I Think I just blew my APM 2.5

Posted by Allen Merrell on March 16, 2014 at 5:17pm

I was setting up ch6 on my 2.5 and accidently plugged my Receiver channel 6 output into the APM 2.5's output 6. Now I can't connect MP to the APM. I no longer get all the flashing lights. I can hit the reset and get some instant flash but no connection. Can it be fixed or have I made toast out of it? HELP!!

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Replies

  • MR60
    Hugues March 17, 2014 at 10:58am

    Welcome to the club. This happened to me on TWO APM 2.5 boards in less than a month.

    Here is a first tentative to restaure the first card:

    http://www.diydrones.com/group/arducopterusergroup/forum/topics/bri...

    Then second one died too:

    http://www.diydrones.com/group/arducopterusergroup/forum/topics/sec...

    For neither of these two bricked APMs I have found a solution so => garbage.

    • Allen Merrell > Hugues March 19, 2014 at 1:53pm

      OK, guys. Randy was correct. I got my 3.3v regulator from Digkey today, soldered the little jewel in and everything went back to normal its working like a charm.

      Thanks for all the help guys.

  • Emin Bu March 17, 2014 at 2:52am

    What happens if you set the jumper on and power everything thru Input rail....

    • Allen Merrell > Emin Bu March 17, 2014 at 5:31am

      Emin, I tried that and it gave 5v on input and output + rails. I did check the 3.3v regulator and found that I am getting 5v to the input side of the regulator but on the output side of the regulator I only get 0.9 volts. This pretty much says the regulator is not working. Time to drag out the large magnifier , small tip soldering iron long skinny tweezers and tooth pick and remove the old part. Don't you just love the surface mount technology. I shure am glad this is the v252 board.

  • Crady von Pawlak March 16, 2014 at 9:40pm

    Was the receiver being powered from the APM?  If so then then both rails were shared and therefore you 'may' be able to salvage the APM.  

    If you're interested the full schematic is here:

    https://api.ning.com/files/AwOyT6gC1eGh-VuScvuVQ*1pteg76CDk1hbENyK9VgM38*TO8VqWwmy9e00NFxaaxV0DiUd652C*JFOKpGB5l9sR2ljhLQlu/APM_v252_RELEASECopy.png

    • Allen Merrell > Crady von Pawlak March 16, 2014 at 9:55pm

      No, Crady. The receiver being powered by the ESC. Thanks for link to the schematic. I think the 3.3v regulator will fix it. If it don't I will have to decide what next - APM 2.6 or Pixhawk.

    • Developer
      Randy > Allen Merrell March 16, 2014 at 11:13pm

      Allen,

           I would go with the Pixhawk over the APM2.6.  At the moment there's little difference in performance (in fact the APM2.x is arguably more stable) but the Pixhawk will perform better than the APM once AC3.2 goes out.

    • Allen Merrell > Randy March 17, 2014 at 5:01am

      Randy,

      I have been thinking strongly on the Pixhawk, It definitely has the potential, the APM has about reached its limit but still the APM is a great unit it has maxed me out not me maxing it out even though I have almost killed it. The thing that is holding me back on the Pixhawk at this point is connecting it to my radio. I use a modified ersky9x with frsky DJT module and a D8R-II Plus that I flashed with the 27ms firmware. I am not sure of how to hook it up or if it will work correctly. I know this has been a little off topic from the original post so I hope no one gets offended.

  • Allen Merrell March 16, 2014 at 7:30pm

    Randy, thanks for the help. I followed the instructions with hopes it was the 3.3 regulator but I get less than 1 volt across the two pins. Another thing that is strange is that I get 0 volts on the output pins - and + that should be 5v. When I check the input pins - and + I get 4.97 or say 5v. I have only one light that is on, on the board which is green (alive I think). Is this any clue to what is blown. 

    • Developer
      Randy > Allen Merrell March 16, 2014 at 9:08pm

      I think the output pins will only give 5V if you've got the JP1 jumper in place.

      I think the 3.3V regulator can fail in one of two ways, either it produces 5V (like in the video) or 0V.  The other component that can fail is one of the diodes but I don't know much about that.  You might get lucky and find that by replacing the 3.3V regulator all is fine again.

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