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Old 10-22-2001, 04:00 PM
  #13  
Charlie
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Join Date: Aug 2001
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Power capacitors affect different brands of ESCs differently. The Cyclone line is very reliant on them due to the extremely high rate the mosfets turn on and off. The power capacitor actually catches the ripple current that is created by how hard the Mosfets switch. If not used the ripple current turns into heat and will damage the ESC. Mosfets are the fins that stick out. They are transistors and what carry the power in your ESC.

That's why it is very important to use Low ESR (electro-static-resistance) capacitors. If you use the wrong value the cap will only do part of the work or none at all. And yes it will work for a while. It will slowly deteriorate the performance of the ESC. Most people won’t notice until the ESC is so damaged it slows down. Then they go out and buy a new ESC and think their Cyclone was slow all along. Not the case at all. This is very common. Almost all Cyclones that come back with a different external power cap installed have a shorted internal Polar Drive Cap.

Now I can't speak for the LRP units so lets focus my Info on the Cyclones as power caps affect the LRP units differently.

Once again, we have all of this information post in the tech info section of www.teamnovak.com.

Hope this helps, if you need anything else please don't hesitate to email me.
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