Hi , I am a total newbie when it comes to electric flight and in all honesty a little confused about what goes where and step down regulators etc...
Could someone kindly help me out with the diagram I have made of my set up and point me in the right direction.
My Questions are ;
Is it save to use the 11.1V lipo to power everything ?
Am I able to use the 4.8V as a back up battery , switchable durring flight ?
What is the manual switch for when you can power it up by the 2 deans connecter ?

Once I have this set up , I`ll be taking my 1st plane to the skys.

Many Thanks.

[img]file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/Desktop/Wiring%20Diagram.JPG[/img]

Your setup is fine. No switch is needed, when you plug the battery in, the system is powered up.

And the 4.8 battery is not needed. Everything will run off the Lipo pack

Remove the NiCd pack, and the switch from your drawing. The rest of the drawing gets a star, and will be less confusing. And as MinnFlyer stated, the Pack plug-in (Deans) will be your disconnect (switching effect).
-Snuts-

Thank you both for promptly letting me know .
King Regards.

Just remember, once you plug in the Lipo
it will arm your ESC and the Prop becomes
dangerous. Use caution with the right stick (Throttle)

Bob

Hi!
You mean left stick (throttle) !?

Yes, my bad

Bob

Not neccessarily, there are a lot of Mode 1 fliers scattered around the world!?

I have recently bought a voltwatch2 to monitor my battery but it says for NiMh and NiFe only up to 6.0V.
Is there any way i can use it for my lipo ?
Sorry if this sounds silly but I`m a total newbie to wireing instalation.
Many Thanks .

Voltwatch won't do anything for the Lipo. It will stay green until the lipo drops below 6 volts, but if that were to happen you would already be in pretty serious trouble.

If you wanted to, you could use the nicad battery and the switch, and bypass the BEC. The only reason you would do this is for safety - if something goes wrong with the Lipo and you don't use the nicad, you lose control of the plane. If you use the Nicad and something goes wrong with the lipo, you lose engine power but not servo power, and can still land the plane.

Why do people recommend doing this (using two batteries) - is it a weight issue? I was taught always to use a separate receiver battery for safety.

Hello Joe and thanks for the response . I am still struggling to understand how to bypass the BEC . I have attached a diagram to see if you can point out to me what I`m missing . The 2 " Yellow " boxes are male ends , surely these can`t plug into the receiver as well ?
I would like to fly my plane with a saftey battery but don`t know how to wire it all together without damaging anything .
Please Help !!!!

Many Thanks.

[img]file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/Desktop/Wiring%20Diagram%202.JPG[/img]

Sparky,
Are you an electrician? Just asking, most people with a sparky handle deal with electrons.

What you need to do is remove the red wire from the connector that goes to the RX, from the ESC, this disables the 4.8V to power the RX. Then use the 4.8v pack to power the rx by using another available channel on the RX for power.

This saves all the lipo power for the motor. Most people use this set-up flying the larger electric planes.

Sparky,
Here's a picture, notice at the very top you have the red wire removed from the ESC Rx wire. This was shrink wrapped.

Use a pin to release the wire from the connector rather than cut it, then you can replace it.

The switch has 3 leads on it - one goes to the battery, one goes to the receiver, and one is a charge jack for charging the battery.

The hot (red) wire from the ESC to the Rx can be removed from the male plug. The three wires are clipped in, and you can lift one of the clips with a hobby knife and remove the wire. The ESC then only has the responsibility of controlling electricity to the motor (throttle).

Thanks for the response guys , when I have a spare hour , I`ll try what you both have suggested .
Many Thanks guys.

Okay guys , here`s where I am with my electrics plus another newbie question .

I have removed the red wire so my lipo runs the motor and the NiMh runs my 3 servos which is monitored by a voltwatch2 .
My question now is , which battery will run out the quickest or do I have to do fly-bys and check the voltwatch to see ifl the NimH battery is still within its saftey zone.
This is my first plane so I know nothing .

Kind Regards.

Re charge the lipo after each flight !

Check the Rx battery before each flight
with a volt meter (loaded).


Bob

TheLliPo will be good for about 10 minutes of flight depending on power setting
The NiMH should be good for about an hour!

Just make sure the Voltwatch has the little switch set to the correct nominal voltage. I pack it in for the day when the unloaded (ie the servos aren't twiddling) reading is one LED into the amber. That's usually after 4 or 5 ten minute flights on a 2100mAH pack at 6V with 6 digital servos. So a 3 servo setup, 1100mAh 4.8V should have approximately the same duration.
Regards,
Carole Sherrington

Thank you very much Carole , that made complete sense to me and very informative .
Thanks again to everyone who`s helped me with my issue.

Many Thanks .

I have been thinking about the set up,but was wondering about the added weight. Does it change the performance and handling?