What amperage ESC do I need?

[r3ap3rxy]

The ESC I have at the moment is an align RCE-BL25T (25a) which I think is faulty as I can only get about 2-3min flying time before I lose power. Batteries are fine and the people I have spoken to say its likely down to the ESC. I've been looking at the Scorpion Commander's but am not sure which to get. Should I replace with another 25a or go higher, maybe 35a? The motor is a 420lf.

[acwman]

Have you checked everything else?

Is gear mesh too tight? is belt too tight?
Are the Lipos ok.. How many amps are you putting back into them after your 2-3 minutes flight? When you say losing power at 2-3 minutes.. how bad is it? is it that it won't fly/hover anymore? tail wagging?

Does your esc have a Low voltage cut out enabled?

Align supply the 35a with there 450 kits now, and have found it more than adequate, in that I have not had any problems with it.

[Smoothound]

The current rating of the ESC won't alter the flight time! all it does is allow you to pull more Amps. It's possibly you are pulling too many amps for the reasons above and the ESC is going into Low Voltage Cutoff.

I'd steer clear of the Scorpion ESC's, motors are good but the ESC is pretty poor IMHO!

[r3ap3rxy]

Have you checked everything else?

Is gear mesh too tight? is belt too tight?
Are the Lipos ok.. How many amps are you putting back into them after your 2-3 minutes flight? When you say losing power at 2-3 minutes.. how bad is it? is it that it won't fly/hover anymore? tail wagging?

Does your esc have a Low voltage cut out enabled?

Align supply the 35a with there 450 kits now, and have found it more than adequate, in that I have not had any problems with it.

Gear mesh and belt seem fine. Once the heli lost power I put the lipo in another heli and it was flying for 6+minutes. After the 3minutes, anything over half stick and there's no power. Its been happening for about 2 weeks now and since then the tail has had a slow wag. Im not sure about the low voltage cut off, cant seem to find the manual anywhere.

The current rating of the ESC won't alter the flight time! all it does is allow you to pull more Amps. It's possibly you are pulling too many amps for the reasons above and the ESC is going into Low Voltage Cutoff.

I'd steer clear of the Scorpion ESC's, motors are good but the ESC is pretty poor IMHO!

I thought the Scorpion's where supposed to be good, what would you recommend? Something around £40.

[Smoothound]

I'm a bit out of touch with smaller ESC's but I'd go for a Castle Creations if you can afford but I'm sure someone else will suggest something cheaper soon Personally I'd go for a Kontronik but they are even dearer than the castle

[acwman]

Gear mesh and belt seem fine. Once the heli lost power I put the lipo in another heli and it was flying for 6+minutes. After the 3minutes, anything over half stick and there's no power. Its been happening for about 2 weeks now and since then the tail has had a slow wag. Im not sure about the low voltage cut off, cant seem to find the manual anywhere.



I thought the Scorpion's where supposed to be good, what would you recommend? Something around £40.

Well, Guessing if it was ok before and the problem has just started up, it could be the esc??

Scorpion esc has always worked for me. Have used the 60 and 55 scorpions in 450 sized helis. Apart from the soft start not being all that good, I have had no problems with mine and... touch wood, have not had one go wrong on me. Have owned 4 so far.

Hope you do sort the problem..

[Smoothound]

Well, Guessing if it was ok before and the problem has just started up, it could be the esc??

Scorpion esc has always worked for me. Have used the 60 and 55 scorpions in 450 sized helis. Apart from the soft start not being all that good, I have had no problems with mine and... touch wood, have not had one go wrong on me. Have owned 4 so far.

Hope you do sort the problem..

That's my main gripe with them to be honest. Considering how late they came into the ESC market the soft start is simply not good enough at best and complete crap at worst. I just can't be bothered to use these poorly programmed ESC's in this day and age. It can't be that hard to get it right can it? There is no excuse when you are not exactly charging entry level prices!! CC and Kontronik can do it every time! If you can't be arsed to make a proper soft start why list it on the programming? I mean ther Scorpion ESC's have 3 levels of start and they are really FAST, FASTER and FASTEST not what they describe them as....

All the time people keep accepting it as OK they will not spend time and fix it

Rant over

[acwman]

All the time people keep accepting it as OK they will not spend time and fix it

Rant over

Haha...LOL.. I was being polite..but agree with you that the Soft Start is Cr@p..

Only use them on the 450s, and with my flying, the soft start, I don't really need them.. as the way I fly, I just get it up to speed and then chuck it around

...but really compared with even the Align esc it is laughable as described as having a soft start Haha

The Kontronics are amazing.. and I have also found the Jeti 'spin' series esc very good.

[Smoothound]

As much as it pains me to admit the Align ones are pretty good in the slow start dept

[derrick]

Could this problem be anything else, ie motor i have looked at the heli myself but i am not really into electrics, Every thing is running freely,
So is there a way of checking if it's the motor or esc.
i use a scorpion esc on my beam and had no trouble with it the bad softstart i will live with lol