Telemetry will never be mainstream. I’m primarily a racer and would absolutely use it if I had more options. Right now Hobbywing offers the best solution with their ESC data logging via OTA. If there was a way to tap into that on the MT12 that would be super cool, even if it was just data points without the colorful graphs. But I don’t see it happening. So the convenience of the HW/OTA setup is just way better and easier than mucking with the radio GUI endlessly, wasting life away. Just plug n play and be done.

If HW et al don't want to send data via standard 3pin receiver cable, the other way to do this is for Radiomaster to release receivers with more sensors. The ER3C-i already has an external voltage input. Nothing stopping RM offering an RPM sensor port for the motor, then a sensor output to the ESC.

Shouldn't be that difficult to get the telemetry data out of the programming port from the Hobbywing ESC if you know the protocol.

Yep, my mistake. Got confused.

Ah good to know. I'll update my receiver too.

I spent a few hours going through my MT12 last night after receiving it in the mail. My verdict, as someone who used to race touring cars for a long time before taking a break - it's unnecessarily complex for most racers. Even if you learn all the ins and outs of Edge TX, it is not user friendly for surface drivers, nor is it intuitive when you need to make quick adjustments on the fly. It's like it was designed for FPV nerds wanting to dabble in a base model RTR rock crawler by programming a variety of useless mixes. I need throttle and I need steering, maybe with some expo. That's it. Knowing that I've got 16 channels, endless switch assignments and telemetry barking at me when some guy is up my butt trying to pass me is irrelevant. I bought it because it was cheap. Should have just got a Futaba 4PV. Oh well, I'm committed now.

At least the rx’s are cheaper than Futaba for someone in your situation. So that’s cool.

Edit: Yep, bricked. Need an FTDI adapter. Have found how to unbrick it so all good.


Help! I bricked my ER3C-i receiver flashing partition after the 3.3.0 bin wouldn't work because there wasn't "enough space available". I used Bardwell's video but ignored the part where he clearly said don't use this on receivers. I don't have an unbrick dongle. Is there are other way to do it? I've tried pressing and holding the boot button while powering on.

First of all, please tell us specifically what operations you are doing and what state you are in. Otherwise, we cannot help you.
My guess is that your receiver is not bricked.

Disregard. It is definitely bricked. Just spent a few hours diagnosing it and finding a solution. I do need the FTDI dongle.

That was good. I don't need to help you.

I'm not even a hardcore racer and I've done some telemetry-based tuning to set timing and check on the health of batteries, ESCs etc. doing this required a cheap volt meter and some jumpers, which is more effort than some people are willing to do. I think it's not common because it's not easy or cheap. If it's easy and cheap, and I think this tech has the potential, I can see it being much more mainstream for guys who want to squeeze every last tenth out of their car. I mean, people buy premium titanium bolts, turnbuckles and CF stuff for the potential of minor performance gains because it's relatively cheap and easy. I can see people getting into this once the tech is cheaper and easier to use.

I've just mistakenly bought an er3ci LBT from aliexpress - can I flash this to FCC,or have I just wasted money?

As far as I remember, there is no hardware difference between the FCC version and the LBT version.
In other words, if you flash the FCC firmware, it will become the FCC version.

Cheap and easy is what made telemetry mainstream in the air world. FrSky and OpenTX really drove that change. RM and EdgeTX are in pretty much the same place with the MT12 today as FrSky and OpenTX were with the X9D in 2013.

Nobody wants to use something that's complicated and difficult. It just slows everything down. That's actually one of the drivers for Telemetry over logging. One file for later, critical data viewable on the radio directly at the end of the run.

But it's NOT going to happen instantaneously. Didn't in the air world either, it took years to both develop to meet real needs and for folks to try it out and discover what benefits it brings (in fact some of the posts above are near word for word what I heard about telemetry in the air world 7-8 years ago, especially from competitors). Telemetry itself isn't the game changer, cheap & fully integrated useful telemetry is.

Bolting on upgrades is as easy as it gets. And half of them do nothing (it's like holy water, even if it doesn't help, it won't hurt). What everyone raving about this is missing is that you need compatibility and support with the ESC too to get meaningful results. Unless there's a high end open source ESC for surface vehicles available, you only have half of the equation. And that's not easy to make!