Battery, ESC and Motor question

[surfanarchist]

OK, I know I've picked up bits and pieces that answer this but I'm not clear so here it goes. My question is; when setting up the heli power system, how do you determine correct amperage and voltage for the ESC? I know it depends on motor and battery but what is the formula you use to figure this out? I'm assuming that higher voltage batteries reqiure a lower total amperage for the ESC but how does the Kva of the motor figure into all this? How does one estimate what kind of surge amperage one may need to account for? Is there a thread on this subject?

Thanks

[Pinecone]

Well, the easy way is to use what other people have figured out. :)

There is a lot to it. KV gives motor RPM for a given voltage. Motors are rated in max watts that are safe to put through them. Amps x Volts = Watts. But you don't really know what it pulls without using a wattmeter or a data logger. If you over propr or over pitch, it can pull more amps (watts) than are safe and a) cause your ESC to shutdown, b) cause damage to your lipo pack, c) burn up your motor.

A given heli will require a certain amount of watts to fly various manuevers.

So a lot is trial and error, with some educated guessing.

For planks, you cna use something like MotoCalc.