New Equalizer 10 Announced

[Kiwi]

OK,

Its the weekend and I hope to have some time to do some more work on the EQ10. My first change was to redisgn my fancy test rig. Seeing as I want to test servos to destruction etc on it I needed a way to log the information on a PC. Viola!!!! my trusty power analyser had been gathering dust so I press ganged it into service and got rid of the ampmeter and power switch.

Now I'm ready.

[Kiwi]

OK,
First let me explain what all that junk is doing on the board.

The power analyzer reads volts, amps watts and watt/hrs. Thats more than enough to tell me whats going on and whats about to burn up if it happens.

The blue LED voltmeter tells me what voltage the receiver is getting. In this case I have a FROMECO pack direct to the Power Expander with NO REGULATORS. Yes the board is 8 volt compatible but it has an onboard regulator so the receiver sees a very clean and constant 5 volts. I will explain why 5 volts is critical later on in this series.

The servos on the right are some new units I imported from China. They are 200 oz at 6 volts and around 250 oz at 8 volts. Lets use the law of averages and assume they are good for 220 oz then. These servos cost $12:00. Yes true and I hope to test them to failure to see if they are any good at all. They are metal gear, seem to function OK and I have 20 to play with and let you guys know what I find.

The four servos on the left are some good old FMA servos from my trainer days and are just to show me if something is moving when it should not. The ganged servos are on rudder, the others are simulating throttle ailerons and elevators.

Simple stuff I hope.

Kiwi

[Kiwi]

OK,

First test have come up with bloody fantastic results. This power expander is a little more sophisticated than any other I have used so there is a learning curve for sure. Like all Smart-Fly products they are pretty straight forward once you wotk them out and this one is no different.

First trick was to do a board reset. That just put everything back to the factory spec and that is something you dont need to do with the prior versions. Once I done the reset then I done an auto calibrate. Thats fancy nerd talk for setting your radio trims to neutral and then telling the power expander to set all the channels to zero so the expander neutral matches your radio. Its bloody magic how it works and it was amazing the difference I found when I done this. I had another system on this tester last week and had all the servos set to zero using that system. Now I found on the ganged servos as much as 15 degrees difference. Thats a serious change and dont ask me why it happens.

OK so we have the board reset, the neutral values adjusted to zero to suit the radio and we are off.

Well I wanted to see how close I could get the centers on the ganged servos. I also have another brand name power system and it is also adjustable but I find the steps are extremely large on it and it was hard to get the linkage to a perfect match. Well once again our good buddy at Smart-Fly has been listening and the steps on this power expander are so fine you can hardly see the servo arm move when you push the increase or decrease buttons. Its slow, it extremely accurate and its so easy to do.

So on my very first attempt at setting up the servo neutral I got an increased current draw of .05 of an amp. Thats unheard of as the receiver and the meter etc I have running off the system draw 0.30 amps. The increase to 0.35 is by far the cleanest I have ever experienced.

Next I will unbolt all the linkages again and go through the setup using the auto end point hold and adjust feature.

So far this product has beaten all my expectations, but I assure you if I find anything untoward I will say it here as well. Just somehow this thing seems to be out to prove even my most pessamistic opinions wrong.

Kiwi

[Kiwi]

Okey Doky,

Well I read a bit more and the next trick was to setup the Power-Expander so that when I hold the radio stick over for say rudder for two seconds the servos all go to the end point and stay there. Yes that means you hold the stick over, the servos go full throw or to the end points you have on your radio and stay there for you. Cool trick as it means your not like a one armed paper hanger trying to adjust end points and lining up bolts etc.

Then I went and turned on the option so the when setting up ganged servos they go into idle sequentially. That means when your adjusting say servo 1 and 2 then servos 3 a 4 dont have power so they dont effect the setup. When 1 and 2 are done you turn the rotary switch to 3 so now 1,2 and 3 are live and you adjust number three. When thats done you turn the wee switch to number 4 and do it again. Its a bloody breeze guys. Easiest ganged servo setup I have ever seen.

AND!!!!

The current draw right across the servo range from full throw to full throw gives me a current consumption of less than 100 milliamps compared to the servos being disconnected. Hoolly Dooley thats sweet. And no squealing servos. Just silence and perfectly adjusted ganged setup.

I'm hooked on this one guys so if your interested start bombarding Robert at Smart-Fly to see when he will get them into production.

These two photos show the servos on full deflection and the current draw at that. As you can see the reading is between .35 and .40. Given that with no servos the unit is drawing .3 that means we are looking at 50 to 100 milliamps drain on the batteries at full deflection.

Now this is going in my 260 so stay tuned as we get it flying.

Kiwi

[adrian]

news!! units available from the end of the month and the price +-$300 - marvelous

[adrian]

[adrian]

[adrian]

[adrian]

something on the site went boom and now there is three posts - lol

[forgues research]

	Quote: Originally Posted by adrian
	something on the site went boom and now there is three posts - lol

Ah ha it happened to you also,

Roger

[adrian]

and i was laughing at you - and you to pick it up - lol

so Roger now were equal - hey bro dont forget to send me the link for the video on the evo80 comp - like the new prices!!!!

[Edge540T_Flyer]

Hey Kiwi,
How about an update on this one?!?