[Stanfr0]

Hi,

I'm a complete novice to the hobby and to this forum so please tell me if I've posted in the wrong section or am asking a stupid question.

I'm worried about what happens if I fly out of range of my transmitter or if the transmitter dies.
I have a Flysky FS-i6 with a FS-iAB receiver wired with parallel channels to a Revo.

Ultimately I am going to install a GPS and would like to set up return to base but in the short term I want to stop my quadcopter flying into the sunset (or worse).

I've tried setting the failsafe on the transmitter to 0%, 50% and 100%. 100% works in that it sets the motors on full throttle if I turn the transmitter off (not what I need) but 0% and 50% do not seem to set the throttle channel and the motors seem to increase over a few seconds.

How should I be setting up failsafe with my system?

Am I right in thinking that its better to set the throttle to say 10% for hopefully a controlled decent rather than 0% or off when so the quadcopter drops out of the sky?

Should I be doing this on the FC rather than the RC?

Apologies if I am asking stupid questions.

Robert

[TheOtherCliff]

The motors increase because it is trying to stabilize when sitting on the ground.  It tries harder and harder, but still does not have enough thrust to lift the low arm.  This does not happen in flight.

If your RC has failsafe, then that is usually the simplest way to set up a failsafe.  Make sure that the flight mode switch has the correct failsafe settings too.  Be aware that the FC failsafe is completely separate, and some unlikely things (like cable from Rx to FC coming loose) will set off FC failsafe.  The default for FC failsafe is to stop all motors immediately.

[NicholasDavid]

A quick note on the controlled decent thing. It may or may not be a good thing. Say for instance you  lose signal and it goes to fail safe and crashes into a tree, or tumbles and lands upside down.  Then the whole time your trying to find it, the copter is slowly burning up 4 motors and 4 esc at 10% trying to controlled fall.   It's usually just better to zero everything after maybe a 3-5 second delay to see if it regains signal or just put it down. Think of it like a crash you always throttle down or disarm immediately. Same for fail safe. IMO.
Now if your running a really expensive camera rig, You do what ever you think is necessary. Lol.

An easy fail safe test is take your props off! Turn on your radio. Plug in your propeller-less copter. Arm. Give enough throttle to have them spinning. Then switch off your radio and see. Be ready to unplug your copter if it goes full throttle!  If it shuts down, try switching your radio back on and see if it gives you control again. All vital stuff to know.

[TheOtherCliff]

Another thing to worry about is that modern RC transmitters often have safety checks before the transmitter will even start transmitting.  These safety checks can be changed though.  The default on my Taranis is that the switches (e.g. flight mode switch) must be in their "normal" position and the throttle must be zero.  All this adds time and confusion and different flight modes to the time it takes to get the transmitter running again if switched off.

[Stanfr0]

The motors increase because it is trying to stabilize when sitting on the ground.  It tries harder and harder, but still does not have enough thrust to lift the low arm.  This does not happen in flight.

If your RC has failsafe, then that is usually the simplest way to set up a failsafe.  Make sure that the flight mode switch has the correct failsafe settings too.  Be aware that the FC failsafe is completely separate, and some unlikely things (like cable from Rx to FC coming loose) will set off FC failsafe.  The default for FC failsafe is to stop all motors immediately.

Thank you all has become clear and both now seem to be working as expected. Things were not helped because I had got the wrong channel for my throttle 

[Stanfr0]

A quick note on the controlled decent thing. It may or may not be a good thing. Say for instance you  lose signal and it goes to fail safe and crashes into a tree, or tumbles and lands upside down.  Then the whole time your trying to find it, the copter is slowly burning up 4 motors and 4 esc at 10% trying to controlled fall.   It's usually just better to zero everything after maybe a 3-5 second delay to see if it regains signal or just put it down. Think of it like a crash you always throttle down or disarm immediately. Same for fail safe. IMO.
Now if your running a really expensive camera rig, You do what ever you think is necessary. Lol.

An easy fail safe test is take your props off! Turn on your radio. Plug in your propeller-less copter. Arm. Give enough throttle to have them spinning. Then switch off your radio and see. Be ready to unplug your copter if it goes full throttle!  If it shuts down, try switching your radio back on and see if it gives you control again. All vital stuff to know.

Very sensible advice which I have taken, the throttle is now set to zero - Thank you.

[Stanfr0]

Another thing to worry about is that modern RC transmitters often have safety checks before the transmitter will even start transmitting.  These safety checks can be changed though.  The default on my Taranis is that the switches (e.g. flight mode switch) must be in their "normal" position and the throttle must be zero.  All this adds time and confusion and different flight modes to the time it takes to get the transmitter running again if switched off.

Good point, I've got this issue with the Flysky FS-i6 and haven't worked out if I can turn this function off. I'm going to do some range tests to see if its an issue when I fly out of range or lose signal which may not be the same as turning the transmitter off - thank you for your help