Well in the quest for getting better windsurfing video footage I managed to dump my Phantom, Brushless gimbal and new Hero3+ into the ocean yesterday. It was bound to happen at some point and to be honest the only thing I was truly annoyed about was the fact that the camera didn't get the crash. The file is there but it's corrupt, I'm trying to recover it but at this stage nothing is working.
....The good news is that everything still works?? I went home and flushed the whole thing in the bath tub with fresh water then went about pulling everything apart and drying it out. I'm sure it's shortened the life of everything but at this stage everything is OK, The only thing that is stuffed is the battery for the Phantom....
What did I learn from this....Don't use aftermarket batteries and I'm sure this has failed and caused the crash. And if you get your Gopro wet, All is not lost just act quickly especially in salt water(Remove battery, flush it out ASAP and get it dry). When I pulled the phantom out of waist deep water after a few minutes it was still running?
I hope I can recover the footage so I can post It up, Should be cool to watch.
Don't have the gopro in the case when on the chopper? seems like a smart option given the potential dunking it may receive :)
Also with electronics if the get wet etc dump then in a bag of rice over night, it absorbs all the moisture quick smart.
When you use the gimbal the GoPro is naked, I've tried using the camera attached with just the standard housing but the footage is rubbish. As for water, I don't think fresh water would be 2 bad but saltwater causes corrosion very quickly...like in minutes. But it seems ok at the moment, But I did do the rice thing....It's the most mentioned fix mentioned on the net when it comes to getting water out of a GoPro. 
Select to expand quotejh2703 said...
[br]Well in the quest for getting better windsurfing video footage I managed to dump my Phantom, Brushless gimbal and new Hero3+ into the ocean yesterday. It was bound to happen at some point and to be honest the only thing I was truly annoyed about was the fact that the camera didn't get the crash. The file is there but it's corrupt, I'm trying to recover it but at this stage nothing is working.
....The good news is that everything still works?? I went home and flushed the whole thing in the bath tub with fresh water then went about pulling everything apart and drying it out. I'm sure it's shortened the life of everything but at this stage everything is OK, The only thing that is stuffed is the battery for the Phantom....
What did I learn from this....Don't use aftermarket batteries and I'm sure this has failed and caused the crash. And if you get your Gopro wet, All is not lost just act quickly especially in salt water(Remove battery, flush it out ASAP and get it dry). When I pulled the phantom out of waist deep water after a few minutes it was still running?
I hope I can recover the footage so I can post It up, Should be cool to watch.
Once your go pro is working reinsert the SD with the corrupt file and start recording a new one. What's should happen is the the footer will be written to the last file and a new one started. Then stop and take out the SD and see if the footage is fixed.
Hope this helps.
I was testing my RC Seaplane out it was going nice across the water so I went for lift off but the engine mount came loose & the motor tilted forward which dragged the plane under like a submarine it looked good at the time but I had to paddle out to the middle of the lake to retrieve it lucky I had my sailboard in the back of my van. Turns out it was still working even though it was full of water & so I let it dry out & everything still worked the lake was fresh water luckily.
