UPDATED - THE FUTURE OF ESC’s for F5J ?

[AnthonyB]

Here is a Hacker B20-15L with a tiny 20A Bl_Heli esc from my Facebook page “Gliding North West” in August '18.

The reason I am showing it is that it was deemed to be necessary to add an electrolytic cap (low ESR) to all esc's.

I will add also that since that date I have tried to use these tiny things and a 2S battery with HV servos on all builds. So no bec or sbec.

Even with a 4m F5J, it only really needs 350W to get to height. So 6.6v x 53A = 350W.

Scrolling through here, there is no sign of any caps being used – Has nobody had problems ?

[ThermalBoy]

18 hours ago, AnthonyB said:

Here is a Hacker B20-15L with a tiny 20A Bl_Heli esc from my Facebook page “Gliding North West” in August '18.

The reason I am showing it is that it was deemed to be necessary to add an electrolytic cap (low ESR) to all esc's.

I will add also that since that date I have tried to use these tiny things and a 2S battery with HV servos on all builds. So no bec or sbec.

Even with a 4m F5J, it only really needs 350W to get to height. So 6.6v x 53A = 350W.

Scrolling through here, there is no sign of any caps being used – Has nobody had problems ?

I have not seen anyone so far using an electrolytic cap(s) with their Drone ESC's. The high quality Tekko Metal F3 ESC 65A is supplied with a cap but the instructions state that its not required unless you are using 6+ cells. I've not used Caps on any of the Drone ESC's I've tested nor have Kevin & John who were involved in the initial testing. No problems reported.

What apparently is important in this regard though according to an electronics engineer I spoke to, is that you set braking to be 60-80% max. Be sure to turn on "Damped Mode" in the BL Heli Software. If you dont the brake will ignore any % set and will use 100% braking which is seriously abrupt and not what is required.

Colin

[AnthonyB]

Hello colin.

Every esc I have ever bought over the last 20 years has had caps on. Some times I have even replaced them, if all was not going well.

That a quad does not have them on the esc does not mean they don't have or need them.

I have read in "the blurb" for some of these new esc's that there are a lot of caps actually in the circuit.

So, I have now used about 20 of these and I love them. I have also bought ones like the Plush_32 - 120A for one of my F5J models where I wanted over 1kw input. As soon as you buy "ready to go" esc's with heat shrink on, they do have caps. Try ...... https://oscarliang.com/capacitors-mini-quad/

Anyway, it just seemed strange, if you don't have problems, then you don't have problems. I am very happy not to put them on if I don't need to.

[Graham Lorimer]

Thanks Guys for all the investigative work and trial and error in supplying this information, not something I would try unaided.

The first ESC (an Aria 70 Amp) I got programmed by a very helpful fellow flyer, all good except I did not set the throttle points before flying the first time, The ESC would not always provide power to the motor without disconnecting and reconnecting the Lipo several times, although once power was flowing, the entire flight was without fault, throttle opening and closing several times.

The next one I did all the work myself, it is a 60 Amp Opto ESC, bought from Hong Kong, and I notice that it displays a "LOW VOLTAGE PROTECTION", with the option of Off or On with a step from 2.5 volts up to 4 volts being selectable.

Can someone please explain the upside / downside of selecting this feature for a F5J application as On with say 4 volts being the choice.

Assistance much appreciated, as always.

Graham

 

 

[AnthonyB]

Hello Graham, no one else has answered, so I will give my opinion.

For F5J. You should know the battery requirements for your model.

The smaller the battery, (the lighter you want to get everything) the lower your voltage will drop. I would say don't switch it on. If you know how long your battery will last (how many climbs) – that is it, just don't fly more than that. In a comp change the battery more often.

If it is operative and it pulls the voltage down, and triggers – that round is ruined. I would always go with a battery of at least 2 rounds, in case you need to run back to back.

If you change the battery after every round (putting the spare on charge) not only do you know you are safe, you know exactly how fast it will climb. The climb will always be different on a new battery against a previously used one.

If the battery / esc is on a sports type model, then maybe, but well below 4V. The damage to a battery happens when the voltage gets too low. There is a big difference between too low on a standing battery and the voltage sag you get when running the motor. Again, using and testing your own battery is the only way, not a figure given by a bloke on interweb.

I try to only use 2S – no BEC, and so the motor voltage is the same as the Rx voltage. My Altis Nano puts out the voltage via telemetry, so I know what it is. (If I dare look down while doing a power on climb)

[Graham Lorimer]

Thanks for the answers Anthony.

It leaves me with a further question, given that the options range from 2.5 - 4 volts, should I presume that is a measurement taken off just one cell in my Lipo pack, or at least an average of all the cells in the pack.

I look forward to the answer

 

 

Graham

 

 

 

 

 

[Harry Peberdy]

Not Shure why you would want to go to low voltage most recevers will not work on that lower voltage so your glider would not respond to command and you can only measure one of the cells if using a jeti product messering through balance lead

[AnthonyB]

13 hours ago, Graham Lorimer said:

Thanks for the answers Anthony.

It leaves me with a further question, given that the options range from 2.5 - 4 volts, should I presume that is a measurement taken off just one cell in my Lipo pack, or at least an average of all the cells in the pack.

I look forward to the answer

Graham

You don't plug in the balance lead, and so it is a measure from the whole pack, and it can guess how many cells. My Aria does not give this option.

I have this option on straight BL_Heli (non-32) ESCs but they give the option of, from 3.0 to 3.4v which I feel is more realistic. (I checked this first) I have just left it off.

Anthony.

 

 

 

 

 

[AnthonyB]

I have just been doing some quick tests on a motor / prop combo and the battery went very quickly from 12v down to 9.9v on 40A draw. That's 3.3v / cell. So if I had set at 3.4v/cell it would have cut during climb.

Some ESCs give the option of cut or reduce power (if you can't switch it off) and I always go for reduced power.

I have seen many times in many places this feature tripping people up. "My motor cut during flight - but it worked briefly when I landed. Is it my motor, esc or battery ?"

[Harry Peberdy]

There is no way a motor should cut on a fully charged battery I get three good 30 second climb out when practicing your battery will however cut if it has a bad cell when you full charge battery you should look at what the oms are before turning charger off as the resistance goes higher this will cause I had one that showed full charged and in flight it gave me 5 second's of motor 

[Jerry Lunt]

Hi Guys,

I could do with some more up to date advice/instructions on how to execute programming of my new ESC.

I have the Dys Aria 70A ESC, an Arduino Nano interface and BLHeliSuite32_32720.

So, I connected the Arduino to the ESC as shown then connected the Arduino to my laptop.  I got 2 LED's on the arduino, one steady red, one flashing red.  No indication on my laptop of any driver being installed thereon.

Opening the BLHeli32 software produces an muti-tabbed displayas here

 

Now I'm stuck because it is not giving me any com port to select.

[Jerry Lunt]

Further info.

I had the Arduino connected to a USB 3 port, no device loaded.  I reconnected to a USB2 port and a device driver installed, it said, and my W10 Settings thingy opened on the Devices page and USB Serial showed " device unavailable".  If I click on that it offers me to remove the device.  The BLHeli program still did not give me a port to select.

No idea what to do about that. 

[MikeE]

You need to get the Arduino working first. Ug it in and upload a driver for it.  Google will find one for you.

[Jerry Lunt]

Still no joy.

I've been here:  https://www.arduino.cc/en/software

and downloaded both the .exe and .zip versions of Arduino IDE 1.8.13

Then I went here:  https://startingelectronics.org/software/arduino/installing-arduino-software-windows-10/

and following those straight forward instructions installed the software with drivers but when I go as instructed to update the drivers for the Arduino, windows tells me there's no drivers there!!

Device Manager, instead of showing PORTS (Com & LPT) shows Other Devices/USB Serial with a yellow triangle ! mark.

[Jerry Lunt]

So, when I connect the Arduino to the laptop the POW (power) LED lights up and the L LED flashes red.  I think this flashing LED is indicator that something is amiss.  When AndyH connects his, only the POW LED lights up.

Could this indicate I have a duff Arduino?

[MikeE]

 

Here's my driver. 

[Jerry Lunt]

Thanks Mike but still no-go.  There's several downloads available at the Silicon Labs site, so I downloaded the Universal Drivers version and ran the CP210xVCPInstaller_x64.exe version.  Seemed to install OK but connecting the Arduino and opening Device Manager resulted in the same Other Devices/Serial Bus entry showing the following properties:

I'm beginning to think there's something on my laptop preventing this installation.  I am Administrator.

[DaveH]

The flashing LED is good...  They all seem to be shipped with a simple program to flash the on-board LED. 

At least the basics of the board is good. 

 

 

[MikeE]

Have you unzipped and put the driver on your desktop?

[Jerry Lunt]

Seems like this is all a problem with my new laptop or the fact I plugged the Arduino into it first through a USB 3 connection.  I don't know though I'm pretty sure that when I plugged it then into a USB 2 connection, the driver installed, but wrongly ??????

So, I've tried with my old W10 laptop, plugging the Arduino straight into a USB 2 and it loaded the driver and Device manager shows me this:

. . . . .  allowing me to flash the Arduino with the BLHeli32 software.

I need to talk with my IT expert (son-in-law) for explanation and sort.

Thanks for your considerations and advices.  Jerry