Whats it going to take

[_paralyzed_]

when it rains lollipops and gumdrops, and there are free unicorn rides at every street corner, and money is obsolete and all women loose, and government gives way to a eutopian existence.............

[jsr]

Originally Posted by _paralyzed_

when it rains lollipops and gumdrops, and there are free unicorn rides at every street corner, and money is obsolete and all women loose, and government gives way to a eutopian existence.............

Sadly, this is true. There are ways to make the ESCs almost bulletproof for our application, but it would cost a pretty penny, either eaten up by the Brand (i.e. CC, Tekin, HW, etc.) or by the customer (most likely as the brand will just transfer the cost to us).

Just a couple of things they could do:

1. Buy components with additional shock testing at specific levels that replicate the most severe cases in a 1/8 RC application.
2. Design the PCB/layout with larger solder joints for improved mechanical hold (also improves heat dispersion, along with the use of large ground planes). Also support mechanically sensitive components with epoxy.
3. Stricter mfg inspection acceptance criteria (lower yield, or spend the money to improve mfg processes).
4. Conformal coat everything (adds a bit to mechanical strength, mostly to small components only).

There are more options, but all adds up to more cost that the brands will not want to eat. Sadly, this is like the exotic car industry...the consumers will gladly accept the faults of the product for the privelage of running them AND there's no one that will stray from the main to offer something that is dramatically better at the same end cost to the customer (because they know the market will still buy them). Take Ferrari...Kias have better paint jobs than most Ferraris, but people will willingly pay $225k for one with orange peel paint because of the reasons above.

The physically larger components required to handle the power of 1/8 applications also makes them more prone to physical damage due to stress. That's one of the reasons why 1/10 applications don't see the same failure rates.

Tightening acceptance requirements and/or improving mfg processes will likely yield a drastically improved product to the end customer, but they will eat more cost than to have customers send in product to be replaced (especially with the short warranties of most companies requiring the customer to pay a partial fee for repair/replacement).

If you have questions on specific mfg processes/improvements/etc., let me know. I'm in electronics mfg. HTH.