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Permalink Reply by Vernon Barry on May 6, 2012 at 2:43pm

Just a question are these the 880kv motors?

You must drill the hole in the frame larger because the C-clip on the bottom of the 880KV motors is larger and thus drags on the frame. You really should check this on all the motors as you will destroy them quickly!!!!

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Permalink Reply by Stein Atle Sundland on May 6, 2012 at 11:03pm

Thanks, but i dont think its a shafing problem. All the motors spin freely when not powerd from the Esc. I have swaped motors as welk and every thing points to on Esc. Im beginning to think there might be something wrong with the Esc

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DistributorPermalink Reply by Martint BuildYourOwnDrone.co.uk on May 7, 2012 at 7:02am

Hello Stein,

 

Is this the motor / ESC which feeds the 5V to the PDB and then the RC / APM systems on the copter?

 

As Venon has said the holes on the 3DR frame might need to be opened a little to let the bottom of the shaft line up and clear the arm, however that does not sound like your issue... 

 

Regards

 

Martin.

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Permalink Reply by Stein Atle Sundland on May 7, 2012 at 9:59am

Hi Martin.

Well im using a dji 550 frame and the arducopter electronics, so im connecting all of the Esc to the APM. I have not checked yet wich ESC/Motor that powes the APM. Will do, but im at work for one more week..

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DistributorPermalink Reply by Martint BuildYourOwnDrone.co.uk on May 7, 2012 at 2:19pm

Hello Stein,

 

I don't own one right now, however I used to have an Arducopter with the APM 2 board, and the motor / ESC which was powering the APM was always a little slower to spin up, this never made any change to the flights, just on takeoff there needed to be a moment before going to full takeoff power to let all the motors "catch up" to the same RPM ....

 

Regards

 

Martin

www.buildyourowndrone.co.uk

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Permalink Reply by Jean-Marc Gendreau on May 30, 2012 at 8:53pm

If all ESCs are connected directly to the APM, it mean that all their 5V outputs are shorted together because on the APM the middle pin of all outputs are connected together  This is not good.  In the original arducopter, the APM is powered by the BEC of only one ESC because all ESCs are connected to the power distribution board then the 5V on only one ESC is sent to the APM.  Remember that the 5V output of the BEC is very low impedance so if you connec 4 BEC in parallel some outputs will be back driven by the BEC that has a the higher voltage.  Even a few milivolts of difference might end up in several amps of current that are back driven to another BEC output.

You can solve your problem by removing the red wire from the BEC connector of 3 of the 4 ESCs.  This way your APM will be powered by only one BEC and none of your ESCs will be back driven.

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Permalink Reply by Chris Huitema on May 7, 2012 at 3:19pm

Have you checked the brake setting on the ESC. i have all mine set to on, so if im about to crash i can cut the throttle and the props stop spinning before they hit the ground. has saved many a prop during initial testing.

 

i think the lower 4/5 of the throttle range is braking and the other 4/5 is throttle, without the brake setting it is all throttle.

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