Smoked motor?
 

Sourced a used Team Powers Actinium V2 motor awhile back, never managed to connect it to my Team Powers Radon Sport ESC. Motor kicked around in my parts bin all summer. I finally got around to asking a friend to solder it up for me last night, but we ran into a couple of problems.

First, when soldered A-to-A, B-to-B etc, the ESC would only sync to my transmitter (Futaba 4PLS) if it was set in reverse. If the Transmitter was set to North, the ESC wouldn't sync at all. We had two options - I could either rebuild the trans and place the motor on the other side of the car (necessitating hacking the body shell) or he could swap the motor wires. We chose the later option and connected C-to-B, B-to-A and A-to-C.

That solution worked, in that the motor reversed polarity(?) and the Futaba was able to sync (in reverse, of course) to the ESC. This brings us to the second (related I think) problem. When under load, meaning that the car is on the ground, with running gear connected, there was a sound coming from the motor that can only be described as a "box of rocks". I initially thought it might be a motor bearing, but another guy I worked with said the sound was the motor cogging, due to a bad sensor wire.

That's an easy fix, right?

I changed out the sensor wire, turned on the remote and powered up the ESC and promptly heard a sizzling sound and smelled burning. I assumed it was the ESC that had gone poof, but now I'm not so sure, because I just pulled the entire unit and tested it outside of the car. The ESC doesn't feel hot or smell bad, but the motor hits on both of those counts. What gives? Where did I go wrong? Did switching the motor wires screw up the motor sensor board or damage the motor in some other way? I'm willing to solder on a new motor, see if it works...

Thanks for any insight that can be offered.

When running sensored, the connections should definitely be A-A, B-B, C-C, but I haven't had a fried motor because of an incorrect "order", even though I accidentally did that a few times (bullet plug motors rather than permanently soldered). Didn't the ESC have a programmable setting for reversing motor direction though? Seems odd the ESC wouldn't communicate with the transmitted without reversion.

If the motor had any timing set on the end bell and you ran it reversed, you’d effectively be running negative timing. They get very hot very quickly this way and I’ve seen people smoke them like this.

I have a spare Turnigy Trackstar ESC that behaves normally - with the motor properly connected (A-to-A etc), the ESC syncs to the transmitter (regardless of Throttle setting Nor or Rev).

I'll look in the ESC settings before I connect a replacement motor.

When you reversed the throttle channel on your radio and connected the motor A to A and so on did you recalibrate the esc?

Yes - no go. Transmitter throttle set to NOR, ESC would not calibrate.

Yes I understood that part. My question was when you reversed the channel on your transmitter (meaning your transmitter was set to REV) did you calibrate the esc?

Basically where you went wrong was when you connected a to b, b to c, and c to a with a sensored motor. If it was sensorless you would have been fine. The hall effect sensor senses a magnetic field telling the esc where the rotor is then the esc powers up the correct phase. Which wasn't the correct phase because you had the motor wired wrong. When using a sensored motor you always connect a to a and so on. If it won't calibrate then reverse the channel in your radio and recalibrate the esc. The esc then knows what signal to look for to give forward power and which signal for brakes. I would try wiring up a different motor to the esc and calibrate the esc and see what happens. Without doing that I can't tell you exactly what's been fried whether it's the esc or the motor or both. Just that something has definitely been fried.

Soldered up a new motor and used a new sensor wire as well. Works.

TP motor also worked sans sensor wire.

Looks like I'm in the market for a new sensor board on the motor.

loa you did nothing wrong the sensore would have to the esc what phase to fire.. you might have gotten some cog nothing to make esc or motor smoke..

So... different motor, kinda the same tune.

Affixed my trusty Novak Vulcan to the (now) untrustworthy TP Radon Sport and got overall similar results. The motor cogs a bit on take off and then smooths out afterwards. Also, and this is new, the ESC randomly cuts off and/or refuses to power on.

For the record - running gear are okay. Spur and pinion mesh is just right (little bit of rock, not a lot) and the internals looked okay as well. Did not go as far as tearing down the diff (gear). I suppose that I could put in a known-good ball diff).

Basically, per my friends warning, i'm thinking this ESC got a little too hot during soldering. I'm given to understand that the speed controls are especially vulnerable to failure after many soldering/de-soldering cycles.

I'm now on the look-out for NIB old-stock Novak, unless anybody can suggest another motor brand (not Reedy or Tekin or Trinity or any other soup de jour) to check out. I've heard good things about Maclan and Orion, Hobby Wing too.