35% Planes Plus Extra - Electrocuted

[KatManDEW]

Wasn't sure if this should go here or in one of the electric froums...

Kitman and I conspired to electrocute a Planes Plus 34% Extra. Maiden was Tuesday. The new Jeti Spin 200 ESC performed flawlessly. Motor and batteries were pretty warm after flying, but the big Jeti Spin 200 didn't break a sweat. The Jeti anti-spark feature sure is nice. I positively like the idea of not having to change connectors constantly.

Kitman is on the sticks in the video below, while I manned the camera (she didn't fly near as pretty with me at the sticks). I had never flown anything this big before and I was pleasantly surprised at how well it flys. Bigger does fly better, and now I'm hooked.

She's no speed demon horizontally, but the speed is more than adequate, and she doesn't seem to change speed one bit when you point her straight up

The components are as follows;
Neu 2215-2Y "BAM" motor
Jeti Spin 200 ESC
12x8000mah Thunder Power Pro Lites
Single Hitec 5955's on alierons and rudder.
Hitec 5945's on each elevator.
Two Apogee 2250mah receiver packs with Smart-Fly Batshare
Fromeco regulator
Smart-Fly Power Expander
FMA FS8 receiver.

She sure is one sweet flying plane. Jeti rules!

The video is here;
http://www.katmandew.com/Video/PP_Extra_1.wmv

[rcpilot82]

cool man! watch your wings, canopy, and stab root ribs for failures! Good Luck!!

[Andy Thomas]

Glad to see you got this thing in the air. Did you end up with a different speedo altogether?

[dmichael]

Nice job- what prop is that?

[KatManDEW]

Yep, totally different speedo. A couple Castle 125HV's cooked before the plane even got off the ground. The new speedo is a Jeti Spin 200. The Jeti is very well made, and also has an anti-spark feature which is very nice because the spark that occurs when connecting other large speedo's damages connectors quickly, requiring that they be replaced far too frequently.

That's a 30x20 prop from Tennessee Propeller. We need to get a 28x24 prop to try.

I heard about the wing failures, but not the stab and canopy. What should we look for? This canopy is joined where the front piece is normally screwed to the fuse, to provide battery access, and there's an additional latch where the two pieces join.

[rcpilot82]

Kat, your on the right track with joining the foreword part of the canopy. the rear latches on the turtle deck are the real problem though. mine decided to literally fall apart after about 8 flights. you may not have the problem as quickly since you don't have as much vibration being electric and all but I still think yours will fail. i know of several cases on both the 35% and smaller versions having this failure. as for the stabs, I do not know if my problem was one off or typical(like the wings) on these planes but I fly 3d and noticed after about 20 or so flights that my root rib on the stab had broke loose from the rest of the stab. this would allow the stab half's to pull out on the tubes, and bind the elevators in the down position. you don't want to have to try and get parts for this plane because from what I have heard planes plus is out of business. just wanted to five you a heads up on things to look at in your pre flights so you hopefully won't have an accident. good luck!

[Pacific Planes]

Nice Job. I have been looking for a similar post. I am looking to convert a 30% plane and a 35% plane but I have been having trouble finding the right speed controllers. Word on the street is that Castle Creation is coming out with a 350 amp speed controller but I have not been able to find one. I think I am going to run 3 parallel 14.8 V 4800 mAh packs in the 30% and 4 in the 35%. This way if one of the battery packs goes bad I only have to replace one. I have also been looking for a charger that will do 4 4800 mAh packs at once, or one that will run 15 amps on a single charge. Any advice for the set up?

[Pacific Planes]

I was also curious to see if the Poly Charge 4 would work for this. I know it only charges 3 amps but would it work for a 14.8v 4800 mAh pack (may just take about 1:45 minutes a pack if it did)? Lastly, I was a little worried about charging a LiPo of this size without balancing the cells (which Poly Charge 4 doesn't do). Any suggestions?

[KatManDEW]

Thanks for the heads up rcpilot82. Any advice on what to do to avoid problems with the wing or stab?

Pacific Planes: I wish I knew of a good, high power, multi port charger. I have a PolyCharge4 that I use for indoor planes. It has a wattage limit that prevents it from charging at full amperage with 4 cells. In other words it won't push 3 amps with 4 cells. I don't remember the wattage limit, but whatever it is, divide that by your pack voltage, and that's how many amps it will push with that size pack. (use the charged pack voltage, which is 4.2 volts per cell)

Best bet that I know of would be a charger that can handle 12 cells, and use it with balancers attached to the packs while charging. You also want a charger with a high wattage limit, to avoid the same problem the PolyCharge4 presents. The only chargers I know of that will do high cell counts with a respectable charge rate are the Orbit Pro and the big (big dollar) Schulze chargers.

After the experience with Castle ESC's in this plane, I wouldn't use a big Castle if it was a 1000 amps. The two Castle 125's that died in this plane, fried before the motor even turned one revolution.

I've had real good luck with the low voltage Castle's, but for high voltage stuff I'm a Jeti man from now on.

[bodywerks]

What's the AUW of your bird?? I just finished a 35% QB 260 with the same motor and prop and am at just under 27 pounds with the batteries. It has plenty of power to hover and get you out of trouble and even pull out, but it is no rocket ship on pull out. I have the same prop, but am running a CC PHX110HV esc, maxamps 4,000's in a 12S2P configuration, and two TP1320's for the receiver. The batteries are brand new, and the speed control settings are stock. I am pulling about 122 amps peak for 5,000 watts and about 37 pounds of static thrust (as measured by a calibrated force guage, not motocalc). After the packs break in, I will mess with the ESC settings. I should be able to get 5200+ watts out f it...
BTW, do you have the new SHD gearbox or the standard? Mine is the standard gearbox and I am already starting to feel a little play in it.
Also, I know what you mean about the sparks! The 110HV doesn't have that feature, but the way I have my batteries plugging into the esc is a series/parallel configuration - basically two deans Y harnesses in parallel to each other. So I have a little jumper with a 15 ohm resistor inline that I plug into the esc, then the battery into it, temporarily. I get no spark, and while the esc is counting cells, I plug the remaining parallel lead of the 4th battery into the esc to keep the circuit closed, then remove the jumper and plug that battery directly to the esc and I am set.

[bodywerks]

Here are a few pics. I sent Stickerbiotch(AKA Bryan at Aerographix) a rough drawing of the logo you see on the cowl. He did his magic and this is what I got. It's simple, but cool looking! If you want him to make you one, have him put a slash after the "2Y" instead of the dot. I plan on fixing that as well...

[bodywerks]

	Quote:
	After the experience with Castle ESC's in this plane, I wouldn't use a big Castle if it was a 1000 amps. The two Castle 125's that died in this plane, fried before the motor even turned one revolution.

Castle makes a 125HV??? I know they make a 125 amp esc, but it's not an HV, and is only good for a 6 cell lipo. It would pop in a flash if a 12S lipo was connected to it. Are you sure it was a 125HV? I can't find such a speed control online anywhere in the USA. My 110HV has worked fine for the first couple flights so far. Now, I have heard that these super-high-efficiency Neumotors can pop capacitors and stuff if you have bad batteries, wires that are too long or too small in gauge, or connectors that are dirty or not rated for the amps you are pulling. I am knocking on wood here, but mine seems to be doing fine. And, according to the guys at Castle, if I had a problem with my setup or the ESC, I'd know it right away. So, since I have two flights on it already, I think I'm in the clear.
Also, what do you think the temps of your battery and motor were? My batteries only got to about 110 degrees and the motor was about 120 after a 6.5 minute flight that included some hovering.

[KatManDEW]

You're right bodywerks. They were 110HV's. The second one actually ran the motor once at the field for a pre-flight test, but when it was connected later to fly, it sizzled before the motor turned over. We could hear it, and then smell it

RTF weight is a little over 25 pounds, with 6 ounces of lead in the nose to be on the safe side for the maiden. That can be removed now.

The Neu 2215 was one of the first ones, so I doubt it's the SHD gearbox. Can they be upgraded?

Haven't measured anything yet. The Jeti Spin 200 has data logging which we can read with the Spin Box programmer. I have a peak reading, calibrated force gage I can use.

Batteries were purchased new for this plane. Wires have always been stock length, and connectors are Neu 6mm bullets.

[bodywerks]

Cool deal. I just flew mine again today. I have found that I need to precision-balance the prop and spinner. I thought they were balanced well enough, but I actually noticed a slight loss of power from the vibration...

[Bunky F. Knuckle]

That is a HELL of a diference in ESC's there!!!!!!!!!

Not checked the vid out yet, but do you have any stick time on it..........