Trex 550x beast x

[mr magoo]

Hi Guys

just had my forth flight and taking a left hand turn, on taking the turn the beastx re-initialise in mid air and down she went.

all the servo and power plugs where in correctly, on the bench I rechecked all the plug and wiggled the stick and all was fine, then the power stop to the beastx, replug power and all was fine.

what your thoughts on this

[rhodesengr]

need more info about your setup.
What is your RX setup?
How do you power the RX and your RX?
Where is the power connected?
Post some photos?

[mr magoo]

The setup I have is main flight lipo to esc with build in bec, running power to the beastx, from esc, all servo's plugged into beastx and the cables from beastx to jr dmss recieiver

[rhodesengr]

hmmm, should be ok. Not familiar with that RX though.

[Abenn]

What ESC are you using, and what servos? As rhodesengr has said, we need more details.

More likely than the BeastX re-initialising on its own, possibly the receiver re-booted for some reason -- maybe the BEC in the ESC couldn't supply enough power.

[mr magoo]

This is what comes with the trex 550x kit

730MX Brushless Motor(960KV) x 1

DS820M High Voltage Brushless Servo x 3
Rating voltage: DC 7.4-8.4V

DS825M High Voltage Brushless Servo x 1
Rating voltage: DC 7.4-8.4V

RCE-BL100A Brushless ESC x 1 (hobbywing branded align)

Jr dmss receiver 8 channel Operating Voltage : 4.0V-8.5V

[rhodesengr]

so just FYI, I have had zero problems with my 550x using all stock equipment. Did you set your BEC voltage? I set mine to 7.6 for no particular good reason. However, I am using a Spektrum AR7700 RX that has a Sat in addition to the main RX.

Really only two things to explain your situation; either power connectors are loose or you are have an RX signal loss. Hard to tell which from here. You could mount up a telemetry recorder like a TM1000 which would monitor both RX issues and BEC voltage.

[Smoggie]

Your antenna routing doesnt look good. In the photo it looks like both antenna are just laying together and not fixed in place.
The idea of diversity antenna like you have on your Rx is that they are routed to different locations on the heli and put in different orientations, ideally at 90 degrees to each other. Having them sitting together defeats the object of having diversity antenna.

Did you carry out a range check prior to flying from all orientations around the heli?

[Ah Clem]

Grumpy Old Man is absolutely right on the antenna placement!

How many amps is the BEC rated for? For this size of machine you need at least 10 amps, constant.

How many power leads from the BEC to the Receiver? To get ten amps you need at leasttwo power leads.

What does your receiver telemetry show? Do you have the low voltage alarm set in the transmitter?

[canbarelyhover]

+1 on the antenna placement. I never really cared myself until it cost me a crash. Luckily it was just on a 450. Range check is a good start but nothing beats in flight telemetry to see the avarage fades/drops that are happening with your particular flight style(affects distance and orientation) during the course of a 5min flight.

[mr magoo]

I had the bec voltage set to 8v and its output current: continuous 10A / instant. 25A, I have the power lead from the esc going to the mirco beast.

the antenna place is as JR recommend only reason for the way they are in pic as I was checking all connection which all seemed fine

I have the radio set to 5 min flight time, I was only in a 90 seconds of flight, lipo had 76% after crash

I don't have telemetry set up. range test was fine

I'm doing to get a new kits any advise on a new electrical setup

[Smoggie]

I'm at a bit of a loss then. Does the Microbeast have data logging? That often helps narrow down the cause.

I had a similar loss of control incident on my Trex 700X on the fourth flight which I couldn't positively identify the cause of. In my case i was just flying along straight and level quite close in when it suddenly went into a fast pirouette and wouldnt stop spinning even after hitting throttle hold. Mechanically all was fine after the crash so it must have been something in the FBL or receiver at fault, so i changed out both. Fortunately i had a spare FBL and sat receivers. I also added a couple of capacitors to protect against possible voltage fluctuations.

I cant really say what fixed it but something did because i've had 20 flights since without issue.

[rhodesengr]

Originally Posted by mr magoo

I'm doing to get a new kits any advise on a new electrical setup

You never posted what TX you have. I am assuming you have a JR TX?
Looks like the RX you were is discontinued. You should choose a new RX that will work with your TX and connect to the MB with single line.

This is from the MB manual:
SRXL is a data format that is used by different manufacturers of radio systems and that is sometimes designated differently. Please see this site for further information. Choose SRXL when using the single-line signal of one of the following receivers: JETI receivers with UDI serial output mode (not PPM), JR receivers with XBUS Mode B output, Multiplex M-Link receivers with SRXL output, BEASTRX receivers with SRXL output,

If you have a Spektrum TX you can use the AR7700

This link talks about which JR TX's can support xbus mode B
https://www.jrpropo.co.jp/english/dl/data/XG_XBusEN.pdf

Here is one of several JR RX's that have xbus
http://www.jramericas.com/234670/JRPR03597/?pcat=474

You just have to do your research and choose products known to play together.

[mr magoo]

the radio I have is a jr14xg

[rhodesengr]

well like i said, you have to do the research and find components that play together but looks like they bundle your radio with this RX
http://www.horizonhobby.com/radios/a...iver-jrpr03597

So that might be one to look at. Doesn't seem in stock at a few places I looked but that looks like the one to get. Looks like it also has telemetry so you can record the BEC voltage and RX fades (if it works like the Spektrum stuff I have).

[mr magoo]

sorry rhodesengr I can get telemetry but only rx voltage anything else I would have to get sensors for.

you talked about using two power cable, what the best way would it not over power the system .

I have been looking at one of these

http://www.fast-lad.co.uk/store/prod...ducts_id=27906

and this

http://www.fast-lad.co.uk/store/prod...ducts_id=28610

[rhodesengr]

Originally Posted by mr magoo

you talked about using two power cable, what the best way would it not over power the system .

Well it wasn't me that mentioned two power cables but that just means to apply power on two empty ports. You can't easily do that with the 550x stock BEC since it only has one output cable. Some BECs come with two output cables. I am just running the one wire on mine. If you use an RX battery instead of the BEC to run the lectronics, then you can easily make up a cable that splits the battery to two servo-style plugs. This is what I did on my 700L which uses an LiFe battery and not a BEC.

There is nothing wrong with adding the optipower backup device but that isn't what was meant (I think). The Optipower just kicks in when the BEC voltage drops out, otherwise it is actually a small load because it charges while you fly.

You know that maybe you just have a bad wire or maybe rubbed through on the frame. I have a foamy plane that came with cheap servo. The rudder stated acting crazy flying back and forth. Turned out to be a bad connector from the rudder servo. I cut it off and soldered ona different one and it fixed the problem. On the bench, try wiggling all your wires and maybe you can find the bad one.

[Ah Clem]

"Well it wasn't me that mentioned two power cables but that just means to apply power on two empty ports. "

I was the one who mentioned the second power cable.

You can have a million amp BEC, but the most you will get through one of the servo type cables is about five amps, so you may well have browned out the FBL unit in flight.

The second power cable would come from the BEC and be connected to either a spare port in the receiver or the FBL unit.

I have a JR XG14 and have flown it in a variety of aircraft (both helicopter and fixed-wing). It is an excellent radio!

What rhodesengr said about checking the cables is spot-on! One bad one and it can ruin your whole day.

What he also mentioned about X-Bus is good too! I have X-Bus with the Beast X on my Trex 700E and it works beautifully. Much better connected "feel" than with all the PPM cables. You can run one of the aforementioned power cables to the receiver (the X-Bus cable will carry current to the FBL unit) and one to the FBL unit itself.

[Smoggie]

It does seem a little stupid to put a 25A BEC in the ESC then feed it through a single servo plug. I did some testing with high currents through servo plugs a while back and concluded that the max sustained current was around 5A (limited by voltage drop). I did put up to 8A through a plug but the voltage drop was about 1V and it got pretty hot. For very short term spikes though i'm sure it could easily pass well over 10A.

Having said this, I very much doubt that it's the cause of your problems because many others are flying the Trex 550X Super Combo very hard without any issue and by the sounds of it you werent even working the servos hard at the time.

Only thing i can suggest is just to go over the installation with a fine tooth comb and make sure everything is perfect, with especial,care to antenna placement with respect to shielding form the frames, battery and other 'solid' objects.

once the installation is checked and ok do a servo load test by doing very rapid pitch pumps (with motor not running). This should expose any serious issues with power supply to the FBL/receiver.. Then do a very thorough range check from all positions around the heli. If all that checks out you should be good to go.

[rhodesengr]

You could put a Y-cable on the BEC output to artificially make two connections but i don't see the point in that. It just adds more wire and all the current still has to flow through the Y common point. I think there is usually more resistance in the connector than the wire, so using a Y cable doesn't really help.

I am still thinking it was either your RX acting up for whatever reason or a bad connector/damaged wire rather than a power issue.