, the thing is likely gone if he lost vision on it.

As other said, if it's a smart one, review any footage that may have been captured or see if he can find out where the return-to-home was set.

Lots of options here, but it might be gone. Once you have the make and model, I'd head to one of the specific forums to see if they can provide assistance. As an example, got to http://dronepilots.zone/ and select the manufacture for the specific forum. I'm spending time at https://mavicpilots.com/ since I just got a Mavic Mini.

These light-weight drones will "fly away" depending on wind conditions. It might be calm to 5 knots at the surface, and go up 300 feet and it can be a different world concerning wind speed and direction.

They also seem to fly away for other reasons including calibration problems.

I spent $500 on the Mavic Mini, and I'm trying to be really careful after reading about various fly aways.

Hope he is able to find it!

This is a good example why, if you buy a drone, make sure it has the 'Home' option. My stepson lost one when he forgot to set it for home and it got caught up in a wind and was lost.

Jim

The drone was a Sharper Image Live Streaming Video Drone (.3mp video)

When lost the drone was not paired with a smart phone.

Grandson grabbed the drone after charge was complete - took it out and lost it before my daughter even had read the directions.

The drone does not have GPS and was not recording video when lost.

The video indicates max. range ~ 100 meters. I am assuming that is approximately the range of the lost drone.

The purchase price was ~ $70 - not a high end model fortunately.

Photos of the box sent to me match with those in the video below. I have a bunch of numbers from the controller but have not yet decoded them to discover which one is the model number.

I think the model # may be 1010929 (2311076).

video of same or very similar drone > https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FlMs9v5LRMU&t=314s

Thanks for any help you can give. The little guy is heartbroken at the loss of his Christmas present.

^^^^^
Man...that sucks for the little fellah, Zonie. I remember my first RC airplane...nice replica of a C182. It suffered "fly away" the first day I had it due to my ineptness and high enough winds that I shouldn't have been flying it by myself in the first place until more experienced. Unfortunately, I fear your grandson's drone is sunk cost at this point, but THANKFULLY it wasn't in the hundreds of dollars like my RC plane.

Hope they get a stroke of luck, though, and find it!!

sorry to say but I think your grandson needs to put some jam in his pockets because he's toast on this

chances of finding it are slim to none unless he happens to wander across it entirely by accident

Couple of Christmases ago, a strange woman and small kid were standing in or back yard looking up into the trees. Wife went out to see what was going on. They had come from several blocks away and kid had gotten a toy drone that had taken off in our direction. Woman said, "I paid $100 for that thing!"

Kid looked up and said, "YOU bought that?" He had thought Santa had brought it!

Yeah, it's gone.

I'd let him for a couple of days at least.

I just saw that someone found one here in town on a neighborhood social media page. I'm guessing an option would be to reach out to local forums and ask them.

I painted the first Estes model rocket I built blaze orange. A friend of mine and I launched it over a corn field, saw exactly where it landed and never found it. It was a learning experience. Next series of launches were over the golf course. We found it every time.

Good luck with the drone.

quote:

Originally posted by Jimbo54:
This is a good example why, if you buy a drone, make sure it has the 'Home' option. My stepson lost one when he forgot to set it for home and it got caught up in a wind and was lost.

Jim

A lot of people actually lose their drone hitting the Return To Home function because you have a height that you set and the drone will go to that height and RTH. Unfortunately at that height it might be extremely windy and the setting on most of these drones also turns off Sport mode. If your drone goes up high and the wind is over 20mph most drones will not be able to combat that wind speed unless they are in sport mode. In that case it will be losing ground to the wind and eventually run out of battery and will then automatically land where it can.

To the OP. The good news is that it probably didn't get too far away so some searching in the general direction may produce a lucky result. In the future the kid might want to put his phone number on the drone so if someone finds it they might text him.

quote:

Originally posted by 1s1k:

quote:

Originally posted by Jimbo54:
This is a good example why, if you buy a drone, make sure it has the 'Home' option. My stepson lost one when he forgot to set it for home and it got caught up in a wind and was lost.

Jim

A lot of people actually lose their drone hitting the Return To Home function because you have a height that you set and the drone will go to that height and RTH. Unfortunately at that height it might be extremely windy and the setting on most of these drones also turns off Sport mode. If your drone goes up high and the wind is over 20mph most drones will not be able to combat that wind speed unless they are in sport mode. In that case it will be losing ground to the wind and eventually run out of battery and will then automatically land where it can.

To the OP. The good news is that it probably didn't get too far away so some searching in the general direction may produce a lucky result. In the future the kid might want to put his phone number on the drone so if someone finds it they might text him.

Yeah, RTH is kind of a last resort for when you loose connection. If that happens on mine, I work a few seconds to the signal back and fly back myself. RTH may or may not get you home depending on what the wind conditions are like and if the drone can go to a higher speed against the wind.

I've read about a few people loosing their drone assuming RTH would work. Nope, they saw it just keep going away with the wind. If they flew home themselves and kicked it into sport mode, might have gotten back.

While in Thousand oakes california, we were going to a christmas brunch , many years ago.

we were on a narrow two lane road going about 25 m.p.h. in the F250 super cab long bed with 33 x 11.50 -16.5 all terrain tires.

30 feet from a drive way , an r.c. Baja 500 v.w. beatle zipped out and went right under the passenger side tire , SmooSH !

I stopped and told the dad I was sorry , he said it was totally his fault, the 7 year old boys face had no signs of life, I felt horrible

Thanks for all the input on this. The search continues tomorrow, basically just walking the prospective neighborhoods and hanging "wanted posters" in the area.

Definitely this has been a learning experience for the grandson. I am sure he will put more thought into future ventures like this. "School of Hard Knocks Certificate of Participation" has been awarded.

I'm glad his grandpa never never ever made such a mistake . . .

He has a birthday coming up in February, so maybe a replacement drone will be in the cards then if this one is not found.

Thanks again for all the help and let me know if any other revelations on finding it come to anyone.

quote:

Originally posted by RHINOWSO:
Yeah, it's gone.

I'd let him for a couple of days at least.

Nice guy !!!