Extremely Aggravated by Beacon GPS Syncing Issues - Skydio 2+ & Beacon v2.0

[bikeridez]

I received a new Skydio 2+ and the new version of the Beacon in June. First, I would like to state that when I'm able to actually launch the drone, it performs beautifully and the video footage is spectacular.

However, getting the drone to launch with the beacon is extremely difficult. The drone was purchased to film hiking, MTB rides, and moto rides. I do not want to fly this drone with my phone or a controller. I only want to fly with the beacon for now. From the very start, I've had nothing but issues trying to get the beacon to sync to the GPS satellites. Most of the time the drone will auto power off before it can get a GPS lock. I first contacted support in early July about the issue, and after providing coordinates, I was told that it was probably because I was in a basin. However, it was a desert basin, with mountains on all sides but they were 50 miles away and there was clear view in every direction.

Be that as it may I tried over and over from different locations around Las Vegas. Finally, Skydio decided to replace the beacon saying that it was defective. Before the new beacon even arrived, they also had me send back my drone for which they sent me a new one because they said log data showed the drone was defective too. Now here I am 2 months later with a new drone, new beacon, and I've traveled to many other locations, some up to 4 hours, away where I was at the highest point any where around and still I have the same issue. The beacon just cannot sync the GPS without 3 or more tries. Sometimes the beacon will get a GPS sync but when I start the launch count down it will loose sync and it will start all over again. It's extremely frustrating. First, if you are with anyone, they will have no patience waiting 15 minutes for you to keep trying to get your drone up. Further, I really don't want to waste 15-20 minutes every time trying to get the drone launched and then failing in many cases.

I've now emailed support 3x in this week and they now don't even respond at all about this issue. In my last exchange with them back in August they stated "We recommend pairing your Beacon to your phone to obtain a GPS lock quicker. I'd also recommend ensuring your drone and Beacon are in a clear area away from obstructions."

The fact is, again, I don't want to have my phone out, mounted on my handle bars, etc when I'm flying. This drone was purchased solely because of the beacon and the GPS tracking ability. Just for sake of argument, in few of the places that I was unable to get a GPS lock, I also tried connecting the beacon to the drone, then the my phone to the beacon and nearly instantly, the beacon gets a GPS sync. However, as soon as you shut off your phone screen, the beacon loses the GPS lock and starts syncing again. This is so aggravating. In my opinion, there is something seriously wrong with the technology in the beacon. It does not perform as it should. I would be maybe 40% less aggravated if I could connect my phone, get the GPS lock, and then be able to put the phone back in my pocket and the beacon would still stay connected to my phone and keep the GPS lock.

I don't know what the solution is here, but I'm ready to throw the drone off a mountain next time lug that huge carrying case, with 2 batteries up 8,000 ft to a mountain peek and I can't get GPS sync. This is problem, and I'm just one of many complaining about this issue. Skydio we really need this issue solved.

Further, Skydio doesn't really provide any detail on best ways to get GPS sync. When the beacon is searching for GPS sync, is it the drone trying to sync, or the beacon or both? Should I be holding my beacon up in the air and/or pointing it in a certain direction? What about the drone, should I be holding that up too?

One last thing I wanted to point out. A few days ago I installed the latest firmware update which also updated the beacon too. However, now when I first turn the drone and beacon on, it takes the beacon almost a full minute before it can even find my drone. Previously, the beacon would connect to the drones WIFI in a few seconds. So I'm not sure what the hell just happened with the last firmware update but now it's even worse than before....

 

[KDub]

Today I had issues connecting the manual controller. Took about a minute each time after completing full power up. I also had some pretty bad GPS issues with Waypoints and RTH I’ve never had in this same spot. This is a large, open area with a ton of soccer fields and plenty of satellites. It was pretty gnarly how way off it was on both location and altitude on each playback. Almost forgot that the video would start to chop out frequently. I do think there’s a little something up with this latest update.

 

[kenmavic2zoom]

has happened to me, hand launch, drone turns around to lock on for a second, then shoots off in a hurry only to pause while looking in a different direction....same as your video. luckily it wasn't too far away and i could fly it back; reboot. just have to be prepared for this until skydio can figure it out.

i don't know what to tell you. i never ever try to use drone and beacon alone. a phone is always involved. otherwise, it'll never get gps sync. i haven't tried shutting off the phone to see what happens but that shouldn't matter....i'll give it a try. i understand you may not want to have your phone involved during the adventure but at the start, seems to me to be a must if you want to make sure everything is locked in and reliable. not yet ready to trust the beacon only.

 

[Ridefreak]

I've had mine act the same way as the video requiring me to land and restart everything to get it working correctly. That's happened 2x, first time was right after an update (the update prior to the most recent). The GPS sync is frustrating, since the beginning it's taken excessively long to sync w/o the app open, sometime so long that the drone times out and shuts off. I attribute it to poor GPS receivers, I use GS data often and where we live and have always had good reception for everything GPS except the SD2. Not sure if this is true but I've heard SD recently upped the number of satellites required to get the ok to launch.

W/O a phone GPS sync required way too much battery so I've always use the phone along with the beacon. I've also needed the app's find the drone function which works very well when the app is running the entire flight. I'm not sure what the problem is with minimizing the app and the drone loosing GPS sync. That's pretty much how I do it every time, as soon as gps sync is achieved I stick the phone in my pocket. I know there's some android settings for how an app runs (or if it runs) while minimized in the background, that might be an issue.

Overall I was far more satisfied with the drone's performance just after it's initial release then I am with it now. To me they're chasing a dream with trying to increase the range of this drone, obviously it's not an easy fix or it'd been done already. Tells me it probably wont get better w/o some more hardware changes. It's never had good range and to me it seems like their efforts to increase the range range has screwed up some basic functions that it always did well. The range was poor from the start and it's still poor. This isn't a long range drone and most who buy it with that in mind come away disappointed. The thing is sky blue for god sakes, you can't reliably see a sky blue drone in a blue sky at long distances.

 

[Ridefreak]

FYI, for what it's worth. If you want to bring this up where Skydio would have a tough time ignoring it their official forum is a sponsored Discord server over on the Discord site, I was invited to it when it first happened but quit after about 3 days, to me it's design is one of the most juvenile I've ever been on and I use quite a few forums.

 

[paularity]

Just going to throw a counter point into this thread

I’m like 80% Beacon only flights - and over water too!

Pre-RTH functionality was added to the Beacon, if I had an assistant on the beach I used to have both the Controller and Beacon simultaneously connected as a back-up, but it actually caused a lot of gimbal ‘jerkiness’ issues that I had to troubleshoot with Skydio support

Mind you this was late last year and I haven’t done it since - so no idea if that has been addressed

I’ve also lost 2 drones flying solely with the Controller that are directly related to GPS signal issues and to date never when using only the Beacon solo

I pretty much only fire up the App if I need to change some settings or to review footage between flights

Yes, sometimes it does take slightly longer to Sync, not often I find

But if it’s being cranky a quick reset of the drone and the Beacon seems to work for me

I always hand launch and land too

Got no answers to other peoples issues, maybe there are more satellites over Australia haha!

Agree with Ridefreak that certain firmware updates have adversely affected some functionality

That being said I have had a chance to use the Enterprise and 3D Scan on a live gas plant recently and as confident in the abilities of this drone as I am from having it ping around my head for 2.5 years, it was still pretty hectic watching it dodge pipes and gather data!

 

[bikeridez]

has happened to me, hand launch, drone turns around to lock on for a second, then shoots off in a hurry only to pause while looking in a different direction....same as your video. luckily it wasn't too far away and i could fly it back; reboot. just have to be prepared for this until skydio can figure it out.​

i don't know what to tell you. i never ever try to use drone and beacon alone. a phone is always involved. otherwise, it'll never get gps sync. i haven't tried shutting off the phone to see what happens but that shouldn't matter....i'll give it a try. i understand you may not want to have your phone involved during the adventure but at the start, seems to me to be a must if you want to make sure everything is locked in and reliable. not yet ready to trust the beacon only.

Skydio support finally replied on the my question on whether the you can shut the phone off or not and still keep the GPS signal. They stated the following:

"To answer your question, once your phone and Beacon have obtained GPS lock, you can then close your phone and operate with the Beacon only."​

Here was my response:

I’ve tested this several times now and this does not work. First, I connect the beacon to the drone, then I connect the phone to the beacon. As a result, I get a GPS lock instantly. I’ve tried this 5 times now, even in areas where I do not have a clear view to the sky and would never expect to get a GPS sync. Every time I can get a GPS lock nearly instantly once the phone connects.​

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The problem is once you shut off the phone screen, the GPS sync is lost. Just for sake of argument, I just went outside and shot this video for you:​

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As you will see, I can’t get a GPS lock, the second my phone connects to the beacon I have a GPS lock, Then the drone is ready to fly. I then close my phone screen. Then a few seconds after I close my phone, the GPS lock is lost and its stuck syncing again and it will likely not get a GPS sync.​

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Maybe there is a setting on my phone that needs to be changed? I’m using an Iphone 13 Pro Max if that helps. I really need to figure out why this doesn’t work as you indicated.​

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Please help.​

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The most striking thing about this is that the beacon cant get a GPS lock at all nearly everywhere I go, but the second my phone connects there is a full GPS lock. My phone is arguably not much larger than the beacon and does a lot more than the beacon. Thus, the technology to get a quick GPS lock could be made to fit into the beacon.

At this point I truly feel mislead by this purchase. The Skydio 2+ and Beacon 2.0 do not function as advertised. Basically, for me I have a $1,000+ device that looks great on my shelf…

 

[paularity]

Skydio support finally replied on the my question on whether the you can shut the phone off or not and still keep the GPS signal. They stated the following:

"To answer your question, once your phone and Beacon have obtained GPS lock, you can then close your phone and operate with the Beacon only."​

Here was my response:

I’ve tested this several times now and this does not work. First, I connect the beacon to the drone, then I connect the phone to the beacon. As a result, I get a GPS lock instantly. I’ve tried this 5 times now, even in areas where I do not have a clear view to the sky and would never expect to get a GPS sync. Every time I can get a GPS lock nearly instantly once the phone connects.​

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The problem is once you shut off the phone screen, the GPS sync is lost. Just for sake of argument, I just went outside and shot this video for you:​

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As you will see, I can’t get a GPS lock, the second my phone connects to the beacon I have a GPS lock, Then the drone is ready to fly. I then close my phone screen. Then a few seconds after I close my phone, the GPS lock is lost and its stuck syncing again and it will likely not get a GPS sync.​

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Maybe there is a setting on my phone that needs to be changed? I’m using an Iphone 13 Pro Max if that helps. I really need to figure out why this doesn’t work as you indicated.​

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Please help.​

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The most striking thing about this is that the beacon cant get a GPS lock at all nearly everywhere I go, but the second my phone connects there is a full GPS lock. My phone is arguably not much larger than the beacon and does a lot more than the beacon. Thus, the technology to get a quick GPS lock could be made to fit into the beacon.

At this point I truly feel mislead by this purchase. The Skydio 2+ and Beacon 2.0 do not function as advertised. My wife, who purchased this drone for me for Father's Day, is an attorney and wants to go after Skydio for false advertising. Basically, for me I have a $1,000+ device that looks great on my shelf. I'm going to give Skydio support a few more days to try and figure out how they are going to solve this issue before we start considering what do legally.

Have you asked for a new Beacon?

 

[VEGASROBBI]

First, I do agree there are some bugs that have been introduced with new versions of the software, it does seem the original software was more stable to me. I have noticed that updates have added features and additional distance while at the same time introducing some bugs. The two most prominent bugs I see are always in the first flight of the day. The first was the flyway at launch however I haven't noticed that with this new version of the software. The second has been a consistent problem for the last few updates and that is disconnecting from the beacon while in flight. This may be related to what is going on with you, or not.

When my beacon disconnects it usually flies back to the last known position but recently I've been using ridefreaks suggestion of pushing the blue button and it seems to snap out of RTM.

I have noticed that the newer skydio 2 + beacon is more stable than my original if that makes any difference.

A lot of the time I fly beacon only and the wait time to get GPS is extended so I connect to my tablet and GPS is acquired quickly. Most of the time disconnecting the tablet does not result in losing connection with the beacon.

Not sure I have any advice other than to make sure your phone is on the approved device list and you may try re-pairing the beacon to your drone by plugging it in with the provided cable.

Good luck.

 

[bikeridez]

Have you asked for a new Beacon?

Yes, Skydio has replaced the beacon and replaced the drone.

 

[XtremeMTB]

Hi. I'm new to the Skydio forums. I reside in Arizona but I'm in Las Vegas for the week to ride. I came to forums looking for solution to problem I'm having with the drone and beacon. My issue is same as reported in this post and others. I went out riding yesterday in Bootleg Canyon trail region. The elevation is very high and the Lake Mead is on one side so a clear path to the sky was in all directions. After three attempts to get the GPS connection, all that ends up is the drone shutting off. Previously I've had maybe 20 flights since I bought the Skydio Plus and beacon in July. Out of the 20 flights using the beacon only I've only encountered this issue 5 times where I could not sync at all. Then maybe 10 times where the drone would power off and then on second or third attempt I get connection and can launch. Before I came to Las Vegas yesterday I did do a software update on drone and beacon. Now I can't get GPS connection at all. So I'm not sure if it's just Las Vegas area problems or if the software update caused this. I also tried connecting beacon to phone and it gets GPS lock fast. But when I put phone back in lock screen mode the connection is lost. My phone is IPHONE 12.

 

[XtremeMTB]

BikeRidez, I'm back in Phoenix and still having this same issue. There was an update last week. After installin it, the problem seems to have gotten worse. Have you gotten any fixes from Skydio support?

 

[bikeridez]

Hi Xtreme - Since I made my original post I've had opportunity to do 5 more flights. Out of the 5 flights, 3 were done with a recent update from Skydio (including beacon) and the other 2 were with the same firmware version I complained about initially. The first of the 5 flights I had some issues. I had really hard time getting a GPS sync and then after I did get the drone launched, lt locked on me and then as I was packing up to start moving, the drone just drifted slowly off about 400 feet away. It just so happens I was already at the highest point anywhere around (4000 ft). It was super scary. I tried to switch to manual mode but nothing on the beacon would make the drone respond. I finally decided to just start moving away and see if it would follow me. After I got about 100 feet from the starting point it started to follow me. However looking at the footage afterwards the drone was no longer following me visually. It appears that it was following the GPS because I would go out of frame a lot. At some point about 10 mins in the flight it started visually tracking me again and the footage was fine. After that when I was at the bottom of the mountain I road a trail that was was very low on the ground. I was actually in a 50ft deep slot canyon and never expected to get a GPS lock. But it did. Not only did I get GPS lock, the drone followed me through this tight slot canyon perfectly. A week later I had more flights, each time I was able to lock the GPS when I was on the bottom of the mountain and then let the drone follow me up and then down. What I've seemed to figure out now is that when I'm at a high altitude, it is extremely hard to get a GPS sync. But if I'm low to the ground (with a lot more obstructions) I can nearly always get a GPS lock (at least for the last 4 flights). Also the latest firmware update seems to make getting a GPS lock faster for me but I'm not really sure because I havent attempted to launch from a high point in 4 flights. I hope to get back out there again this weekend for another attempt. I will keep you posted.

 

[bikeridez]

Just another update. I went out Friday and tried to launch 3 times from 3 different high points. In all 3 attempts the Skydio 2+ failed to get a GPS sync and would auto power off. A couple of times the beacon showed ready to fly, but as soon as I held the button to start the launch count down the beacon shows “syncing” again and I could not launch. What a pain in the ***. I really wish Skydio support would stop ignoring my support requests and help me out. Specifically , I want to know more about how the beacon works with GPS sync. For example: 1) is it the beacon that acquires the gps signal and then passes it to the drone or vice versa. 2) should we be moving around (in circles) to try to point the beacon (or drone) at the sky to get a gps lock 3) why when we put the cell phone on Lock Screen does the beacon lose the gps sync? (Shouldn’t the beacon store the sat locations)? 4)why is it harder to get a gps lock at a high altitude vs. a low altitude? 5) how the hell would we use the new one button launch feature if there is no GPS lock before hand?

At this point I’m still serious concerned and aggravated with Skydio support failure to even respond to my support requests. Ignoring this problem is not making it go away…

 

[Ridefreak]

After this last update I'm seeing different behavior IRT to the GPS sync. I'm really aware of this since I have a routine I follow pretty close and it has changed a little with this last update.
Before: The beacon would connect to the drone rather quickly, then start the gps sync process. at this point I always connect the phone to the beacon to speed up the sync, it still took a little while.

After: The beacon takes longer to connect to the drone showing "Looking for SDXXX" for a longer period. As soon as it finds the drone, I can see the beacon's network and connect the beacon with the phone, the GPS instantly completes sync. Occasionally when doing final setup (preparing to launch) the system will loose gps connection and begin the gps resync all over. This has consistently gotten better each flight since the update.

I rely on the phone to speed up the GPS sync process. I'm often out in the desert and the drone is sitting there running in the hot sun while it's trying to sync, it's caused high temp alarms more then once not to mention shutting itself off and having to start over. Once I get the gps sync I like having the phone screen there to see what it's locked onto. Especially since the new update. I've had it fly off following someone else before. Once I see it's locked on correctly I mute the phone screen and drop it in my pocket. All my takeoffs and landing are hand launch, I find those to be fast and super simple once you get the hang of it.

I've also had the drone loose visual lock like you described; the drone is kinda following along but the camera isn't pointing at the subject. For me it's probably happened half a dozen times since the drone was new 2.5 years ago, doesn't seem to be update related. I've seen it caused by the beacon being bounced on a tether and just from riding along. For me it's not lasted long, usually if I come to a stop or slow to check on the drone I can see it sometimes. Pushing the blue button with lock it back onto the subj. might take a try or two.

 

[bikeridez]

Hi RideFreak,


Thanks for your detailed response. I have a question about:

>>Once I see it's locked on correctly I mute the phone screen and drop it in my pocket. All my takeoffs and landing are hand launch, I find those to be fast and super simple once you get the hang of it.

What do you men by "mute the phone screen"?

For me, when i put my phone back to the lock screen, the beacon loses the GPS sync a few seconds later. That is what I showed in the video on the original post on this thread. That is what i sent to to Skydio support when they instructed me to use the phone to get a quicker sync. I would be fine adding my phone to get a quicker sink in nearly every instance. However, when i sent Skydio support that video explaining that there "work around" does not work, they just ghosted me. I have 2 tickets open right now and no one will respond.


Also:

>>All my takeoffs and landing are hand launch, I find those to be fast and super simple once you get the hang of it.

Same here.

>>After: The beacon takes longer to connect to the drone showing "Looking for SDXXX" for a longer period.

Yes, this I noticed immediately after the last update. Before the beacon would connect to the drone quickly and now it takes quite a few seconds before it finds the drone. I've noticed that takes the longest when I'm at high elevations. Its so weird being that the drone is an arms length away.

 

[VEGASROBBI]

I'll try to add to this complicated issue. I normally fly with the beacon but lately I've been flying with my iPad only and it has worked out well. I have noticed recently, especially after the most current update, that I've been getting more GPS sync issues and beacon disconnect issues. It is ironic because at the beginning I had a problem flying with my iPad only but now it outperforms the beacon, I feel there's a problem in the communication between the beacon and the drone.

 

[Ridefreak]

Hi RideFreak,


Thanks for your detailed response. I have a question about:

>>Once I see it's locked on correctly I mute the phone screen and drop it in my pocket. All my takeoffs and landing are hand launch, I find those to be fast and super simple once you get the hang of it.

What do you men by "mute the phone screen"?

For me, when i put my phone back to the lock screen, the beacon loses the GPS sync a few seconds later. That is what I showed in the video on the original post on this thread. That is what i sent to to Skydio support when they instructed me to use the phone to get a quicker sync. I would be fine adding my phone to get a quicker sink in nearly every instance. However, when i sent Skydio support that video explaining that there "work around" does not work, they just ghosted me. I have 2 tickets open right now and no one will respond.


Also:

>>All my takeoffs and landing are hand launch, I find those to be fast and super simple once you get the hang of it.

Same here.

>>After: The beacon takes longer to connect to the drone showing "Looking for SDXXX" for a longer period.

Yes, this I noticed immediately after the last update. Before the beacon would connect to the drone quickly and now it takes quite a few seconds before it finds the drone. I've noticed that takes the longest when I'm at high elevations. Its so weird being that the drone is an arms length away.

By muting I'm referring to blanking the screen so it requires a pin or fingerprint to open back up. That's so I don't inadvertently touch the app screen and make something unexpected happen. I brought that up because there seemed to be a question if the drone would continue to operate correctly with the phone in your pocket. I can say it does, I've been doing it that way since this drone was released.

I'm not seeing a noticeable difference in connection at elevation, almost all of my flying is a 6K' and up, sometimes it's over 10K' As for connecting, aside from the differences I describes post update it's about the same now. It wasn't the first few times after the update. Initially the connections were unreliable, I was loosing a connection 10' away with the drone sitting on the ground in clear sky. I powered down and repeated the connection process 3 or 4 times without attempting to fly and it improved. A few days later when setting up for a flight it connected fine. The Subject lock was inconsistent just after launching first time, it would lock on, sit there hoovering and all of a sudden shoot up 50' move a short distance and hoover some more. I'd est it did that 2 or 3 times over a couple min then locked on. Tracking was normal from that point but I had one disconnect on that first flight, there was nothing about the situation that should have caused a signal loss problem. Pushing the blue button rehomed the drone and it locked on normally. The rest of the flights were normal.


For me this is the second time an update has caused weird unexplained behavior, to me it seems to be that once I get it past that first flight the drone's performance seems to improve, both signal and tracking wise. Eventually you'll notice it recalibrate after some successful flights, Its hard to catch, you have to be looking at the app after a flight to see it. The beacon says something like "processing" and if you look at the app there will be a progress bar with "Recalibrating". Takes about a min to complete. I've only seen it 2x after flying and I saw it again just after this update before flying, it's hard to catch and I'm pretty sure it happens more often then I've witnessed. That latter part tells me the drone was likely reset during this update process and it's behavior seems to confirm that. . That's happened once before, it followed a major update that caused SD to replace allot of drones. Back then they didn't follow-up with an additional update like this time and the problem seemed to work themselves out for many of the users.


SD changing the process slightly during the connection was confusing. Like I mentioned, I had the process down pat, it was very routine to get the drone in the air and tracking. This time what seemed to help me the most was repeating the connection process, the drone's connectivity seemed to improve and I became familiar with slight differences in the process. It's also a great way to practice what is often the most difficult aspect of getting the drone up into the air.

 

[Exotic4x4]

I came here looking for some answers to the GPS syncing issue I'm having with the Skydio 2+ and new version of the beacon. My issues are nearly the same as reported by the others. I would say in 2 out 3 flights I can't get the drone to sync to the satellites before it will time out and then shut itself off. It doesn't seem to matter much where the location is (high or low). I've been at the top of mountains at 8,000 ft in Utah. I've taken the drone all through the desert in California, Nevada, Arizona and New Mexico. I've also taken it to multiple lake areas too. The path to the sky is always without any obstructions in all instances. I have never flown this drone with my phone (other then the first launch as instructed in Skydio manual). I don't intend to ever fly this drone with a phone or controller. I have contacted Skydio support and was instructed to try using my phone to get GPS sync. This only works for a few seconds. If I shut off my phone screen, the connection to the beacon is lost and the drone will start looking for GPS satellite again.

 

[bikeridez]

By muting I'm referring to blanking the screen so it requires a pin or fingerprint to open back up. That's so I don't inadvertently touch the app screen and make something unexpected happen. I brought that up because there seemed to be a question if the drone would continue to operate correctly with the phone in your pocket. I can say it does, I've been doing it that way since this drone was released.

My tests show me that on on my IPhone 13 pro max, once the phone is on Lock Screen, the beacon starts syncing again. Maybe this issue is related to the iPhone, or a setting on my iPhone.

What phone make and model are you using?