40 rigger Electric conversion

[hugh hargett]

Thanks Hugh,

Battery not delivering enough power makes sense.

I will try to find some higher C packs, the key is getting one that will fit.

I got lucky that this pack fit between boom blocks like it was made for the boat.

Anyhow I'm off to search internet for a pack of the right size, cells, capacity and C rating.

Just check you measurements thats all. You should be able to find one very close in length the maybe taller and wider. Looks in the photo like you might could go a little wider and taller. For what you already have consider a slightly smaller prop than a 450 maybe a 447 or 448 if they make such a thing and see what you get. Id put a 6 series on that rigger anyway .FE's act different than the nitros

 

[fletch51]

I got a Flightpower 6S 50C Lipo, and the boat liked it a lot. Eric Canto finally saw the boat in person and pointed out that there is too much weight on the front, so I will be switching positions of ESC and battery. Fortunately, this will give me more flexibility on battery dimensions too.

Anyway, I have not moved battery yet and I ran 3 laps and then checked the temp of everything, the only thing warm was the wires between ESC and motor.

I ran about 5 more laps and decided to bring it in for another temp check. I let go of the throttle a little abruptly and the rear of boat popped up a bit and the motor would not go again. About 2 seconds later... Smoke!!....., I think the manufacturer put a little too much smoke in the ESC. So at least I got that nasty smoke out of it.. LOL

Battery and motor have been tested since ESC failure and they are fine.

I will have a Castle Hydra ICE 240 soon. the wires are gonna be longer between ESC and motor so I'm gonna get some more 10 gauge stranded wire.

Next weak point may be the motor, Im not worried tho, NEU makes nice stuff.

 

[hugh hargett]

I got a Flightpower 6S 50C Lipo, and the boat liked it a lot. Eric Canto finally saw the boat in person and pointed out that there is too much weight on the front, so I will be switching positions of ESC and battery. Fortunately, this will give me more flexibility on battery dimensions too.

Anyway, I have not moved battery yet and I ran 3 laps and then checked the temp of everything, the only thing warm was the wires between ESC and motor.

I ran about 5 more laps and decided to bring it in for another temp check. I let go of the throttle a little abruptly and the rear of boat popped up a bit and the motor would not go again. About 2 seconds later... Smoke!!....., I think the manufacturer put a little too much smoke in the ESC. So at least I got that nasty smoke out of it.. LOL

Battery and motor have been tested since ESC failure and they are fine.

I will have a Castle Hydra ICE 240 soon. the wires are gonna be longer between ESC and motor so I'm gonna get some more 10 gauge stranded wire.

Next weak point may be the motor, Im not worried tho, NEU makes nice stuff.

Im really surprized about your esc i havent heard of many of them failing;esp in a setup like the one you have.It doesnt seem to be to hot of a setup so im surprized.

 

[Chilli]

Just curious. Are the motor to esc wires soldered or are those 4mm bullets? Given the size of the boat, motor and prop, I'm pretty sure the 180 amp controller was giving you all she had. Especially if she was running a little heavy in the front. You'll love the Hydra Ice. The data logging is very cool. Very nice build!

 

[Paul Traufler]

A 180A ESC in this 6S setup would limit you to props more like < 45mm in diameter. More or less for the FE stuff you need high pitch and lower diameter props. Maybe look into a V937/3 or a V940/3 I would be careful going over 40mm in diameter, a short burst would be ok, keeping it at full throttle for a lap or two would push you over the top on the ESC. (This assumes the batteries can supply more than 180A, the 20C packs are dropping to much voltage I expect that will cause issues with the ESC.) Look into 30C packs in the 5000+ mhA range that will kick her into high gear!

Paul

 

[hugh hargett]

A 180A ESC in this 6S setup would limit you to props more like < 45mm in diameter. More or less for the FE stuff you need high pitch and lower diameter props. Maybe look into a V937/3 or a V940/3 I would be careful going over 40mm in diameter, a short burst would be ok, keeping it at full throttle for a lap or two would push you over the top on the ESC. (This assumes the batteries can supply more than 180A, the 20C packs are dropping to much voltage I expect that will cause issues with the ESC.) Look into 30C packs in the 5000+ mhA range that will kick her into high gear!

Paul

Paul he was running 50c packs I agree that his prop may have been a little large but a t180 has surge capability of 360 amps for a few seconds so I still think there was something else going on there with the failure. Maybe and incorrect timing setting or pwm setting on the esc. I also dont know if the t180 has internal bec. If it does dont use it. Use and external battery for reciever power and add some external caps inline with the power leads of the esc.

Fletch that leopard should do just fine.

 

[Paul Traufler]

Unless I missed it the packs are a 5000 20C rating, so that is the lowest potential of the system. (The motor and ESC can handle more amps than the battery can supply.) Now if the battery can NOT supply the system with what is "asked" for by the motor and ESC bad things CAN happen, but mostly that is from a large voltage drop. Think of it like this, you hook up a fire hose and nozzle to a household water outlet, the fire hose and nozzle will "ask" for more water flow but the house supply can only give you so much. Was the boat "hopping" on the water? The prop coming in/out of the water is very hard on the system, the almost instant surge in RPM with the prop out of the water then as the prop drops back into the water the load goes WAY up and the system asks for way more current. (Read this as hopping is for bunnies not FE boats!)

Perhaps the water cooling failed, this will cause some bad things to happen, pretty fast also. More of less the ESC will fail very fast without water cooling, can drag down the battery and motor with it also.

Paul

 

[hugh hargett]

Unless I missed it the packs are a 5000 20C rating, so that is the lowest potential of the system. (The motor and ESC can handle more amps than the battery can supply.) Now if the battery can NOT supply the system with what is "asked" for by the motor and ESC bad things CAN happen, but mostly that is from a large voltage drop. Think of it like this, you hook up a fire hose and nozzle to a household water outlet, the fire hose and nozzle will "ask" for more water flow but the house supply can only give you so much. Was the boat "hopping" on the water? The prop coming in/out of the water is very hard on the system, the almost instant surge in RPM with the prop out of the water then as the prop drops back into the water the load goes WAY up and the system asks for way more current. (Read this as hopping is for bunnies not FE boats!)

Perhaps the water cooling failed, this will cause some bad things to happen, pretty fast also. More of less the ESC will fail very fast without water cooling, can drag down the battery and motor with it also.

Paul

See paul:"I got a Flightpower 6S 50C Lipo, and the boat liked it a lot. Eric Canto finally saw the boat in person and pointed out that there is too much weight on the front, so I will be switching positions of ESC and battery. Fortunately, this will give me more flexibility on battery dimensions too."

Fletch whats the mah rating on those 6s 50c pack?

Ok paul you mean the horrible amps spikes created by the in and out action of a hopping prop . Got ya! Understood.Get you some extra caps inline Fletch.

 

[Chilli]

About 6 posts back Fletch switched over to a 50C Flightpower pack. In this case I really think the controller was pushed to the limit. You have 37" rigger with a big motor, running on 6S, turning a 50mm prop. You have a 180 amp 6S controller that was probably run close to it's "continuous" current and voltage rating for five laps. Now throw in a CG that was too far forward ( the boat was running wet so more amps drawn) and what looks like 4mm bullets between the motor and controller (more resistance). Remember fletch said the wires between the motor and controller were warm.

I think fletch51 is doing the right thing. Swap the battery and controller position and go to a bigger controller. Use 8 guage wire to extend the motor leads and put some bigger bullets between motor and controller. Then, down the road.... a Neu 1527!!!

Fletch, do you know how many mAh you put in the pack after the run??

JMHO

 

[fletch51]

Excellent replies and analysis of the situation, Paul, Hugh and Chilli. You're really making sense and helping me move towards figuring this boat out, for a few reasons.

Chilli: After the run the voltage was 3.8v or so per cell, it was 4.2v before run. My charger does not specify mAh delivered.

Prop was hooked up, no hopping.

I purposely didn't mention, because It may have happened after ESC failure, is that after the 5 lap run the coolant line was not attached to the rudder pickup nipple. During that five lap run(they are smallish laps, the pond is small) I did not look for for coolant spray, because I was paying more attention to the front running wet and the boat was not tracking perfectly straight. The rear of the boat did smack the water after the abrupt throttle down and that could have taken the coolant line off, I simply don't know. It is extra large Dubro tubing but it does fit very snug on rudder nipple, however it did not have a zip tie on it like every other nipple does, my mistake.

The battery is a 5000mah, 50c(100c momentary burst) rated Flightpower 6S with 12 gauge wires going through Castle 6.5mm bullets to 10 gauge ESC Input wire. The Seaking ESC also had 10 gauge Motor wires going thru 4mm bullets which are directly connected to the motor windings that extend outside the Motor body(can).

I took the motor apart to put at least 10gauge as close as possible to the fields, but realized the motor windings extend outside the can, so I decided to leave the motor alone, but I am going to eliminate the 4mm bullets between motor and ESC, and simplt have solder/heatshrink connections. I also hope to solder directly to the board of the new ESC without any bullets.

In RC car racing, it was very common to solder the battery pack in for each run, but I think in this boat I'm gonna have to stick with those 6.5mm bullets between battery and ESC.

Thanks for all the replies. I am confident this bad boy will be up and screaming soon.

 

[fletch51]

P.S. The Seaking ESC has/had a BEC which I like and I used in this setup,(I like the philosophy "less is more"). I use regulators in my nitro boats because I like lipo receiver batteries. I don't want to add a receiver pack, this boat is already getting pretty heavy. I understand the importance of capacitors too, I just hate to build a Frankenstein boat, Maybe I should stick with High Nitro and pistons.. LOL

Anyhow I already have a Castle USB thingy that I needed for five seconds to setup a Lipo regulator for a receiver pack in a fuel rigger, so I'm hooked and don't mind buying the electronics for a sweet FE!!

no big whoop, the new Flightpower pack cost about 250 chickens

 

[MarkTanski]

Don't use the BEC if you are running more than 4s, for some reason they all seem to have issues.

Not sure at this point if I'd go with the Castle Hydra Ice esc. There have been reports of this one failing as well. Castle has never had a great reputation as far as boat escs go, The joke is they are expensive to cover the cost of all the replacements.

Glad you stopped with the motor lead ideas!

I'll probably get banned for this or something but there are much better forums available for electrics.

This is a great site for nitro, but not so much electric, thats why I have almost no post count here, I've been boating and racing for about 27 years, just not so much nitro anymore.

 

[Paul Traufler]

Water line coming off was the driver to kill the ESC I'm pretty sure. Under the load it was on the ESC will make some heat, and inside a enclosed box with no water cooling it turned into a eazy bake oven! I tell all the new FE guys to route the water exit so you can see it real EASY, like the top of the cowl or some place that is NOT is the normal spray. Pretty sure this will nail down what happened on this one.

Paul

 

[hugh hargett]

Don't use the BEC if you are running more than 4s, for some reason they all seem to have issues.

Not sure at this point if I'd go with the Castle Hydra Ice esc. There have been reports of this one failing as well. Castle has never had a great reputation as far as boat escs go, The joke is they are expensive to cover the cost of all the replacements.

Glad you stopped with the motor lead ideas!

I'll probably get banned for this or something but there are much better forums available for electrics.

This is a great site for nitro, but not so much electric, thats why I have almost no post count here, I've been boating and racing for about 27 years, just not so much nitro anymore.

As far as forums there are some other good ones but alot of the guys on here are on those forums too.Besides he hasnt gotten any info from IW that has been wrong. Fletch add the caps dont get weight crazy. A good fe may weight a little more thatn its nitro counterpart,but you dont want to be replacing esc's left and right. Trust me people have run t180's in everything from amphog monos to superfast hpr cats, there was something off there that should not have been!water cooling watever? Im a firm believer that when you are running efficiently that water cooling isnt so critical. Many guys in europe run without it.I personally run watercooling but ask me do I think I have found the most efficient setups in my fe's and I will tell you NO.As far as castle I truly believe that castles need to be run as the manufacturer recommends; 2p and on a castle or a nue motor.You cant expect good warranty service if you dont follow what the manufacturer recomends.If you follow the recomendations and your product still fails and you have to pay $$$$ for repair you got a doo doo product.If you dont follow any company will use that as the first excuse to say (USER ERROR)!

I hate to put a plug out there but rather than debate on if that leopard is worthy or not if you buy the nue can I get your leopard?lol. Fletch drop down on that prop please, get in the 42-45 mm range try a 645 or so.Please also consider the caps. What should your cg be in relation to the trailing edge of the sponsons for a rigger?Could you strut be too low? could you be genrating too much lift with that 4 series prop?Is you strut angle at 0?Just a few things to consider.

 

[MarkTanski]

With your setup running 6s if you use a 645 prop your speed will be about or under 70mph. Thats about what a JAE21fe rigger running 4s with a ul-1 spec motor and esc will do. People are running a modded 1450 with spec power on the JAE.

This past winter I wrote a speed calculating program, people have been reporting that it seems to be accurate to within a few mph by GPS. It is based on the data collected from a large number of boats and setups, a known racer did that part, I just put it into an easy to use package with a simple front end.

Thats where my speed estimates for your setup came from. You might be surprised how accurate it is. I certainly was, I was expecting a much larger error factor. I can't take credit for the data collection and the statistical work.

 

[Paul Traufler]

Hey Mark is that program available for download?

Paul

 

[fletch51]

I saw a few posts on other message boards that some of the new ICE ESC's have burnt upon first connection to battery.

In car audio, some large systems incorporated a HUGE capacitor or capacitors near the amplifiers. 1 farad is a common capacity(about the physical size of two coke cans stacked) sometimes a bank of 1 farad caps are used, and before first solid connection to a battery, in order to prevent a huge arc or spark, a resistor like 1000 ohms was used in-line on one of the wires, to slowly charge capacitor. and thereafter the capacitor was permanently attached to battery so it only had to be done once. My point is I have been considering using a resistor on ESC to avoid that arc and shocking of the caps everytime I plug in the final battery connection.

My strut may be a bit low, bottom of strut is about 2.5mm below the bottom of the rear sponsons and there is about 1* negative angle.

 

[MarkTanski]

I use a 1 ohm resistor to charge my caps, the anti-spark circuit helps. In our use a nunber of smaller caps is better than 1 large cap, better heat dissipation. Make sure you use the same voltage though.

speedcalc.zip

 

[fletch51]

Yeah, I took a guess at 1000 ohms probably a bit high, but at that resistance and 1 farad capacity a 1/4 watt resistor will prolly handle the current/heat.LOL

I agree with more small caps versus one large, along with heat dissipation, the legs coming out of these small caps are thin, so multiple caps add up the conductors, like thicker wire

 

[hugh hargett]

I saw a few posts on other message boards that some of the new ICE ESC's have burnt upon first connection to battery.

In car audio, some large systems incorporated a HUGE capacitor or capacitors near the amplifiers. 1 farad is a common capacity(about the physical size of two coke cans stacked) sometimes a bank of 1 farad caps are used, and before first solid connection to a battery, in order to prevent a huge arc or spark, a resistor like 1000 ohms was used in-line on one of the wires, to slowly charge capacitor. and thereafter the capacitor was permanently attached to battery so it only had to be done once. My point is I have been considering using a resistor on ESC to avoid that arc and shocking of the caps everytime I plug in the final battery connection.

My strut may be a bit low, bottom of strut is about 2.5mm below the bottom of the rear sponsons and there is about 1* negative angle.

Its quite common to see a resistor used as a spark arrester. When I get home Ill measure one of my esc's and tell you the value. Fletch I do car stereo too.The caps you using here in the boat will be simply more of the variety you see already present on the t180. They should be appox 330uf @ 35 volts or around that. Heat transfer is one thing but multiple smaller caps in parallel will charge and discharge faster than one big cap imagine 4 1 ounce cups of water versus 1 4 ounce cup. Etti makes bank perfect for up to 6 slipo but you can get them on ebay for quite cheap.I'd throw 2-4 additional on there.The etti uses 5 i think and is kinda nice coz they have accomodations to solder the caps to the battery supply lines.you just strip away maybe a 1/8th inch of insulation and solder the bank.8 ga wire should suffice almost overkill at this short length. Thick wires will add just as much weight as the caps so i would let them get too thick or too long. Im no rigger expert but id go back to 0 degrees on my strut and id adjust my height so tha the front sponsons sees and AOA of 3-4 degrees. I dont think your strut should be lower than your sponsons. Id look for a balance point to be 1.5 to 2 inches off the sponson trailing edge.Flech find you balance point as it is now and work from there.

Mark I like your speed calculator. what did you write it in? Do you have any plans to further develop it? Things like amp draw etc would be helpful.It seems pretty basic;hull slip and rpm times the overall prop pitch and some basic unit conversion from inches to miles from rpm to rph. You can calculate torque from the kv and find the max usable amp draw from the motor specs . Id like to look at the code sometime if you dont mind. Pm me

note: I first noticed castles having problems when they wouldnt turn a little screamer outrunner without cogging and it was told by castle that it was a firmware issue. Which "could" be bs. I say could be becuase without the proper topology it doesnt matter what the firmware is; the propper hardware has to be in place for the firmware to make a difference. Ex: if the incorrect resistor and cap value is selected on the fet drivers floating power suppy the RC rise and fall time wont be fast enough to keep up with fet switching needs a multipole motor at high rpm would require.You can update the firmware in this case all you want, it wont do squat but burn up the motor bridge or cog the motor. More recently Mike lucaz almost got set a blaze buy a castle hv 240 on hookup and everything was correct polarity etc.Now you guys are reporting Castle Ice problems. I too have heard of someone burning one up on hookup, BUT

castle not the only ones to do this! Thinking as an american im sure castle has designed their esc around their motors

versus the more universal esc's by there chinese counterparts. This would result in a truly superior esc for castle and their motors but it would also make the castle esc's have motors it doesnt like. Any motors with a higher pole count or higher than expected rpm range may cause an issue. Firmware update may help but only within the limits of the topology. This is why I think people should follow the castle guidelines as stated. If castle builds its esc's like their motors they "HAVE" to have a decent esc. There motors are kick azz!Agreed?Im of a firm opinion that if you run something other than a neu or a castle motor on a a castle esc without consultation with castle support you are asking for trouble with them. Just my opinion based on the evidence. I certainly cannot believe that the engineers at castle would take the time and trouble to design and manufacture a peice of junk. They could not make money this way.Also if you have an esc with 2 servo leads one for programming and one for reciever connection IT IS PARAMOUNT you are hooked up to the right one I found through trial and error that you can fail an esc this way too.Double check all connections and make sure the reciever plugs are in the right way as alot of these esc's dont have the tab on the servo leads to ensure proper polarity.