Comments

• T3

  Aerhead March 20, 2012 at 8:27am

  Bradley

  I'm still thinking that you don't have the one ESC going to a low enough throttle setting.  Try recalibrating all four ESC to a lower throttle setting by adjusting the trim on your Tx lower.  Having set lower will not bother the APM 2.  Be sure to set it back to center after your done.

  Larry
• Chris Mulder March 20, 2012 at 8:25am

  All of the ground signals should be connected together anyway because most ESCs will have this connected to the -ve wire of the ESC input - these should all in turn all be connected to the same -ve terminal on the battery pack... worth checking that this is the case using a multimeter...

  Sounds to me as if you have a faulty ESC ... I also found that some cheaper ESCs that I'd bought started misbehaving as soon as I used the 5v output from the BEC.

   

  How does the ESC behave when you plug it into the APM output pins directly?
• 

  Ellison Chan March 20, 2012 at 8:14am

  Btw, I also don't use the power harness as supplied by 3DR, since I build my own frame, and power bus.  I plug all my ESC into the APM.  If they are working properly, all the regulators on them should be outputting regulated 5v, and it shouldn't be a problem.  Additionally do that means that all the grounds are connected together, which imho, is better for signal decoding, since all signals are relative to ground.
• 

  Ellison Chan March 20, 2012 at 8:10am

  Oops, yes, "I would replace it".
• 

  Ellison Chan March 20, 2012 at 8:00am

  Bradley sounds like you have an ESC that's either failing or just slight out of spec. so that it is not decoding the pwm from the APM properly.  I would not replace it, because you don't want it to fail while in the air.
• T3

  Aerhead March 20, 2012 at 7:35am

  bradley

  Look at the starting guide.  It shows how to connect the ESCs.  You can just connect all the ESC and they will be connected together but it is not the recommended way.  If all the ESC are not the same type connecting them all could be a problem.

  Larry 
• T3

  Aerhead March 20, 2012 at 6:17am

  Bradley

  Your problem with the ESC is common.   Setting up the programming of the ESCs and calibrating them can be challenging.  Throttle calibration must be done very carefully.  

  The starting point of your throttle stick when using a receiver to control your ESCs MUST be at a low enough setting to have your APM 2  be able to control them.

  Search for how to calibrate ESC and do all four the same if you have not done that already.

  Jiro meant to write ESC instead BEC.  BEC stands for battery eliminator circuit.  There is a BEC built in most ESC that gives you 5 volt to power servos and flight controllers.  You can buy a stand alone BEC to get a 5 volt supply for a large voltage range.

  Larry 
• 

  Jiro Hattori March 20, 2012 at 5:09am

  I found smiler issue of initialization of BEC and some reason. The APM2 or post firmware of AC2.4 may have sensitivity to the voltage of power supply. You may have some drop down of voltage on PDB by some reasons; wiring, soldering, cable size and so on. Any idea for this?
• T3

  Aerhead March 19, 2012 at 8:36pm

  Bradley

  I've been fighting the same problem for days.  I think I found the reason for the arming problem.

  If you unplug the USB without clicking on the DISCONNECT button the APM 2 board will not arm after you connect the battery.

  To bring the board back so you can arm, just plugin the USB and open the Terminal screen.  What for a minute and you'll see both LEDs are flashing.

  Now the important part. CLICK on the DISCONNECT button and the board should work when you connect power.  If it still won't arm try just waiting 10 minutes to plug it in.

  Good luck

  Larry
• Developer

  Jason Short March 13, 2012 at 9:39am

  Add sonar - Yes.