Water break in ???

[rudderman]

I was reading about the dd tail upgrade and it said something about a water break in.What is a water break in and how do you it ?Also do you have to do this with all motors ? Im use to nitro trucks so anything electric is foreign land to me lol.Thanks for any feedback

[chopperdudes]

i did dry break in and have had it for a long time and still running strong. i did it for extra protection... ran out an AA battery with it... ur good to go.

[rudderman]

So connect a AA battery to it and let it run until the battery is dead?Also do you do that with all motors

[chopperdudes]

i do it with tail motors because it's not as strong as the main, i don't do it to the main because it is quite tough. you could though... i dunno if it'll actually make a difference... just on the safe side.

[carlo_the_wonder_frog]

Put a "AA" battery and connect it directly to the motor somehow, then drop the motor in a glass of either Reverse osmosis water or another pure water with no additives. This will help seat the brushes to the commutator and help the life of the motor.

[rudderman]

So you say submerger the motor :shock:

[Buzzkill]

Is this for real?

[Raysun]

Yes it is. Slot car guys do this for a motor that needs to be as competitive as possible. The idea is that a water break in will seat the brushes without the arcing that creates burns and pits. Obviously the motor must be dried out before running in the car/heli. Plus oil the armature shaft on both end when dry.

Ray

[flyinfool]

From years of car racing my experience has been that water break-in will increase motor power but shortens motor life. Dry breaking gives longer motor life but less peak power.

So for racing, power is everything and I just put one hand on my wallet and in the water they went.

In the application of a tail rotor life is more important than peak power so I would do a dry break-in. running a full AA battery may be a lot more than needed. 15-20 minutes should seat the brushes. Those brushes are really tiny and don't need much to seat in, and don't take much to wear out.
A lot of this boils down to a Chevy VS Ford debate. there are people that will have successes and failures with either system.

[Buzzkill]

Personaly I drive a Chevy :glasses2:

[chopperdudes]

yep, when in rc cars many break it in, however, as time passes, there's more and more 'pre-cut' brushes that doesn't need break in. i do believe that breaking in the tail motor will lengthen it's lifespan. i've heard somewhere that dry break in requires a longer time than water break in (whole AA batt as opposed to 10~20min water break in) but both should seat the brushes and give longer lifespan.

[slikrx]

So you say submerger the motor :shock:
Yep, "pure" water (deionized, etc) does not conduct electricity. Dissolved salts like table salt, epsom salts, bicarb, etc dissolve into ions which conduct the electricity. No ions, no current flow.

Drop in a gram or 2 of salt, then BLAM! smoked bits. (heck, even a sweaty hand can inrotduce enough contamination to cause a problem)

[Graeme]

Is distilled water okay?

[slikrx]

Is distilled water okay?
Since I've never done this, I'm not sure... but definitely not ideal.

There's a "quick & dirty" test you can try that will give you some idea of how good it is.

You will need a multimeter that can read into the meg-ohm or gig-ohm region.
Turn the multimeter to read ohms, (highest scale, if needed) and place the tips of the leads intothe water about 1mm apart, max. Distance is important here. Closer won't be a problem, but too far apart can be.

Anyhow, with the test leads in the water <1mm apart, take an ohm reading. It SHOULD be offscale or >5 meg-ohms. (1 meg-ohm could be OK, but that's the lowest I'd even consider) If you're over 5 meg-ohm, you should be OK.

Anything lower than that and you could end up with hard water deposits or even worse - a short during break-in.

[Graeme]

Thanks for the test tip, slikrx.