DJI Phantom 4 Shell Replacement

Geschrieben von: ForumHermit

Kommentare: 28

Schwierigkeitsgrad

Difficult

Schritte

Zeitaufwand

1 - 2 Stunden

Einleitung

You are probably here because you wanted to get a better angle while you were trying to get that perfect shot and ended up getting a little to close to that tree than you thought.

This guide will give you a step-by-step on how to replace the shell of your DJI drone so you can do it yourself and not have to pay a stranger to touch your valuables.

*Notice, this repair does require some soldering.

Werkzeuge

Ersatzteile

DJI Phantom 4 Body Replacement

Schritt 1

Push down and twist the propellers counter-clockwise to release from the drone.

Note which props are the left hand and which are right hand for reassembly.

gunnyvann -

Schritt 2

Firmly press the battery tabs on top and bottom of the battery and slide out the battery.

Schritt 3

If gimbal lock is still on, remove it from the drone.

Schritt 4

Using a T8 screwdriver, remove the eight Torx screws from the plastic shell.

it’s metric, not Torx. I believe 2mm.

bradyb1234 - 07/04/20

Schritt 5

Using a T6 screwdriver, remove all eight screws on the grey gimbal assembly.

Schritt 6

Using a plastic spudger or pick, gently pry the gimbal assembly from the drone.
Do not try to pull the gimbal assembly away from drone just yet—there are cables that must be unplugged first.

Schritt 7

Using a Phillips #000 screwdriver, remove the two screws and the gimbal bracket.

Schritt 8

Using your fingers or needle-nose pliers, gently unplug the left (red box) cable by pushing in the white clips on the sides and sliding the cable out.
Using a spudger, unplug the 3-in-1 cable on the right (orange box) by gently prying up.

Schritt 9

Using a Phillips #000 screwdriver, remove the two screws and the antenna bracket.

Schritt 10

Using a spudger, gently disconnect the four antenna cables.
Remember the order in which the antenna cables are plugged in, or refer to this step during reassembly.

Schritt 11

Using a Phillips #000 screwdriver, remove the two screws located on the white plastic tabs.

Schritt 12

Using a spudger, carefully bend the two metal clips upwards.
Be gentle and do not break the clips. You will need to bend them back down upon reassembly.

Schritt 13

Using a spudger or flathead screwdriver, gently pry up the LED cover.
Using a spudger or flathead screwdriver, carefully pry up the underlying sticker.
PRO TIP: Stick the sticker to the smooth side of the plastic LED cover to keep it clean and from losing stick. PRO TIP on reassembly: be sure to align the stickers so the tab fits in the snap slot.
Repeat this step on all four LED covers.

Schritt 14

Using a T8 screwdriver, remove the 3 screws that attach the shell and motors together.
Repeat this step on all 4 motors.

Schritt 15

Using a spudger or pick, carefully pry your way around the seam, undoing the clips that attach the shell together.
PRO TIP: If you are replacing the shell because your old shell is trashed, don't worry about cracking or damaging the broken shell. Just go for it.
Do not try to pull the shell completely apart just yet, there are some cables that must be unplugged first.

Schritt 16

Using your fingers or needle-nose pliers, gently unplug the cables by pushing in the white clips on the sides and sliding the cables out.

Schritt 17

Using a knife or flathead screwdriver, remove the melted plastic rivets holding down the LED board. Be careful to not damage the LED.
Carefully pry up the LED board from the drone shell.
Repeat on all four wings.
During reassembly use a dull soldering iron tip to remount the LED board to the new shell.

Schritt 18

Using a small screwdriver, carefully pry up the motor and LED cables where they are glued down to the shell.
Repeat on all four wings.

Schritt 19

Desolder all 12 of the motor wires that connect to the drones mother boards.
DO NOT cut the cables with wire cutters—they are enameled wire and are a pain in the butt to solder back together and have them still work. Do yourself a favor and just desolder them from the board.
For reassembly, note the order of the cables. While the drone is upside down, black is the top wire, grey is middle, and white is bottom.

Would heat shrinking the wires back together if you cut them be better than soldering?

Justin White - 03/09/17

If you cut the wires you should twist and solder them back together to insure you have a good and strong connection. Heat shrink is what you use to cover that connection instead of using something like electrical tape. So what you do is put on a small piece of heat shrink on the wire first, then solder the wire together, then slide the heat shrink tube over the joint, and then you hit it with some heat to shrink the tubing over the connection.

ForumHermit - 04/09/17

Schritt 20

Using a T8 screw driver, remove the four screws that mount the battery bay and brains from the upper shell.
Carefully remove the brains out of the upper shell.

Schritt 21

Carefully peel the shielding sticker from the upper shell. Note that you can't remove it all the way until you remove three screws.
Using a Phillips #000 driver, remove the three screws that are mounting the board to the upper drone shell.

Schritt 22

Carefully pry off the screw covers on the legs that are attached to the lower shell.
Using a T6 screwdriver, remove the two screws. Repeat on all four corners.
Take note on where you are removing the cables from, and install them in the new lower shell in the same way you found them.

Abschluss

To reassemble your device, follow these instructions in reverse order.

Tinte & Feder

ForumHermit

Mitglied seit: 16/08/13

1685 Reputation

24 Kommentare

**Note that if you crashed your drone and are replacing the body shell, there may be more problems with your drone internally. I replaced my drone shell and kept getting ESC status errors when I would try and take off. I had to send my drone in to DJI to have them fix it. They ended up replacing three of the motors (they were a bit stiff to turn so I wasn't surprised), the ESC board (left), and the left and right landing gear modules. That all cost me $215 USD which was mostly for the two hours of labor, the parts were cheap.

ForumHermit - 30/07/17

hreat guide but why do you need the heat Gun/shrink?? I'd add a glue gun to secure the motor wires in the arms again...

john racovelli - 09/08/17

Yeah sorry about that @wahoo66, I've removed them from the guide now but I had them in there because I made the mistake of cutting the motor wires instead of just unsoldering them so I used heat shrink tubing and a hot air gun on mine but I don't recommend people doing what I did.

ForumHermit - 10/08/17

Great guide thanks or putting it together, it helped me transplant my P4 to a new shell.

To note #22 my landing gear actually had T6 screws not phillips.

Thanks again.

julio Benitez - 22/04/18

Thank you Julio! I’ve just corrected this to saying T6. I’m glad this guide was helpful for you.

ForumHermit - 23/04/18

I tried changing a landing strut on my P4 and completely screwed it up. I didn’t scrape enough Locktite off the connector and ruined the plug. I won’t tell you the nightmare it was to fix my screw up. I have an AA in digital electronics with a ton of soldering experience and am thinking about repairing DJI drones. I am wondering where I can get manuals or other ways to learn how to fix these. This video is perfect.;

katrapper - 31/05/18

Hello katrapper, I actually made this guide myself from scratch so I don’t know where else you can get guides other than Google and YouTube. This is actually the only drone guide I’ve ever made. So if you do end up getting into fixing drones, please make some guides and share them with the community.

ForumHermit - 01/06/18

More than a comment it is a Question I want to pose. I cracked the middel shell of my Phnatom 4. Upper shell and gimbal assembly are intect . So I imagine that to replace the middel shell only I Need to do all the steps up to step 16, then skip steps 17,18,19,20 and 21 . I am Right? Thanks!

Juan Gonzalez - 15/06/18

If by middel shell you mean the upper shell with the shielding sticker in step 21, yes, you can skip all the other steps and just replace the upper shell. Which would be relatively easy since you wouldn’t have to unsolder any of the propellers to remove the lower shell. However you may not be able to buy just the upper shell and may have to buy the bottom as well, you can look around.

ForumHermit - 16/06/18

Anyone in Iowa United States know someone I could get in contact with so I don’t have to send mine into DJI?

koppj92 - 07/11/18

To be honest DJI was really good. They were fast and affordable. And I got a brand new drone out of it but only paid for a few parts.

ForumHermit - 09/11/18

This guide just raised my confidence to 99% on repairing my Phantom 4 Pro! Thanks!!!!

Larry Sorensen - 18/11/18

Great guide I followed this step by step. But I am getting ESC errors on all four motors. I think my soldering onto the ESC board may not be great. also had to replace the legs and antennas as one of the sensors broke from the circuit board. Any ideas as to how to trouble shoot ESC No1-4 errors?

Darren Patterson - 24/12/18

The ESC errors are a tricky one. I was not able to repair mine and ended up sending my drone in to DJI for repair. They ended up raplacing my motors and the left ESC chip. I would honestly just recommend sending it into DJI for repair. I think the only way to fix the ESC error is to have them replace the board. They actually just sent me back a new drone entirely and only charged me for the new case and some labour. I was really satisfied with their service.

ForumHermit - 04/01/19

Excellent guide, much better than wading through a YouTube video as well. I followed this for replacing the upper shell on a Phantom 4 Pro. Almost exactly the same, just different position of plugs in step 16 but obvious to sort out.

John Whitehouse - 15/04/20

Great job

CT’s - 28/11/20

Can you tell my what kind of wire glue is used. The current glue is flexible and can be pulled apart to release the wires. I do not want to use regular hot glue / gun; since it cools very hard and would make taking my drone apart again in the future very difficult. I have been having a very hard time finding out from my searches and DJI refuses to tell me. Thanks

Peter Howie - 28/12/20

Hello Peter, I am unsure what glue was used. If I remember correctly, it felt like a silicone based glue. However I have to admit, I did not bother gluing the cables back down when reassembling the drone. Also, note that I made the mistake of cutting the cables rather than just unsoldering them, so I didn’t even break the glue by the solder joints. I definitely wouldn't use anything too strong in case you have to do it again. You could honestly probably get away with just a basic glue like the Elmers glue that you give kids in school. The cables are soldered at one end and fixed on the other so the glue’s main purpose was to keep the cable from rattling around too much and from getting pinched during assembly. You could also look into the Loctite Silicone glue at Walmart for $5. Maybe do a test with the Loctite on a small piece of scrap plastic to see how it sticks, how flexible it is, and if you could easily pry a cable out of it if you need to ever do it again.

ForumHermit - 30/12/20

Thanks so much for the quick response … I’ve found different fast drying silicone products that are electronics grade and plastic safe. Any thing in a hot gun sort of application like DJI uses is very quick but most require an expensive special gun due to clogging issues with sticks and you have to buy bulk. Dow chemicals offers free samples of a lot of their products so I am going to try their quick dry 30G tube first. Thanks.

Peter Howie - 30/12/20

Does anybody know for certain if the shell for the P4 Pro is compatible with the P4 Pro V 2.0? I’m breaking my head trying to figure it out!

februaryoak - 24/01/21

O’boy did watch how the antenna looped thru frame works… :{

Mark Richter - 08/06/21

Excellent guide

arshad ch -

Just would like to share with everyone a few things. I used my Phantom 4 Pro as a business doing high end real estate photography. It was a trooper for hundreds of homes. One day I took it out of the hard case and noticed a droop in the lower case. Had to get the job done and fortunately had some duct tape in my trunk. Literally taped it up and got the mission accomplished. Went home and disassembled the lower case and found that the screws holes holding it together had crumbled. There were crumbled pieces in the drone! I have never crashed or had a hard landing. I have a 21 year career in Marine Corps aviation and I am sure it was from vibration. If you ever see any slight shift in the bottom plate, stop and investigate! Only thing I can recall is flying on a really windy day once. No performance problem but, could be the reason. I was surprised not to find more of this issue on the net. The author of this did noteworthy job of assisting shell replacement I give him a Bravo Zulu!

gunnyvann -

Thank you @gunnyvann! I tried to be very thorough in everything! I'm glad this guide can be of use to people.

ForumHermit -