Couple of guys have crashed electric planes at the field recently. Reason has been that the ESC quit. All planes have an e-flite ESC? I am on the side that it was pilot error, but would like to know if anyone else has had problems a e-flite ESC

Are they all on 2.4? Just asking because if the battery voltage gets too low it could cause a rx brownout.

Reading the somewhat limited descriptions of a couple of the E-Flite esc's on Horizon Hobby's website doesn't give the info I was looking for.

The logic that sets the minimum voltage level on some ESCs can cause problems if the battery doesn't start the flight fully charged. There are some ESCs that read the start voltage and take some percentage of that as the minimum voltage for that flight. That can kill the battery and the flight and really isn't very good logic.

It says you can program the E-Flite ESCs minimum voltage but I didn't find what the default is if you don't choose a setting. What does the info say that comes with those ESCs?

You really should have a fixed voltage programmed into your ESCs if there is any possibility you might start a flight with a less than full LiPo. It's something like 3V/cell. I know there is one major brand ESC that does that percentage thing. A couple of us have ruined batteries and wrecked planes with that brand. I'd started out with Castle Creations ESCs and didn't read the fine print when I bought one of these less expensive, big name company ESCs.

I've had several problems with the "non-pro" E-Flite ESC's and one "Pro" ESC.

The BEC on the ESC will get overloaded with as few as three servos, potentially causing in-flight failures.

However people are best advised to always check out the servo handling capacity of on-board BECs when they are used!


The Thermal shutdown on the ESC's seems to kick in prematurely, even if the ESC is somewhat cool.

Things like motor timing, etc. tends to reset itself surrepitiously, to the point that I have to resort to bringing the programming guide with me whenever I take a E-Flite ESC equipped plane out to the airfield. 10-20% of the time I have to reset the settings.

The ESC's do not seem to have a lot of overhead... so if it is rated for 30A, THEY MEAN IT! Not 35A for 10 second bursts, as the latter will wreck the ESC.


The newer "Pro" series ESC's went with a switching mode BEC, so at least the servo draw problem is addressed on those.

As with all electronics, to be safe always design in a 20% margin!

the crashes were within 30 seconds from take off with I assume fully charged lipos.  the complaint was always, " i don't have control"  I take that in two ways.. 1. you really have no control, nothing. and 2. you don't have control as you expected..<div>I can't imagine that a large company such as e-flite would sell ESC that are so bad, that say 80% of people that use them, crash them..  on that thought i would say that there is a very good chance that the crashes at the field is due to pilot error.  People that say they are good rc pilots don't ever want to blame themselves for the crash.. lol.. I know very little about electrics as i fly nitro and gas, just curious on the problem of others at the field.</div>

The "I don't have control" situation is symptomatic of the on board BEC being overloaded.

E-Flite does tell everyone in their documentation that you are supposed to use NO MORE than TWO servos if you are using their ESC with 11.1v LiPo packs or above.

Yet many RTF or receiver ready planes come with 3 or 4 servos hooked up along with a 11.1v LiPo pack... or the pilots fail to head the warning on their own planes.

I've seen ESC's from other manufacturers used in a similiar manner, only to have the pilot loose their plane under similiar circumstances.

No one pays attention to the current rating of the on board BEC.... yet it is more important in most cases, than the ESC's power rating.

Hmm.. interesting, Opjose. I wonder why some folks would rely on power ratings because that's only part of the equation. I, personally, always thought it was the current capabilities (max operating amperage) that was one of the most important parts of selecting an ESC. That asssumes that current is independent of voltage, meaning that a 30 amp ESC will do so with 2 or 3 cell IiPo packs, which, of course, it is not. Power factor is ok if it is taken in the proper context. I've never looked at the "power"rating, just the amp ratings and have pretty much used 3 cell packs. (my "Bug" http://www.lightflite.com/ uses two cell LiPo's but that's the exception to my collection).

And, I've not thoroughly read the manual for the Eflite ESC's, but have used them with more than two servos without problems. Now I must admit that I am more of a glow person and fly electrics only on occasions.

CGr

Look at it this way.

If your ESC cuts out because of overheating, etc. but the BEC is properly matched to the power demands of the plane, the likelyhood is that you can still deadstick your plane in.

If your BEC cuts out, you loose all control, and your plane becomes an unguided missle.

For me the latter is more important so to speak.

I've also used E-Flite ESC's with 11.1v LiPo's w/o problems with three micro servos, but only when I'm using small E-Flite servos which are rated for lower current draw.

More than this is problematic on the analog BEC's often used.

The manual does go over this in detail.

Fair enough. Thanks for the informative reply.

Now you got me going. I'm gonna have to see how many Eflite ESC's I have and if I am powering them correctly. But, as you said, mine are using no more than 2 micro servos and all are using 11.1 volt LiPo packs.

The Bug uses something different, not sure exactly what it is but I'll certainly check, but I'm pretty sure it's not the Eflite.

CGr.