OK and safe to check out code from rep for flying ?

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garfield_de
Posts: 2
Joined: Wed Jul 24, 2013 10:01 pm

OK and safe to check out code from rep for flying ?

Post by garfield_de »

Hello Everyone,
actually, a friend of mine is flying a high-powered multiwii copter. The performance of the copter is great to even crazy. Unfortunately we started to see issues all of a sudden with crashes.
Basically either one or multiple motors would stop in flight randomly, sometimes after 1-2 minutes, sometimes only on the 2nd flight after 10 minutes..

Up to now, we have repaired the copter three times and done the following:

- Added a buffer capacitor to prevent brownouts
- Re-calibrated the high and low-power of the ESCs (to make them start at the same time)

The regulators are multistar 30a from hobbyking with SimonK-SW. We have set the following: #define MINTHROTTLE 1100 // (*) in the config.h
Now, we have re-built the copter once again, but have also done the following in addition:

- Changed the BEC to a better one
- Changed the receiver from a 8-Channel Turnigy one to a Jeti one

I am not sure however if it is a hardware problem. Unfortunately, Multiwii has no logging, so it is quite hard to diagnose what is going on.
So, i have two questions:

- What do you think could be the issue ?
- Do you think it is safe enough to check out code from the repo for productive flying ? - Up to now, i have used version 2.2. Would it maybe improve stability to use a checked out version ?

Board is a Crius AIOP v2.

Any help would be appreciated.

Cheers

F.

Deet
Posts: 129
Joined: Sun Jul 08, 2012 1:54 am

Re: OK and safe to check out code from rep for flying ?

Post by Deet »

Sounds like an ESC/Motor issue, most likely an ESC is overheating

PatrikE
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Location: Sweden
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Re: OK and safe to check out code from rep for flying ?

Post by PatrikE »

I hope you are NOT using bullet connectors between esc and motor's.
It's a well known problemsource.

PatrikE
Posts: 1976
Joined: Tue Apr 12, 2011 6:35 pm
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Re: OK and safe to check out code from rep for flying ?

Post by PatrikE »

I hope you are NOT using bullet connectors between esc and motor's.
It's a well known problemsource.

Sebbi
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Joined: Sun Jul 08, 2012 1:08 am
Location: Germany
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Re: OK and safe to check out code from rep for flying ?

Post by Sebbi »

PatrikE wrote:I hope you are NOT using bullet connectors between esc and motor's.
It's a well known problemsource.


I do and never had a problem. What kind of problems would they cause?

garfield_de
Posts: 2
Joined: Wed Jul 24, 2013 10:01 pm

Re: OK and safe to check out code from rep for flying ?

Post by garfield_de »

Hi !
It really can not be ESC overheating as the problem also occured ~ 30 seconds after lift-off while just hovering without excessive power.
Even when flying the device full power, it performed sometimes for 10 minutes, so i guess we can remove overheating from the list.

In fact, we were using bullet connectors, but have removed them now.

I am not sure if this is actually the source of a problem. I have heard only of issues when using the bullet connectors before the ESC in the main power lines, but not in the motor wires. - Can using bullet connectors between the ESC and motor stop completely the rotor spinning ?

Coming back to my initial question: Does it make sense to use actually a dev or not-release version to fly the copter as it may be more stable ? - If so, which version could be used ?

Cheers

F.

agittins
Posts: 3
Joined: Sat Jul 27, 2013 4:19 pm

Re: OK and safe to check out code from rep for flying ?

Post by agittins »

I know it's a week old or so but rule of thumb is: if stability matters, use official releases, not development versions. Occasionally you might come across some issue which is solved in a development version and it's worth switching but only in specific cases and these are fairly rare generally. If you don't want to crash, stay with official releases and give it a week or two after release before updating (by which time someone else will find out if there are any major bugs)!

Your problem sounds a LOT like bullet connector issues. Doesn't matter if they're on the battery side or the motor side of the esc, an intermittent connection to just about anything on a multirotor is a disaster in waiting. I think the esc can lose sync with the motor if one of the connections intermittently drops (not sure) but at the very least you are going to lose power to the motor while the connection is broken. The problem seems to be with the bullet connectors which have the "skirt" on the male connector which is free to rotate - meaning it's also free to break contact. You can solder one end of the skirt to the plug but you have to be careful to not flow solder into the skirt or the plug will be impossible to insert. I just solder directly now.

scrat
Posts: 925
Joined: Mon Oct 15, 2012 9:47 am
Location: Slovenia

Re: OK and safe to check out code from rep for flying ?

Post by scrat »

What flight controller your friend uses on his copter and how your friend powers the FC....with ESC or separate BEC?

rudebo80
Posts: 2
Joined: Tue Oct 18, 2011 8:09 am

Re: OK and safe to check out code from rep for flying ?

Post by rudebo80 »

garfield_de wrote:The regulators are multistar 30a from hobbyking with SimonK-SW.


If i remember correctly, HK multistar 30a is using switching bec. conecting this bec in parallel for powering the fc will causing problem.
Regards

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