ESC acting strange after first RC car assembly

[Masacur]

Dear all, 

I have bought my first RC car recently (A Tamiya TT-02 chassis). THe kit does not include all parts so I bought the following separate parts. Hobbywing Quicrun 1060 ESC, Austar M AX5S transmitter with receiver, a 20kg servo and a 3000 mAh 7.2V battery.

I just finished assembling it. Steering works, but the car does not want to move.
I made a small video. Do you happen to know what could be the problem?

• Throttle trim is in neutral position.
• Tried normal and reverse mode on transmitter, no change
• Tried low medium and high throttle limit, no change
• Using the throttle handle will make the red light go on and beeping starts
• When adjusting throttle trim to positive side the red light goes on and beeping starts
• When adjusting throttle trim to negative side, the red light goes on.
• Also if I leave it on for some time, it occasionally start beep irregularly with the red light as well. (last part of the video)

[Masacur]

This is the link to the video:

https://youtu.be/aD2C6LHvx2s

[alvinlwh]

Are you sure your steering is working. The range of movement seems awful small. Can you check that? And while you are at it, check that you can push the car along and the motor will turn. At the bell end (where the wires are), you can see the shaft. It seems like the ESC is trying to turn the motor but the motor can't turn. 

[Juggular]

Alvin noted that you should check the range being small? That's a good suggestion. 

On the top of the transmitter, there should be a Dual Rate switch showing L, M, H?  Try setting that to high, and see if that helps with the throttle.  

Steering dual rates seems to be the last knob on the face of it?

 

[Andreas W]

Maybe you have plugged the connectors from ESC (and the steering servo)  the wrong way around in the receiver? 

[alvinlwh]

As Andreas had noted, can you take a clearer picture of your RX? 

Your plugs seem rather high and are they plugged into CH3 and VCC? In fact CH1 and 2 seems to be empty in this view. 

[Masacur]

Thanks for the replies so far. 

The steering trim is set in low setting because linkage tends to snap off the servo motor on high setting. I want to fix this also afterwards.

Throttle limit on top didn't change anything as well. 
Regarding the connectors, see pictures below. I believe they are correct. 

Based on Alvin's comment, I took out the motor to see if to works when not assembled. And indeed it works! 
I can then also push the car forward/backward and the driveshaft is spinning.
But once I put in the motor and match the pinion gear and driveshaft gear, I cannot push the car forward/backward anymore. 
I'll search the problem there then. Any tips or past experiences welcome

 

[Masacur]

If I place the motor a bit higher up in the chassis (so not push it all the way down), then it is working fine.

 

[alvinlwh]

Check you got the motor mounted in the correct holes for your gears. 

20kg maybe too much for the parts, I had heard of steering bits being broken by such servos. IIRC, I only have a 3kg in my TT-01. 

[Masacur]

That might be the issue indeed. Currently it is on "C" but it should be on "G" I suppose. I could not find D9 with 21, 22, 23, etc. in my kit but that might be the backside of the 18, 19, 20, etc. part?

 

Luckily I can turn down the power of the steering, but maybe it is overkill indeed. I will first try to replace the plastic connection part to a metal connection part and see if that gets better. 

[alvinlwh]

26 minutes ago, Masacur said:

That might be the issue indeed. Currently it is on "C" but it should be on "G" I suppose. I could not find D9 with 21, 22, 23, etc. in my kit but that might be the backside of the 18, 19, 20, etc. part?

That means your pinion is pushed hard up against the spur, jammed up probably 

The twenties are on the other side of the teens. Turn it around and you will see them. 

[Wooders28]

For the first set up on a 1060, I set the jumper to ,Forward and brake only. That way, you know if forward is forward.

I believe, the beeps at the start, which actually come from the motor, tell you its calibrating, and what battery , double beep then a long beep is 2s, 3 beeps then long is 3s, so presuming its telling you its a Nimh (although the jumper in nimh setting should tell it that)

I'd be tempted to remove the motor, and see if the esc spins it out of the car, then maybe swap the plugs over in the reciever, so steering is the throttle, just to try and eliminate stuff.

Not sure what the current draw is on that servo, but the higher the power, the higher the current draw. The 1060 has a 3amp rating for the servo, so if you don't set the end points for the steering, and it tries to push past the physical end stops, it's possible to trip the esc (brown out) for a second. Not the issue here, but something the bare in mind.

 

[Masacur]

I turned the part around and now it's fully working. Thanks a lot for all of the help. 

Dear Wooders, indeed I took out the motor and it was working. The problem was in my assembly mistake. I put one part wrong way around. 

[alvinlwh]

12 hours ago, Wooders28 said:

Not sure what the current draw is on that servo, but the higher the power, the higher the current draw.

I saw somewhere else that a ballpark figure will be 1A per 3 - 4kg and my tests on a few servo seems to confirm that. I had often wondered how some people run 20kg or more servos, probably with an UBEC? 

[Wooders28]

5 hours ago, alvinlwh said:

I saw somewhere else that a ballpark figure will be 1A per 3 - 4kg and my tests on a few servo seems to confirm that. I had often wondered how some people run 20kg or more servos, probably with an UBEC? 

That's if the cheaper 20kg are 20kg..🤔

Same with speeds, these servos where similar on paper (think the Alturn in the Novafox, was meant to be slightly quicker...)

Some escs can handle alot more amps, ie my 510r can handle 5amps ,and the likes of Castles Mamba X is 8 amps! 

But they'll only really pull the amps ,if they're working hard , so if the end points are set, they're normally not that bad, although I've fitted a capacitor to the receiver in my race truck, running a 10bl120 / 6.5t and a savox 1258tg high voltage servo.

[alvinlwh]

14 minutes ago, Wooders28 said:

But they'll only really pull the amps ,if they're working hard , so if the end points are set, they're normally not that bad, although I've fitted a capacitor to the receiver in my race truck, running a 10bl120 / 6.5t and a savox 1258tg high voltage servo.

I tested a JX 9kg and a Power HD 6kg, 3.2A and 1.9A off car, meaning not connected to anything, with a BL programmer that has servo test function. Now if I am doing it wrong, I am happy to hear it. 

They both caused problems with the stock Tamiya TBLE ESCs and a massive dual cap glitch buster didn't help at all, even at neutral, not turning anything. The JX one is not even happy with a 3/6A UBEC! I swapped in a 1060 and it is solved.

When I see beginners coming in saying they will build XYZ and if they say they will use a heavy (10, 20 or even 25kg) servo without mentioning they are changing the ESC (beginners often just use the ESC in the kit), I will be concerned they end up with problems and will try to highlight this potential problem to them, at least to raise their awareness. 

[KEV THE REV]

On 3/23/2022 at 12:19 AM, Wooders28 said:

Not sure what the current draw is on that servo, but the higher the power, the higher the current draw. The 1060 has a 3amp rating for the servo

Slight hi-jack here . I've got one of those clone Tower MG996R servos ( I say clone because it was cheap ) with a black ? 1060 - looks the same as my red HW 1060 and works the same , the servo info. states 13 - 15 KG torque , are the servo torque figures accurate being as it is possibly a clone ? , would it still be ok with a 1060 ESC even if the figures were accurate ? . I've seen this discussed somewhere on here before and wasn't sure whether to use the servo with the ESC or not ? I'm using 27AM radio - I know I need to upgrade to 2.4 , but for now it is 27AM no end point adjustments on the TX

Thanks

[alvinlwh]

31 minutes ago, KEV THE REV said:

Slight hi-jack here . I've got one of those clone Tower MG996R servos ( I say clone because it was cheap ) with a black ? 1060 - looks the same as my red HW 1060 and works the same , the servo info. states 13 - 15 KG torque , are the servo torque figures accurate being as it is possibly a clone ? , would it still be ok with a 1060 ESC even if the figures were accurate ? . I've seen this discussed somewhere on here before and wasn't sure whether to use the servo with the ESC or not ? I'm using 27AM radio - I know I need to upgrade to 2.4 , but for now it is 27AM no end point adjustments on the TX

Thanks

Do you run brushless and have a brushless program card? They often have servo test function. Test it and see. If you do not, just use it anyway and see if there are any strange behaviour. Here is an example of "weird problems".

After installing UBEC.

However, that is not the end of it. That same car, with the UBEC, after I replaced the servo in the video with a JX 9kg one, caused even worse problems (although I did not take a video of it). What happened was, the UBEC was a 3/6A one. The 9kg servo was tested to be 3.2A off car, meaning it could draw more when installed. Even when not moving, just holding neutral/straight, it seem to overdraw what the BEC/UBEC can provide. On full throttle, RX power (from the UBEC) will cut out for a second, meaning it stays at full throttle during the cut out even when I am applying brake. I tested it again, in car, by flicking it left and right and true enough, after about 10 seconds, everything went off, meaning the UBEC had tripped. the 3/6A means it can supply 3A constantly, and up to 6A for 10 seconds. I had since moved on to buying 5 or more amps UBEC. I binned the TBLE and installed a 1060 and problem is solved.

So back to your question, my suggestion is to just install it and try it out. Your 13 - 15kg should draw 3.25 - 5A based on ballpark figures. If it is on the low side, it should be fine in my experience. Just be aware that if you run into strange problems, do not put it down to the radio gear or ESC immediately. Someone had suggested that my radio gear is cheap rubbish and I should get an expensive one. Luckily I did not as it was never a radio problem and changing the radio will not make the problem go away.

[KEV THE REV]

Thanks for the reply . I don't intend to run this one a lot , but if I do get problems I'll rethink it . Thanks again for the info . 

[Tamiya Fan 1]

High current servo's usually need an external BEC. The Hobbywing one won't have enough BEC power to run the RX and high power servo, so it would be erratic or just shut down while steering.