1. All DJI Mavic family drones fly in GPS navigation mode only. If you don't give any control commands, the drone will hover in one place, resisting wind drift. ATTI mode is a flight mode that does not use the drone's GPS-based navigation system. All safety sensors are also ignored. Only the altitude hold is activated on the drone. In ATTI mode, the drone does not hold its position. From the outside, it may seem that the drone's control has been intercepted and is being taken away from you, but this is not the case, the drone is simply being carried away by the wind. Its navigation system continues to work in the background, and if you lose connection with the remote control, the drone will properly switch to RTF mode and automatically return to the starting point. On older models of DJI drones, switching to ATTI mode is performed normally, using the flight mode switch (FGPS - ATTI - PGPS).
2. Unfortunately, the DJI Mavic 3 drone does not have an ATTI mode option. Conventional radio-controlled models fly in a similar mode to ATTI, but without altitude control. For them, this is often the only flight mode. The first DJI drones initially had ATTI mode, starting with the Phantom 1. You could switch to ATTI using the flight mode switcher on the remote control. This mode is also present on both generations of DJI Inspire drones. With the advent of the Mavic family, DJI removed the ability to enable ATTI. Instead, the company introduced Normal, Sport, Tripod, or Cinematic modes. In all these modes, the navigation system does not turn off. Obviously, this was done to improve the safety of drones in the hands of inexperienced pilots.
3. Despite the fact that flying a drone in ATTI mode is more difficult than in GPS mode, this skill is still necessary, since any drone will switch to ATTI mode when the navigation system fails due to compass errors or satellite jamming (anti-drone electronic warfare systems). In addition, the ability to fly a drone in ATTI mode is useful for flying indoors where GPS is not available. In some cases, it is better to switch to this mode yourself, for example, with a weak signal or a small number of satellites used for navigation, as the drone begins to move chaotically due to a decrease in positioning accuracy. By the way, to obtain a commercial drone pilot's license, one of the tests on the exam is flying in ATTI mode.
4. To enable ATTI mode on your Mavic 3, you will need the following:
- A computer running Windows, preferably version 10.
- Installed version of DJI Assistant 2 (Consumer Drones Series), from the DJI website, Downloads tab, section dedicated to DJI Mavic 3
- The DroneHack program, which is actually needed to hack a drone, can be downloaded for free from the website of the same name.
- USB Type C cable to connect the drone to a computer. It is better to use a high-quality cable with a ferrite ring to eliminate high-frequency interference from the drone's radio path to the computer's input.
5. Launch Assistant 2 on your computer, turn on the drone, and after a few seconds connect it to your computer with a cable. After a while, you should see the drone icon appear in the program window. If so, the drivers are installed correctly. Then be sure to exit the Assistant program, this is important! Without disconnecting the drone from the computer, run the DroneHack program. If everything is going well, in a few seconds the data exchange between the drone and the DroneHack program will start. Unfortunately, the procedure for opening the ATTI mode can develop in different scenarios. In some cases, everything goes smoothly the first time, sometimes you need to reconnect the drone to the computer and restart the DroneHack program several times until the connection between the drone and the program is established and data exchange between them begins
In my opinion, it is important that the computer is connected to the Internet during these manipulations. Repeat the above steps until the drone and the program start exchanging data with each other. When the data exchange takes place, the Hack Parameters tab will become active. Go to this tab and click the "Advanced Parameters" button. Now, in the search bar, you need to enter the first letters of the drone registry key name that you want to change. In our case, it will be fsw, we find three keys named fswitch_selection. You need the key with the parameter "12", change its value to "3", click the Save Parameters button, the search screen closes, and on the first screen, click Write Parameters To Drone. If everything worked out, you have changed the Cinematic Mode to ATTI mode on the drone.
6. If you have already managed to enable the ATTI flight mode on your DJI Mavic 3, you may want to change some more flight characteristics of the drone. You can increase the horizontal speed, climb rate, and descent rate of the drone separately in Normal and Sport modes. These settings can be made by moving the corresponding sliders on the Advanced Parameters screen. Changing the drone's speed and climb rate parameters is critical and dangerous. It is best to change these parameters little by little, controlling the result with test flights.
7. One important thing to note is this. The DJI FLY app interface displays flight modes depending on the position of the flight mode switch. After unlocking the ATTI mode for us DJI Mavic 3, although it will be turned on instead of the Cinematic Mode, the name of the ATTI mode will not appear in the interface, there will still be a "C" designation, but the drone will fly in the ATTI mode.
8. Turning off the running lights, front and rear LEDs on the DJI Mavic 3 should be done to reduce the visibility of the drone in the dark. To do this, you don't have to pry out the LEDs on the beams of the drone, or glue/paint over the lights. It can be done programmatically. There are two ways to turn off the LEDs on the Mavic 3. In the first method, we look for the key with the text 'led', there are several such keys, most of them contain "0" as a parameter, one of the keys has a parameter in the form of a three-digit number, change this parameter to "0", save, write the changes to the drone. In the second case, we look for the "lamp" key, and also change its parameter to "0", save, write the changes to the drone, and the lights turn off.
9. Disable auto-landing at the second level of battery discharge. This will be useful for extremely long flights when you are returning on the last percentage of the battery and the drone automatically descends. Disabling auto-landing can add much-needed seconds when returning the drone. As practice shows, even with a 0% battery level, the drone can stay in the air for some time. Auto landing is one of the drone's safety circuits, and you should disable it only when you fully understand the consequences of your actions.
Search for the key "dji_bat_level_1|g_config.voltage2.level_1_voltage" and change the parameter to "10", save the parameter.
- Search for the key "bat_level_2_action|g_config.voltage.level_2_protect_type" and change the parameter to "0", save the parameter.
- Search for the key "level1_smart_battert_gohome|g_config.voltage2.level2_smart_battert_gohome" and change the parameter to "0", save the parameter.
- Search for the key "level2_smart_battert_land|g_config.voltage2.level2_smart_battert_land" and change the parameter to "0", save the parameter.
- Look for the key "bat_enable_smart_bat_landing_protect" and change the parameter to "0", save the parameter.
- Write changes to the drone.
I've provided a screenshot with all the changes below for your review.
10 Anyone who has held a Mavic 3 in their hand remembers how the drone tends to jump up if you don't grab it fast enough, and even breaks away while you turn off the engines. This behavior is the responsibility of the Precision Landing mode, which, according to the developers, should make it easier and more automated to land accurately on the ground. For those who catch the drone with their hands rather than land it on the ground, you can disable this mode. In addition, it will be useful if you are attaching something under the drone, or flying in fog and clouds.
To disable Precision Landing mode, look for the g_config.flying_limit.avoid_ground_and_smart_landing_enable key and change its value to 0
11 If the compass is off, which is not uncommon, DJI drones reboot the GPS module, which slows down the process of restoring the navigation system. We can disable this algorithm, which will be especially useful when flying in EW conditions. This is done as follows: look for the key "g_config.fdi_switch.gps.with_fdi" and set the parameter value to "0". Don't forget to save the changes and write them to the drone.
