Hi, just been testing my Y6 with it's new 6000mah 4S pack and noticed the motors are getting hot. This is affecting the bottom motors more where if you touch them on the base, non rotating part, they are too hot to touch for more than a few seconds. The rest of the motor is hot but can be held without issue.
To check I did another flight with a 3S 4400mah setup and the motors were again getting hot, not as hot but the flight time was 5 mins vs 13 mins.
It's also worth noting with the 4S setup the ESCs were also getting hot, again after a 13 min test flight.
The flight itself basically consisted of a 13 minute hover in loiter mode, I was testing battery times, and consumed 5000mah. The weather for the UK was hot, 25 deg C. The Y6 is a new 2014 B version weighing 1900 grams or so, std config plus 600 gram pack, with std 10 inch props and 850 blue motors.
And finally to the question, is this normal of does something sound wrong?
The only thing I can think I haven't done is balance the props, guide for this would be handy, but I have no vibration issues looking at the data log.
Replies
Well, I think the ESC issue is a thing of past. The ZTW Spider 30A OPTO Small are working fabulously (knock on wood). Responsive, no sync issues...all is well.
I've read that Maytech and ZTW are one in the same (board wise), but I don't believe that to be the case, at least with the new versions. In fact, some say virtually all ESC's with SimonK f/w are the same. Not in my experience.
Anyway, the biggest problem I've had is the Y6B RTF parameters were very much not liked by this Spy 750 and motors. Thanks to Randy and Leonard, it's all working out fine.
Now I must say in all honesty, after having both the Y6B and this Spy 750, although the cool factor is there with the Spy, the motors are darn powerful and it was built for a purpose, the fun factor is higher on the Y6B. No kidding. I'm going to gather up the borrowed parts and put her back together.
Glad to hear your Y6 is humming along nicely. I too have developed mine as far as I can. Will go out and enjoy flying with it now that it's not overheating and the 690kv motors are plenty powerful with the 13 and 14 inch props.
I've now shift back to swapping out my 880kv motors on my OctoQuad for Sunnysky 4108S 600kv motors and installed self-tightening quick disconnect hubs for the props from FoxTechFPV.
Hey, Doug, which quick disconnects did you get? I bought some from Hobby King, but they do not fit the 3DR motors...
Well Doug, it's orders of magnitude better than the first flights. The Rate-PID is demonstrably higher than Y6B RTF defaults. The difference is night an day, but in any GPS mode it is quite twitchy when adjusting to hold position when the wind picks up a bit. Not a big deal; am getting close to flying a mission (RTL works well). Yaw wanders a bit, and Leonard suggested increasing the IMax on Yaw to correct it.
Now it is a matter of getting the right props to bring the pwm a bit closer still and fine tuning . The throttle @hover is right at 50%
Currently it is running APC 13x5.5 MR on top and 14x5.5 CF TM style bottom. The cross section of the CF props are much wider than the APC MR, so I'm going to just have to play with things to get it right. No doubt there are a lot of dynamics going on here beyond my engineering ability :)
What I'm very pleased with is the current usage @hover is equal to or less than my Y6B even though it is 700g heavier! Flight times are >20 min in 30 degF temps, so that exceeded expectations.
I don't have as much faith in ECalc for co-axial Y6 configurations now. that's for sure.
Please update your Octo project as you progress. I'm always interested in your findings.
It's been a while since I posted a question about the Sunnysky X4108S and Y6 well I tried it but I had trouble getting it stable using the pixhawk so I got longer carbon fiber arms and switched the controller to the naza m, but I'm ready to switch back to the pixhawk. Well hear is a pic
2015-07-12 21.30.41.jpg
Well the props didn't come. Darn! Oh well.
For those with hot motors (particularly unequal temps), part of the solution may be as simple as balancing your copter. I ended up using scales. No more guesswork, using strings, fingers etc., and makes for very accurate balancing.
I did it the old way first, but forgot to take pictures. Note how offset the battery is to the center of the mounting plate. It looks odd, but the CG is right on; the copter was pulling to the left, QED. It is also much further forward than it was originally.
Anyway, this is just for anyone that finds it interesting and wants a quick and accurate way to balance their MR without fiddling around. It's very easy to get within a few grams. Using this method helped with my Y6B's hot motor issues.
The scales are 2000g capacity from Ebay for ~$8 US.
Maybe I'm not imagining things.
http://multirotorforums.com/threads/kde-direct-has-added-multi-roto...
The Maytechs would not spin the motors on my new Y6; horrible sync issues. With the 3DR ESC's, it is flaky; the motors are not smooth sounding although it is flyable, however the copter lumbers too much. Some of that may be lack of tuning, but they are not responsive and I don't think they are spinning as fast as they should. The timing may be set too low, but that's two sets of SimonK ESC's that don't play nice with these KDE motors. So I'm hoping the HW XRotors will work better as they are not SimonK and have 3 timing settings.
The vendor took back the Maytechs, but no word back on how they're going to make it right. I told them up front they were for KDE and asked if it was plug-n-play. Right on their website they claim to have tested them on KDE motors. Last word was they would exchange for ZTW Spiders, but I read they are problematic too (virtually identical to Maytech I've heard)!! Great. Neither has adjustable timing.
Sometimes it's best to take your medicine; I should have bought the $$$ KDE ESC's, would be happily flying. They say that's how they get such high efficiencies from the motor; they are dynamically timed and use proprietary firmware.
Sorry to hear of your problems. This is one area I have not spent time testing and learning. "If it works...don't break it." But I'm also the kind of person that can't just be satisfied with the standard results, so I break mine to learn more and to help others with my results.
Good luck. Will keep watching for how your situation was resolved and outcome of your flight tests.
Eh, live and learn. The supplier called today and did me right I have to say, even more than expected. Altitude Hobbies will get more of my business.
He gives stuff to test to a guy named "Kloner" who I have seen posting at RCGroups and Multirotor Forums, and I trust what he says. In my case, it is a mystery why the Maytechs wouldn't work.
So, we'll see what happens once I get different ESC's.
I ordered some 14x5.5 CF props from http://www.diyquadcopters.com/ $24 vs $72 (T-Motor) I can tolerate, and although there are junk CF props out there, the difference between most IMO is you're paying for T-Motor to balance them.
I should get them by week's end; getting antsy already.
@ Hubertus
This file (2014-09-28 07-46-51.zip) shows great results for a circle flight. The vibrations and RCOU are impressive compared to the other BIN file. Did you change anything?
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