Best piece of advice: don’t be afraid to do it if you really need to, especially if you’ve built the rest of your skate yourself.
For example: I replaced the Atmega chip (TQFP32 package) on an arduino mini clone with an industrial heat gun (a really bad choice for smd rework, but it had to do) a while ago. Not to say it was economically feasible too (the chip costed me the same as a new clone), but what will you do if you need it really quick and you don’t have the right tool at hand. It was an interesting experience.
@chaka, I’m going to need another opinion from you.
I’ve just repaired my dual setup with an interim vesc I’ve ordered from esk8.de.
Now after my second 1h run. At the very end the belt from my right motor broke. I was only doing 10km/h but wasn’t able to brake. The right motor and vesc are fine, but the left one doesn’t get power trough.
Took a look at the drv chip (2nd enertion vesc, not the new one) it isn’t burned yet (cross-fingers) but I see legs with joined solder. Could this be the reason. I’ll hook em up to bdlc once I get home to see if it connects and I can see errors.
There’s been 2 hours between the test’s I’ve made. Left motor wouldn’t do anything.
Now I am at home. No error codes, motor runs again.
So I guess it could’ve been a canbus issue. How do you explain this? how can I resolve it?
I haven’t had any issues on the latest hardware/firmware using 4 pin jst-ph connectors. Make sure the connectors you are using have positive contact, should feel some resistance when pushing them on the pins.
I’m running FW2.18 on both vescs. In the vesc FAQ it states not to connect 5v and ground cause of grounding issues. Enertion Vesc has it soldered on, on the second I use the 2 middle pins with a connector so it’s easy to go from single to dual drive.
I too will be joining the ‘Replace your DRV8302 chip’ club…
Luckily I am in college at Georgia Tech and we have a workshop with professional rework equipment.
I noticed that my VESC seems to have also lost it’s C26 capacitor, can anyone tell me what exactly that does?
Replacement parts have been ordered from Mouser based on the BOM on the VESC GitHub.
After the board stopped working (I was running FOC mode with long wires) I tried to plug the vesc in again for power and it short-circuited and blew the DIY electric skateboards power switch I had on the board and vaporized the nickel strip attaching the positive wire to the battery.
Based on this, I am a bit hesitant to try the VESC again, even after I fix it.
So a few questions:
What does the C26 capacitor do?
I see that some legs of the DRV are fused, it that the issue?
Is there anything else that looks abnormal about the VESC?
Anything else that could have lead to the short
Can the VESC be powered from a lab bench power supply? (Because those have short circuit protection and more importantly wont cause fires)
C26 is mostly use for adding capacity over FOC option, without it you will most likely burn the drv, also if you bought your VESC from DiyElectricSkateboard it is normal they use the BOM for the 4.10 version, witch don’t have the c26 capacitor.
The drv have two set of pin that are short, you can always refer to the schematic available on vedder web site.
and yes you can power it using a bench power supply.
And if you need someone to replace you drv, maybe I can help you.
So if I add the c26 capacitor and do a c18 mod with a 4.7 capacitor I should be much better off running FOC?
Because I’m on a college campus and occasionally ride through buildings and need a quiet board, my plan is to run dual VESC setup in FOC mode, but the way my board is laid out means I will have about 40cm of wiring between battery and VESC.
I am currently using 12gauge flat wire, should I double up on that?
Also, can I combine the capacitor boards of the 2 vescs into one larger capacitor board and then pass wires from there to both vescs? (Cheaper and easier than buying different capacitors if it works)
Here are also some pictures of my burned VESC. You can see the burned DRV and missing C26. Parts have come in from mouser, and I will attempt the repair after my thanksgiving break.
Cool. I think I will go with either 2 or 3 or those to make sure that FOC works reliably.
Also, I have decided that I will braid 3 strands of the 12amg flat wire together and then inlay and epoxy it into the board a bit. That should give me plenty of capacity to push through the wires.
I think it was while pushing the board unpowered. I noticed it suddenly locked the motor.
The following faults were registered since start:
Fault : FAULT_CODE_DRV8302
Current : -0.9
Current filtered : 0.8
Voltage : 30.32
Duty : 0.02
RPM : 72.2
Tacho : 8
Cycles running : 3
TIM duty : 792
TIM val samp : 421
TIM current samp : 23542
TIM top : 46242
Comm step : 3
Temperature : 25.85
I noticed it suddenly locked the motor.