Here's a weird one!

Back in the autumn, I noticed that my only HDZero Freestyle VTX V1 was taking longer to display the chosen channel, several scans, best on about the third scan cycle. This even though in the top bar it was set from last use as the channel it had to find.

Once found, it was perfect, but every boot after battery change resulted in this.

Just before Christmas it was getting delayed so much it was getting to be a real nuisance.  Didn't find a way round it. No changes to quad, only diff being lower ambient temp.

TODAY in -2C it was taking absolute ages to find the channel.......  Until..............  (and I'm fast forwarding here as what follows is consistant and reliable!)

Boot Tx, Boot Goggles, Boot Quad.

Then Arm and take off LOS, briefest of hovers, land and by the time the goggles could be looked into, normal (really good) image present.  Arming and disarming does not do it, it has to be motors powered up and flown, albeit only single few seconds!

Once the image is up, its perfect and stays that way well through aggressive 3D into low battery and land. Its too clean and precise and consistent to be a connection, etc.

Possible you have low power on disarm set?

..my freestyle range has seemed to have dropped… I believe if maybe the antenna,… possible damage from a above tree line disarm. ?… or what some pilots cal a “crash”?

(16-Jan-2024, 07:05 PM)FPVme Wrote: Possible you have low power on disarm set?

Thanks, but no, Pit Mode not set, Low Power on Disarm not set.

(16-Jan-2024, 10:49 PM)Rob Axel Wrote: ..my freestyle range has seemed to have dropped… I believe if maybe the antenna,… possible damage from a above tree line disarm.  ?… or what some pilots cal a “crash”?

Not relevent to my situation and request, image and range are perfect once it boots. No unwanted disarming.

I repeat, my fault is it won't boot to an image on normal or forced scan after battery connection, or is extremely reluctant to boot only doing so after many cycles through the frequencies, yet boots immediately on the briefest LOS lift off and then stays operating properly for that battery duration.

Unfortunately there seems to be a limited number of users of the HDZero system in general, and most of those people are in the racing scene so they talk amongst themselves in person at races to discuss any HDZero related topics and issues which means you don't tend to see them hanging out in forums, and certainly not this one.

Your best chance of getting some help would be to try posting on their Facebook page and/or Discord server if you've not already done so. I hate using both of those platforms, but for the HDZero gear it seems to be the only real option if you have if you want to try and get to the bottom of any issues.

I've ran into 2 instances with hdzero on this type of issue.

1. Damaged antenna - This would make it difficult for the scanner to pick up the signal and when it did, I would get ok signal but range was lacking. As long as I stayed close, it would still be flyable. I was running a dipole and the little feather part on top was missing when I pulled off the heatshrink. You may be running a circular polarized antenna so it might be unlikely but worth trying to swap out the antenna to see if it helps.

2. Weak BEC - Not sure if you're running vbat or FC BEC power. Even the 200mw vtx will pull a good amount of power on startup for a split second, if your BEC can't handle the surge in power, it may be enough for the vtx to throw a fit and not output an image. Mine would light up red and blue which should be good and output image but for some reason it wasn't. I would imagine the freestyle vtx is more power hungry so this could be a real possibility.

OK, so I have cleared the issue, proven today over 8 packs.

Reprise, I had no video after repeated scans, but would find after LOS brief flight, till a battery change, when it repeated.

Betaflight Configurator showed that the VTX was not being set to either Pit Mode or Low Power Mode.

Onscreen supposedly live settings matched that, no Pit Mode and no Low Power modes set.

Tried cycling these to no effect.

THEN, getting desperate, and using the Shortcut menu, I ignored thisprevious information and supposed cycling of the commands, and cycle TX stick switched to 0mW (disarmed, both sticks down and out, then back to Exit 0mW, both sticks down and towards each other.

And its now working normally.

Don't ask why setting the Betaflight onscreen menu did not do this, but it didn't, not until I used the shortcut!

“Shortcut commands”.. are you talking about using the controller to enter the hd zero menu?