R.I.P. or will she be resuscitated?

[Krusty Geeza]

Well my girl (Ms Anafi the 1st) has developed a severe neck wobble! She can no longer see & she can no longer hold her head upright, I think she needs to be put down...

I had an accident with her back early on his year & had a few community events I was booked to capture (voluntarily) so I delayed sending her off to Parrot Australia. The final one was last Wednesday. I took her out this morning & all was well with her, she flew freely & returned with glee. I took her out this afternoon & she can't even calibrate her gimbal or hold it upright. She just stares at the ground in morose sadness & then has neck spasms, twitching violently, throwing her head this way & that.

I suspect the initial incident with the tree that assaulted her did some far worse damage than was initially visible & it's only now decided to become evident.

I sent an email off to my contact in the Parrot Support Australia team, only to have a rude automated message pushed back at me from France, telling me my case had been closed!

I'll share more as I hear from the Australian Support contact.

My next (voluntary) community commitment is in the second week of April.

 

[Liger 1956]

Sorry to hear your news. Hopefully Ms Anafi will be soon travelling to the Parrot hospital for emergency treatment.

 

[MustangPhil]

Assaults from trees should be severely punished by the NFC (National Forest Court).

Did you try to open Miss Anafi and proceed to a head surgery ? Something ‘mechanic’ must have disengaged at the Gimbal level that may be ‘re-engaged’ Or replaced.
I sincerely hope Parrot will provide a kit (like they did for the structure or the engines) with electronic parts (gimbal, camera, Flight Board, bottom cam...)

I’m with you during these sad moments, we do not want to see sad miss Anafi suffering from neck pain,
Phil

 

[Jagerbomb52]

Sorry that happened so long after the first crash. Seems to be along the same diagnosis as with my found Anafi. Camera works but no gimbal control. Mine will video and take pictures but will not calibrate or even zoom. The forward impact most likely did some damage inside but until I can get it apart I can't say for sure.

 

[NortyNinja]

Something to try If you'd like to open the top cover that covers the GPS antenna (2 screws has Parrot printed on it) then unscrew the gps antenna carefully resting it to the side leaving the thin coax attached to the board. Under that you will see the motor controller board (esc) fixed vertically. Look down the front of it you will see a rectangular plug on the end of a thin cable, this maybe loose and or the thin flex, thin tweezers will be your friend, just reseat them.
If not I have a spare motor control board if you are not getting picture or a decent gimbal movement it's either of these problems or the flex damaged.

 

[NortyNinja]

There is another plug that may of come unseated inside the frame of the gimbal



On the motor controller board below

 

[Landbo]

Well my girl (Ms Anafi the 1st) has developed a severe neck wobble! She can no longer see & she can no longer hold her head upright, I think she needs to be put down...

I had an accident with her back early on his year & had a few community events I was booked to capture (voluntarily) so I delayed sending her off to Parrot Australia. The final one was last Wednesday. I took her out this morning & all was well with her, she flew freely & returned with glee. I took her out this afternoon & she can't even calibrate her gimbal or hold it upright. She just stares at the ground in morose sadness & then has neck spasms, twitching violently, throwing her head this way & that.

I suspect the initial incident with the tree that assaulted her did some far worse damage than was initially visible & it's only now decided to become evident.

I sent an email off to my contact in the Parrot Support Australia team, only to have a rude automated message pushed back at me from France, telling me my case had been closed!

I'll share more as I hear from the Australian Support contact.

My next (voluntary) community commitment is in the second week of April.

Ouch, you probably have killed poor Miss Anafi by failing to meet the deadline for her admission to the Parrot hospital. I do not know the consumer laws in Australia but here in Europe, you must immediately send a defective item for repair as soon as you discover the fault.

I hope you can get Miss Anafi's heart, pulse rate and breathing back on so she can lift her head and stroke health.

Regards, Leif.

 

[Jagerbomb52]

There is another plug that may of come unseated inside the frame of the gimbal

View attachment 1643

On the motor controller board below


View attachment 1645

I just had the bottom and top cover off of mine. Just looking inside really does not tell you much. Man those are small parts. Big fingers and micro parts do not match LOL
I think if I want to take mine any further it will mean pretty much a complete tear down. Maybe sometime down the road I just might do that but for now I will just make it a donor Anafi for my new one.

 

[NortyNinja]

Haha I get that, I've hands like shovels and fingers like big toes, tho SMD works something I'm use to I shouldn't expect people to understand a couple of crappy photos
Something like this really helps and tweezers
Head glass £8-10
I will send better photos of it together and where to go to see if it helps for future reference a bit later

 

[Krusty Geeza]

Wow! Thanks for the commiserations people.

I had already mentioned a need to have the Anafi at work, so to speak, with the Australian Support person & they couldn't guarantee a turnaround quick enough to be able to honour those agreements with the various community groups; so I held off. I'm hoping it wont be too hard for them to re-action this case, or to create a new number for it, with all the details I had already given them.

@NortyNinja That is way beyond me, I'm afraid. It looks like a complete stripdown to get to this sort of stuff & I'm concerned about the Australian warranty being voided if I did open it up in any way. Thanks so much for sharing your knowledge here, that is truly appreciated. I've copied it & created a PDF for future reference if I ever need to.

 

[Joe_Scot]

Commiserations indeed, Krusty. I actually came here today as by bizarre annoying coincidence I have the same (or a very similar) problem as you do. My gimbal is no longer working properly.

I had one flight this morning without incident and then when about to make a second flight I noticed that the gimbal did its usual head-shake on start-up but ended up pointing pretty much downwards. It then seemed to retry this sequence 3 more times and then gave up. The app shows the camera as red and when you go to 'fly' it says to make sure nothing is blocking the camera and then to restart the drone. I have done this about 5 times but nothing helps. And the gimbal calibration button in the app seems to do nothing (apart from giving me a spinny propeller graphic)

The camera itself is working fine - it records video, takes photos and still zooms.

I tried to call Parrot support for advice (first time I have ever called) but gave up after an hour of listening to very repetitive music and being told my call is important. Grrrr. Hate that kind of crappy telephone support system.

 

[AaronB]

I had already mentioned a need to have the Anafi at work, so to speak, with the Australian Support person & they couldn't guarantee a turnaround quick enough to be able to honour those agreements with the various community groups; so I held off. I'm hoping it wont be too hard for them to re-action this case, or to create a new number for it, with all the details I had already given them.

Sorry to hear your Anafi woes - the more you fly the Anafi the more it feels like an extension of yourself. It's weird but you really do get attached to the old bird. I think that camera just adds so much to the experience. Just a heads up with regards to the Australian Parrot support - it probably won't be quick if my experience is anything to go by (at this point I'm talking months - not weeks).

 

[Krusty Geeza]

A quick update. I went & visited my place of purchase, armed with printed out copies of all my email correspondence with Parrot Australia Support & the vendors happily exchanged her on the spot! The warranty for this one starts from today too! I bought the original in late December 2018.

I wish the support that any of you are getting from Parrot themselves was this quick & easy.

 

[Joe_Scot]

That sounds like excellent news, Krusty. Good result!

I am just starting the process today re my non-working gimbal. Have called Parrot support and got a case number. Need to send them a photo, a video, invoice for purchase and a few personal details. Will see how it goes....