Of Batteries and the Typhoon H
- Thread starter PatR
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A new avenue to explore in tech manual and maintenance document development. “Tech-smut”.
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Hi all,
I do not have any problems sourcing batteries for my H currently (8000mAhx4) - of course this is not to say that the situation will remain as is for long and I recognize that things can change.
Thinking about the prospect of supply drying up I looked at at AH-1Gs pics and examined my own housing to get a better look at the locking mechanism. So my conclusion is that it would relatively simple to print a door with lock for the H - This would allow the user to remove the charging plug from the battery housing and create an adapter plug which would allow any 3S/4S to be used. The adapter plug would remain in the housing and batteries would be removed by allowing to slide out before unplugging.
There is plenty of room inside the housing for the battery and the minimal amount of wire required.
In fact, the trickiest part is the design of door replacement but this can be taken care of with a few hours at Solidworks
I will put this on my list of projects to deal with after my current stack.
I do not have any problems sourcing batteries for my H currently (8000mAhx4) - of course this is not to say that the situation will remain as is for long and I recognize that things can change.
Thinking about the prospect of supply drying up I looked at at AH-1Gs pics and examined my own housing to get a better look at the locking mechanism. So my conclusion is that it would relatively simple to print a door with lock for the H - This would allow the user to remove the charging plug from the battery housing and create an adapter plug which would allow any 3S/4S to be used. The adapter plug would remain in the housing and batteries would be removed by allowing to slide out before unplugging.
There is plenty of room inside the housing for the battery and the minimal amount of wire required.
In fact, the trickiest part is the design of door replacement but this can be taken care of with a few hours at Solidworks
I will put this on my list of projects to deal with after my current stack.
In concept that shares similarities with what I’ve done, but on my side discarding a case or latch mechanism. Lacking a latch or door to use as a grip it’s extremely difficult to separate the connector halves inside the fuselage without pulling hard on wires, which is never a good thing to do.
There is one big difference between us in what we’re doing, though. You will be selling a product while I’ll be showing how people can do it themselves for less than $10.00 in parts. I don’t care at all if I get upstaged by someone selling stuff[emoji6]
There is one big difference between us in what we’re doing, though. You will be selling a product while I’ll be showing how people can do it themselves for less than $10.00 in parts. I don’t care at all if I get upstaged by someone selling stuff[emoji6]
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The wires on the eBay adapter are 14 AWG.
The insulation is THHN ( the thinnest insulation on the market), since these wires do not need to flex continuously like those on the end of the LiPo batteries, this wire works perfect with the adapter.
If thick silicone insulation were used with the eBay adapter, it would stick to the batteries when you insert and remove them. The THHN insulation slides freely against the sides of batteries while putting them in and out of the battery bay.
The heavy 14 gauge wire combined with the ultra thin THHN insulation works perfectly with this adapt setup.
I believe the main board power supply wires at 12 gauge with thick silicone insulation is done to allow flexibility for assembling and disassembling. Since the wires inside the oem batteries only use 14 gauge.
The primary reason for using silicone insulation, high count multi-strand wire is improved conductivity. An important consideration in battery powered devices requiring high efficiency. Secondary, a very close second, is flexibility.
It’s not cheap, but you already know that as you elected to use a less expensive, higher resistance, easier to solder type wire.
It’s not cheap, but you already know that as you elected to use a less expensive, higher resistance, easier to solder type wire.
Thicker silicone insulation is not going to increase the conductivity. But the silicone material is not slippery, when insering and removing batteries, sliding against the silicone insulation. Repeatedly rubbing the battery, while insering and removing, will cause the silicone insulation to bunch up and tear apart.
Where the THHN insulation lets the battery slide past effortlessly with no wear from the battery repeatedly sliding past it.
Using wire with THHN insulation is not about cheaper and easier to solder, it's more about being the only option to make the adapter durable to handle repeated battery changes.
The use of 14AWG wire is not a problem as the batteries internal wiring is 14AWG and a built in bottle neck. The current loading of the power system should be well below what 14AWG can handle.
The external diameter differential is more or less meaningless in and of itself as batteries in weights that will not significantly impact current loading leave adequate space for the wires at either the top or sides of the battery. Of course anyone disregarding weight and moment arm impacts on flight controller performance might shove the largest, highest capacity battery that will fit in the hole but there’s little that can be done to design out or fix ignorance or stupidity.
To be fair, have you performed current load testing with both stock and after market batteries to gauge the effects of heavier and/or longer batteries that shift the center of gravity considerably aft? 10 or 20 max power take offs, with camera and gimbal, using each battery type with a climb to 50’ or so with a gradual descent landing, along with the same number of hovers maintained for two minutes each should provide enough averaged accuracy to make a useful determination. Of course doing that would require a modification of the board’s input wires to incorporate a test tool. I have not done this yet but it is being considered.
Do not think for a second that increasing aircraft weight or altering the center of gravity has no effect on system performance. Everything has a trade off and some trade offs can be dangerous.
Bear in mind I am not trying to discourage use of your device as I have already suggested using it in some situations. As my presentation will give away for free info on how to modify to achieve the same goal we are in no way competitors. There can be no competition between charging money for something that someone else is giving away. Then again, if someone is trying to sell as many items as possible before a free method supersedes it we have a different situation.
The external diameter differential is more or less meaningless in and of itself as batteries in weights that will not significantly impact current loading leave adequate space for the wires at either the top or sides of the battery. Of course anyone disregarding weight and moment arm impacts on flight controller performance might shove the largest, highest capacity battery that will fit in the hole but there’s little that can be done to design out or fix ignorance or stupidity.
To be fair, have you performed current load testing with both stock and after market batteries to gauge the effects of heavier and/or longer batteries that shift the center of gravity considerably aft? 10 or 20 max power take offs, with camera and gimbal, using each battery type with a climb to 50’ or so with a gradual descent landing, along with the same number of hovers maintained for two minutes each should provide enough averaged accuracy to make a useful determination. Of course doing that would require a modification of the board’s input wires to incorporate a test tool. I have not done this yet but it is being considered.
Do not think for a second that increasing aircraft weight or altering the center of gravity has no effect on system performance. Everything has a trade off and some trade offs can be dangerous.
Bear in mind I am not trying to discourage use of your device as I have already suggested using it in some situations. As my presentation will give away for free info on how to modify to achieve the same goal we are in no way competitors. There can be no competition between charging money for something that someone else is giving away. Then again, if someone is trying to sell as many items as possible before a free method supersedes it we have a different situation.
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I intended to use a wiring sleeve on silicone 12 awg to alleviate snagging or rubbing. I'm not an electric guy or well versed in sUAS design. It's just the way I'd do it if it were on one of my bikes or cars because it's cleaner, more capable, and addresses possible future problems before they occur.
Like I said before, I've ordered the adapter and battery. I fully intend to swap out the smaller wire to 12 gauge. I think I will also run it to the outside of the adapter so there will be no chaffing issues. Remember that longer runs require larger wire.
Silicone wire beneficial properties are flexibility, high resistance to environmental effects, along with the insulations ability to deal with high heat. The insulation also allows for longer exposure to movements generating abrasion. As the factory battery employs 14AWG wire inside the case there's really no benefit in using a larger wire between the battery and the main connector. The 14AWG wire effectively limits what can get to and through a 12AWG wire.
OTOH, when using standard lipo batteries the standard battery wiring is 12AWG in batteries in the sizes we use, so using 12AWG wire from the battery to the main board connector suddenly makes sense, especially as the wiring between the main board connector and the board is 12AWG. With shockazulu's adapter the wire size employed could become a bottle neck. Odds are slim but could and won't are at different places on a risk spectrum.
OTOH, when using standard lipo batteries the standard battery wiring is 12AWG in batteries in the sizes we use, so using 12AWG wire from the battery to the main board connector suddenly makes sense, especially as the wiring between the main board connector and the board is 12AWG. With shockazulu's adapter the wire size employed could become a bottle neck. Odds are slim but could and won't are at different places on a risk spectrum.
Grumpy,
The length of the wire runs here are too short to be of significance. 14 or 12 won't make any differenc as long as the size is consistent from one end to the other. What can make a difference is having a 12AWG wire exiting a battery that connects a 14AWG intermediary delivery wire which then connects to a 12AWG wire at the delivery end of the circuit. The 14AWG wire becomes a resistor.
That idea I really like. I have never felt I needed or am helped by the OA on the TH, and have never so much as turned it on other than once to check it worked initially.
Whereas I am rather consistently experiencing various anomalies with that craft's flight behaviour that could have a lot to do with heat build-up, so any extra cooling we could facilitate would be a very good thing in my book, and as you say, the holes are conveniently well-placed for that endeavour...
Presumably we'd need some sort of screen / mesh there to stop the ingress of nature without affecting airflow too much...
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Therein be the rub. If I want a fusible link I'll install one, because that's what the above scenario becomes in a worst case scenario.
Phaedrus
Premium Pilot
What he said^^^^^^^^
I use this calculator to get at voltage losses in wires.
FWIW, in this use the difference between 14AWG and 12AWG is about 0.03 volts.
I don’t see a screen or other device as much needed unless flying in a leafy environment. Far too many fully exposed systems have been flying without issue for a looooong time. However, none of them would trap and retain debris.
If you did screen the opening pretty much any non conductive material you could stick there with hot melt glue would do. I mention non conductive on the off chance it broke loose and ended up on the main board.
