its been a while! --slash 4x4 problems--

[t-maxxracer32]

Whatsup guys,

I havent been on here for quite a while! Havent posted anything for 8 months! Almost done with my bachelors...

anyways so I let a buddy borrow my slash 4x4 (first mistake) and I just got it back a couple days ago... hed had it for maybe 2-3 months.

I charge up my 3s lipo and plug it into the deans plug... smoke comes out of the ESC

I Let it cool down... bring in a 7 cell NIMH batt....... nothing happens when I plug it in and turn it on.

I go back to the 3s lipo and plug it in to go round 2 and this time it turns on just fine but when I pull the throttle it just sits there and cogs.

I try my other 3s batt and the same thing happens so I unplug and replug all the motor wires, open up the esc to see if anything looks weird (its waterproofed so I cant analyze any of the components), turn lipo cutoff on, re calibrate the transmitter........ and now Im stuck.

I see there being 3 options.
-blown motor
-blown ESC
-???

Its been a while since I messed with any RC's but I know that this slash has been hella reliable since day 1... never any problems!

it is the veliinion vxl3s system with the 3500 sensorless motor I believe.

Any help would be sweet! I wanted to take this to the track or something in the next weekend or so.

Thanks guys!

[t-maxxracer32]

update........ I remembered back in the day if my motor mount screws were too far inside the motor it would cog, so I decided to take the motor out and mess around with the screws and such (I was almost 100% this was irrelevant but decided to go for it.. had nothing to lose), and once I had it open I turned it on, tried spinning the motor while it was not attached to the drive train and it actually spun for like 2 seconds at most then died out as if the battery had no juice. (I charged a 2500 3s batt up to like 1000 mah)

So Im charging up a different 2s pack to see if this changes anything......

still confused because my nimh pack wont even power it on. Maybe I need to do some cycles with my packs.

[Arct1k]

Err didn't you say smoke came out of ESC.

Looks like you blew a phase.

[t-maxxracer32]

Ive had ESCs throw out smoke on me then work fine after and it only smoked for a sec so I was hoping it would be fine.

I guess I am just initially confused as to why it would smoke in the first place.. Ive used that battery numerous times without any problems and my freind didnt tell me anything funky went on while he was using it, but maybe hes not telling me the whole truth.

[brainanator]

Smoke usually means dead, and it came from the esc, so I would say it's a dead esc. But I think you might be well on your way to frying some batteries too! Good Luck!

Any other ESCs/motors to test with, you have to start eliminating variables if you want to find out for sure what's wrong, ignoring the smoke part of course.

[t-maxxracer32]

I wish I had my old stuff to test with but Im left with just the slash.

I may just try and get an ESC cheap somewhere and go from there..

[_paralyzed_]

Originally Posted by t-maxxracer32

I wish I had my old stuff to test with but Im left with just the slash.

I may just try and get an ESC cheap somewhere and go from there..

Definitely the esc, and definitely time to stop plugging things into a bad esc!

You got very lucky if you saw smoke before and still had a working component.

Just plugging it in, a battery can't blow an esc. Unless of course you plug it in in reverse polarity. It was just your esc' time to go.

[Serum]

Yeah, the stuttering and the smoke; i'm definitely with Arctik; you blow a phase.

And like Paralyzed said, stop plugging things into it, or you might end up wasting more parts.

Question is; what caused this? if the motor didn't spin when you powered it on, i would say it's the esc for sure. If you plugged it in, it armed and it started smoking when the motor turned, it might be the motor gone bad too. (and the result of that motor is now a dead esc)

[t-maxxracer32]

thanks for the info guys. Hopefully I can find a new esc soon