HW1060 shutting down

[Carmine A 2046]

5 hours ago, ThunderDragonCy said:

Do you need a capacitor that high capacity? I am very new to all this, but there's a shop in the UK that does the spare cap bank for the 10BL60 Hobbywing brushless 60amp ESC for £4. It's this one, but looks like it's only 660uf total.

https://www.rccarshop.co.uk/electrics/power-caps/hw86030030-hobbywing-power-capacitor-p

What do you think?

Necessary??? Not really. I had spares of that size, making Keep-Alive units for my Model Locomotives (WHOLE other subject!!) 

The extra storage IS good if you can fit it, and guarantee that NOTHING you Run will cause the ESC to Brownout. Besides, they're cheap! 😊

[Carmine A 2046]

BTW.... With that big Cap, I've run 12T Motors and 25kg Servos without a single issue. 😉  I just call it "insurance"!

[Nicadraus 6198]

My caps have arrived.

[ThunderDragonCy 7881]

I cut some capacitors off a dead esc, scraped away the insulation on the battery leads and spliced the capacitor in. I didn't want to ruin the waterproofing. The car works without glitching on the bench, but i haven't had a chance to run it properly yet. 

[ThunderDragonCy 7881]

Update: Finally stopped raining long enough to run my FF01 with a nearly fully charged battery. Ran absolutely no problem for around 5 mins. Lots of full throttle accelerations. All good. Seems there's a batch of dodgy capacitors on these 1060s.

[CoolHands 816]

Amy pics? Are you guys adding these to the one that is already on the body of the 1060? Also, what is the right specs (Ie minimum not biggest possible) to buy

[ThunderDragonCy 7881]

The ones i used are off a dead hobbywing copy. 2x330uf. You can buy them for about £4. Just search "hobbywing capacitor". Here's a pic of mine. I cut the top of the insulation off the motor cables and soldered it in thrn taped it up. 

 

[CoolHands 816]

Ah I see thanks. I’ve got a new 1060 in my mountain rider with a hpi 15 turn motor and it’s bee alright so far. (Unlikely the hpi 15 turn is a true 15 turn though. It’s just quicker than being dead slow tamiya silver can)

[ThunderDragonCy 7881]

4 minutes ago, CoolHands said:

Ah I see thanks. I’ve got a new 1060 in my mountain rider with a hpi 15 turn motor and it’s bee alright so far. (Unlikely the hpi 15 turn is a true 15 turn though. It’s just quicker than being dead slow tamiya silver can)

If its running fine then leave it. I have had a few and this is the first genuine hobbywing i have had that doesn't work properly. Luckily this seems to have sorted it instead of having to buy a new one. 

[El Gecko 1344]

Well despite everyone's rave reviews of the 1060, it looks like I've fallen victim to the "bad batch of capacitors" mentioned above, twice now. The first ESC I got has been doing it for awhile, and the new one in a different car does exactly the same thing. Whenever I'm at full throttle for "too long" it goes into half throttle/limp mode on both ESCs. I thought it was the batteries, the weather, random other stuff on the car, but no. It's been the ESC the whole time.

So now I've got 2 1060s to fix. Going big on the caps. 1000uf should handle it just fine I think? Maybe 3300s would be better, or should I just go for the 4700?

[sosidge 624]

On 1/26/2021 at 2:31 AM, El Gecko said:

Well despite everyone's rave reviews of the 1060, it looks like I've fallen victim to the "bad batch of capacitors" mentioned above, twice now. The first ESC I got has been doing it for awhile, and the new one in a different car does exactly the same thing. Whenever I'm at full throttle for "too long" it goes into half throttle/limp mode on both ESCs. I thought it was the batteries, the weather, random other stuff on the car, but no. It's been the ESC the whole time.

So now I've got 2 1060s to fix. Going big on the caps. 1000uf should handle it just fine I think? Maybe 3300s would be better, or should I just go for the 4700?

Full throttle to limp mode suggests you are overheating the ESC.

What motor? What car and conditions? And does the car run freely when the motor is removed (i.e. no unnecessary drivetrain drag).

I don't see how adding a lot of capacitors is going to change problems after long periods at full throttle. They're used to give a tolerance for brief changes in load.

I have several  (authentic) 1060s that I've used in a variety of cars for racing. Always been spot on.

[El Gecko 1344]

18 minutes ago, sosidge said:

Full throttle to limp mode suggests you are overheating the ESC.

What motor? What car and conditions? And does the car run freely when the motor is removed (i.e. no unnecessary drivetrain drag).

I don't see how adding a lot of capacitors is going to change problems after long periods at full throttle. They're used to give a tolerance for brief changes in load.

I have several  (authentic) 1060s that I've used in a variety of cars for racing. Always been spot on.

ESC, motor and battery are all cool to the touch. It can happen as soon as I turn the car on, or not until the end of the pack, depending on how I drive.

The cars so far are a vintage Grasshopper and a vintage Traxxas Hawk, with different, identical, authentic, Hobbywing branded 1060s. Vintage ROAR 91 stock motors in both (the Hawk is a Slot Machine, the GH has an unbranded silvercan with a Yokomo endbell). Full ball bearings in both and there's no binding whatsoever--I'd venture to say these are my two smoothest drivetrains even.

Doesn't matter what surface--it can be smooth tarmac, lumpy grass, dirt, whatever. Same with different batteries too.

It's not a "long period" at full throttle, more like a few seconds at the most. Like, driving around the street in front of my house, pin it to W.O.T. to see what the top speed might be, and it gets there, but literally as soon as it gets there, the throttle cuts to half and it slows down until the cap recharges.

Or racing, when I hit the end of the back straight, or when the trans "diffs out" going around a turn under power, that kind of thing. It's really annoying.

The first one I got for the Grasshopper didn't have any issues for the first week or so, but now it's every run. The Hawk's brand new ESC did it from the very beginning.

[sosidge 624]

1 hour ago, El Gecko said:

ESC, motor and battery are all cool to the touch. It can happen as soon as I turn the car on, or not until the end of the pack, depending on how I drive.

The cars so far are a vintage Grasshopper and a vintage Traxxas Hawk, with different, identical, authentic, Hobbywing branded 1060s. Vintage ROAR 91 stock motors in both (the Hawk is a Slot Machine, the GH has an unbranded silvercan with a Yokomo endbell). Full ball bearings in both and there's no binding whatsoever--I'd venture to say these are my two smoothest drivetrains even.

Doesn't matter what surface--it can be smooth tarmac, lumpy grass, dirt, whatever. Same with different batteries too.

It's not a "long period" at full throttle, more like a few seconds at the most. Like, driving around the street in front of my house, pin it to W.O.T. to see what the top speed might be, and it gets there, but literally as soon as it gets there, the throttle cuts to half and it slows down until the cap recharges.

Or racing, when I hit the end of the back straight, or when the trans "diffs out" going around a turn under power, that kind of thing. It's really annoying.

The first one I got for the Grasshopper didn't have any issues for the first week or so, but now it's every run. The Hawk's brand new ESC did it from the very beginning.

Try a new motor. As in fresh out of the factory. 30 yr old sealed stock motors are very unlikely to be in good condition, you might have all kinds of arcing and inefficiencies playing havoc with the ESC.

[El Gecko 1344]

7 minutes ago, sosidge said:

Try a new motor. As in fresh out of the factory. 30 yr old sealed stock motors are very unlikely to be in good condition, you might have all kinds of arcing and inefficiencies playing havoc with the ESC.

They're pretty fresh and both are quite fast. Both have good brushes, springs, and comms, and the hoods aren't misaligned. I rebuilt the Yokomo earlier this year.

But you're right, I haven't tried a new motor yet. All of mine are old and rebuilt, which I never had any problems with before.

[sosidge 624]

11 minutes ago, El Gecko said:

They're pretty fresh and both are quite fast. Both have good brushes, springs, and comms, and the hoods aren't misaligned. I rebuilt the Yokomo earlier this year.

But you're right, I haven't tried a new motor yet. All of mine are old and rebuilt, which I never had any problems with before.

What batteries are you using?

[El Gecko 1344]

30 minutes ago, sosidge said:

What batteries are you using?

I switch between an old Traxxas 5000mAh NiMH and a brand new (a few months ago) Gens Ace 3000mAh NiMH, both 7.2v 6-cell. I have not tried with a NiCd, and I don't run Lipo. I thought it was the battery connectors, but all are now tight so it seems I've eliminated that possibility.

[sosidge 624]

16 minutes ago, El Gecko said:

I switch between an old Traxxas 5000mAh NiMH and a brand new (a few months ago) Gens Ace 3000mAh NiMH, both 7.2v 6-cell. I have not tried with a NiCd, and I don't run Lipo. I thought it was the battery connectors, but all are now tight so it seems I've eliminated that possibility.

Older NiMHs can be a concern as they can end up losing a lot of voltage under load. The newer NiMH should be OK as long as it is getting a proper charge before it goes in the car. Chargers can false peak sometimes so make sure the battery is warm at the end of the charge.

Connectors are a good call, they do make a difference, Tamiya connectors are not good but most of the aftermarket connectors are more than capable.

I'm sure you have the ESC jumper pin in the NiMH setting but if it was in the LiPO setting it would cause a voltage cutoff with the NiMH.

[El Gecko 1344]

On 1/27/2021 at 1:29 PM, sosidge said:

Older NiMHs can be a concern as they can end up losing a lot of voltage under load.

I think you're onto something here. Limp mode on the 1060 is activated by low voltage whether it's on the Lipo setting or NiMH. I have been doing a lot of reading, and NiMHs in general might have the voltage drop problem no matter how old, or I just have two dodgy packs. I suspect that adding the capacitor (a nice big one) on the battery side may actually help, since it would smooth out the voltage drop from the NiMH under sustained load. Will experiment and report back.

[El Gecko 1344]

Today's fail: added a giant 4700uf cap (almost the same size as a sub-c cell!) and the car behaved exactly the same way.

I'm starting to think it's the outside air temp keeping the battery too cold. Been doing even more reading on NiMHs and it seems they're worse in cold weather than NiCd (and Lipo are even worse than NiMH apparently).

Still experimenting...

[Mad Ax 9313]

I briefly remember looking into the purpose of capacitors when I destroyed my Mamba Monster ESC in my E-Maxx.  The general advice was that multiple smaller capacitors works better than a single large one.  In this case it was about protecting the ESC from back-EMF, which is more an issue in brushless systems, but might also come into play with brushed ESCs depending on how long your battery leads are and how the current is pulsed to the motor.

Anyhoo - those of you who have added whacking great capacitors might not get the benefit if they are too slow to respond to the change in voltage.  Maybe try adding some smaller ones.  I think they need to be in parallel.

[ThunderDragonCy 7881]

When I fixed mine I used the twin set off a dead brushless ESC. You can buy them as spares for a few quid. Looks like 2 x 330uf

https://www.makeitbuildit.co.uk/hobbywing-capacitor-module-for-car-esc-23233?gclid=Cj0KCQiA6t6ABhDMARIsAONIYyz48MkxA0QE3vxVeaEE5LZVs0uqENgZUTBmKW1CVSltnOjkBVEgX_UaArcREALw_wcB

[El Gecko 1344]

On 2/1/2021 at 7:18 AM, Mad Ax said:

I briefly remember looking into the purpose of capacitors when I destroyed my Mamba Monster ESC in my E-Maxx.  The general advice was that multiple smaller capacitors works better than a single large one.  In this case it was about protecting the ESC from back-EMF, which is more an issue in brushless systems, but might also come into play with brushed ESCs depending on how long your battery leads are and how the current is pulsed to the motor.

Anyhoo - those of you who have added whacking great capacitors might not get the benefit if they are too slow to respond to the change in voltage.  Maybe try adding some smaller ones.  I think they need to be in parallel.

Gonna try adding smaller parallel capacitors at some point but I've determined that it IS the batteries and the ESC working together to cause the half-throttle limp mode to kick in, even with that giant cap on the battery leads. The NiMHs drop their voltage after the first (barely!) 5 minutes in low temperatures, and the ESC thinks something's wrong, so limp mode is activated. It's weird but on both cars with 1060s, sometimes if I reverse and then go forward again, it comes back to full power, but once it has started going into limp mode, it just gets worse as the battery gets colder and the voltage drops even further.

By contrast, I can drive my Traxxas XL-5 ESC in any temperature all day long with either battery, and it doesn't cut out, because I don't think it has a low voltage NiMH limp mode like the 1060.

Can I just unplug the Lipo/NiMH jumper completely, or will the 1060 freak out? I want to try to disable low voltage detection (and limp modes) of any kind before I build a capacitor array that may or may not work.

[LeftyAl 164]

I've jumpered across to NIMH mode when troubleshooting an issue. Used a LV alarm on the  battery whilst doing so. Haven't tried it with a jumper though.

[LeftyAl 164]

Just took a look at the manual. LVC for nimh is 4.5V for a 2 second duration (assuming the ESC is working properly)

Do you have a multi meter or battery checker to confirm the voltage of your batteries?

[El Gecko 1344]

100% confirmed it was the air temperature outside. We've had warmer weather here lately and ever since it has been over 40F there hasn't been a single hiccup.

Apparently the HW1060s aren't good for cold weather. The Traxxas XL-5 has worked perfectly fine the whole time in the same weather with the same batteries.