Noob question thread! šŸ˜€ ask your questions here!

Lipos have another discharge curve than 18650 (Liion) so they discharge flat for a time at 3,7V mostly and start to fall of at 3,5V. If you set them any more lower, you damage them.

I didnt think about the lipo and liion difference you I was think about them as liionā€™s

I did a ton of reading, but still I cannot find a really easy step by step instruction for setting up my FocBox. Does somebody know one?

  1. Plug it into a 3 or 4s lipo(I always start with low voltage)
  2. Upgrade to ackmaniac 2.54 or 3.100 firmwareā€¦if you desire
  3. Perform a read configuration on the motor side and app side
  4. Set up canbus and IDs if your using it
  5. Set amperage limits and voltage limits on motor general
  6. Perform a motor config in bldc or foc
  7. Write motor configuration
  8. Go-to the app tab, setup your control type(ppm, ppm & uart, or nunchuck etc)
  9. Go-to your control type tab ie ppm, setup your ppm endpoints and center. And failsafe.
  10. Pick your motor control type in your app control type tab (ie on the ppm tab, select current no reverse, or current with reverse etc)
  11. Write app configuration.

Plug in a real Battery, test it, go ride. There are detailed instructions for each step scattered around the forum, but this should be a good starting placeā€¦

12 Likes

I had a hard time understanding everything when I was looking for written advice and tutorials, once I started actually paying attention to this videos it all made a lot more sense. Check this thread out

The videos I found most helpful were the one by Jaccoby located right above the ā€œFor more specific segmentsā€ section, and the applicable links in that section.

If youā€™re going to use ack firmware visit his thread and download the tool, you can start with his skipping the official BLDC tool

1 Like

Thank you guys! I did a first set up using BLDC_Tool, will check out ackmaniac later. Everything went well however I canĀ“t control the motor with my Nano-X, it seems to be connected (lights on the remote and the receiver are glowing and in the BLDC tool the pulsewidth bar is not moving, but the ms number is changing, but I can only control the motor with the key arrows :frowning:

1 Like

Read app configuration. Now go to app tab and select your control type. Now write app configuration.

Have you setup remote calibration?

I just finished testing my board. I went 2.4 kilometers over 10 minute time period with moderate hills before my board completely slowed down and became unusable

My batteries together still have 34 volts, (one has 15.5 volts and the other has 18.5 volts I was unable to check the voltage of each cell due because my multimeter can read numbers that low

Any other suggestions? Is my battery supposed to be this bad?

Trying to figure out why your voltages are so different. Your low battery is already at 3.1v. But they should be very close on voltage. Something with your battery isnā€™t right. I bet if you checked individual cells one may be toast. You can check on your charger if itā€™s hobby type

My charger hasnā€™t been reading the correct voltages so far so Iā€™ve been using a multimeter. It could possiblly be beacasue I accidently overcharged one battery about a volt and 1/2 which could have caused the imbalance.

So a faulty charger that canā€™t read voltages is a good way to start fires. Iā€™d seriously consider a new charger. Possibly new batteries to go with it. All of these things considered are excellent reasons why youā€™re having battery life issues

1 Like

I just paid over 100$ for these brand new batteries and charger so are there any steps that can be taken to be sure that there actually is a problem with the batteries before I go blow another 100$ on them, they seem to maintain voltage fine but the board just stops working below 34/35 volts, maybe the vesc?

It is probably one of the cells that has gone bad because of the over charging them.

Possibly, but I think this is unlikely becasue I have always had this problem with my board even before I over charged them

You batteries basically make up a 10s1p batter if you get 2 more in parallel it would be a 10s2p and your range will increase

Shouldnā€™t two 5s batteries go more than 1.5 miles though, Iā€™m not even running then below 34 volts so I think something is programed wrong

5000mah would be 210Wh andnit depends on how fast you are going

The problem is 34/2=17. You had one battery at 15.5 and one 18.5. with your conservative 35v cutoff your two batteries should have discharged to almost equal voltage. This means something is for sure wrong with one battery pack or your charger. More likely battery and the charger canā€™t fix the problem only mask it.

well with that big of a voltage difference, your battery is toast and thats the reason why your vesc shuts down. It has definitely been damaged since you overcharged it. If you had the same problem before overcharging, you have a broken charger or you got a bad cell. Get yourself a new charger and new battery.