Setting up my Mamba Monster X? trouble

[CODYBOY]

Ok, I need some help ( as my wife would say "I already knew that"!!)

I'm trying to get a Monster X set up in my Traxxas UDR, and I can't get it set up to work right. I have a BEC set up for the servo, so it shouldn't be the problem. Everything is programmed as per Castle guide lines, I have probably set up 7 Mamba X'S and have not run into this before. When I give it throttle the wheels start turning to a slow crawl, and then the esc stops. Same in reverse. It does the same thing with to separate radios and receivers. Batteries are new 5200 3s X 2, so total of 6S. I will post up a shot of how I have the esc programmed with my Castle Link. The servo works fine, tried plugging the esc into the servo port on the RX and it does the same thing. What am I missing? I hate putting new electronics!!!! I'll be back with a photo in a few minutes.




Ernie

[HumboldtEF]

Pardon me if I ask silly questions

I assume you pulled the red wire on the ESC since you have a BEC?

And has the ESC been calibrated (throttle brake and neutral)? ESC set to brushless?

[CODYBOY]

Originally Posted by HumboldtEF

Pardon me if I ask silly questions

I assume you pulled the red wire on the ESC since you have a BEC?

And has the ESC been calibrated (throttle brake and neutral)? ESC set to brushless?

Casey,"the only silly question is the one you don't ask"! Right

Yes to all the above, and using a bypass harness for the bec.

After I pull the throttle several times I lose signal to the TX. I shut the esc off and back on it resets. Does the same with both radios.
Ernie

[odomandr]

Calibrate the esc via holding throttle, power on esc, reverse neutral sequence?

[mikemcE]

6s?
Startup at High Power with a 30% punch setting.
JRH can figure this one out!


Hang up and Drive

[HumboldtEF]

What about the A, B & C motor wires are they all in their correct positions?

Could you have left the bind plug in place, I've done that.

[magic_yeti]

Did you update the firmware to the newest version?


Gesendet von meinem Pixel 2 XL mit Tapatalk

[robert@castle]

If you are using the stock radio, they sometimes have to be reprogrammed/reset when using other electronics. The radio that came in the 6s X-Maxx(same esc as the UDR) wouldn't go above 30% with a castle ESC. I think I had to disable temp sensor and telemetry to get it to work properly.

[Natedog]

Originally Posted by HumboldtEF

I assume you pulled the red wire on the ESC since you have a BEC?

IIRC when using rx bypass harness and bec, leave the ESC red wire attached.

Originally Posted by mikemcE

6s?
Startup at High Power with a 30% punch setting.
JRH can figure this one out!

6S minimum lol.
Startup high power and 100% punch please, let your fingers do the power modulation.

Originally Posted by HumboldtEF

What about the A, B & C motor wires are they all in their correct positions?

Could you have left the bind plug in place, I've done that.

Good points.

Originally Posted by magic_yeti

Did you update the firmware to the newest version?

Good question.

Originally Posted by robert@castle

If you are using the stock radio, they sometimes have to be reprogrammed/reset when using other electronics. The radio that came in the 6s X-Maxx(same esc as the UDR) wouldn't go above 30% with a castle ESC. I think I had to disable temp sensor and telemetry to get it to work properly.

Interesting and thanks for chiming in!

[HumboldtEF]

Originally Posted by Natedog

IIRC when using rx bypass harness and bec, leave the ESC red wire attached.

You are correct, I didn't realize there was a bypass adapter.

Hey Ernie will you be using the rock racer/crawler mode?

[CODYBOY]

Thanks for all the info gang!!!!
I think I've tried all that was mention, with a couple exceptions.
Tomorrow I will try reprogramming and moving things around and try the elimination game. I have three different radio brands to try also.

Casey as for the abc/colors for the motor, the Traxxas esc doesn't have ABC marked on the esc and didn't take notice when I first plugged the motor wires If someone could chime in with the right color sequence for the Traxxas motor to the Monster X ESC knowing I have it right would be a help!
Ernie

[HumboldtEF]

well thats convenient. the UDR manual shows nothing too.

I was able to find them marked for a Veniline motor


Have a look and you'll see that the motors protective end cap can be pulled off and under it is the A B C markings hopefully on the UDR too.

[CODYBOY]

Thanks Casey, that helps a lot. I found that the sequence is White-black-blue, ABC. I'll work on it tomorrow and see how things work out. I just hate working with the electronics!!
Ernie

[HumboldtEF]

Any luck yet? keep us posted

[CODYBOY]

Originally Posted by HumboldtEF

Any luck yet? keep us posted

I was so frustrated yesterday by the end of the day!!! I tried 3 different radios brands all with the same affect!!! I'm beginning to think that for some reason the esc is shutting down at a certain power draw, which is just barely turning the wheels before it shuts down. It even cuts power to the RX. I ordered a Hobbywing Max 6 yesterday, just to make sure I have the UDR running by PLBTF. It is either the Monster X malfunctioning or small thing I'm doing that we can't figure out.

Originally Posted by robert@castle

If you are using the stock radio, they sometimes have to be reprogrammed/reset when using other electronics. The radio that came in the 6s X-Maxx(same esc as the UDR) wouldn't go above 30% with a castle ESC. I think I had to disable temp sensor and telemetry to get it to work properly.

Robert, I'm a big Castle fan, but it would be nice to let us know if there are certain Radios that your product has problems with. Most of us don't have the knowledge to figure out what your suggesting. Really frustrating, at 70 I don't need all this hassle! Kind of disappointed that you didn't offer a little more help. I have a hearing issue so calling and talking to service rep is next to impossible for me!
Ernie

[Natedog]

I hear you Ernie and agree.

HW Max6 working great in my X-Maxx, Rockhugger's XMaxx and many other peeps, hope it's sorted soon.

EDIT: HW Max6 working with Traxxas radio and Flysky.

[robert@castle]

Originally Posted by CODYBOY

Robert, I'm a big Castle fan, but it would be nice to let us know if there are certain Radios that your product has problems with. Most of us don't have the knowledge to figure out what your suggesting. Really frustrating, at 70 I don't need all this hassle! Kind of disappointed that you didn't offer a little more help. I have a hearing issue so calling and talking to service rep is next to impossible for me!
Ernie

Sorry for any confusion I may have caused with my earlier post. I missed the part of your original post that said you tried a different radio.

Our products should work with all radios because of the standard servo pulse signal used to control r/c servos. The X-Maxx radio I mentioned just requires some settings to be changed, but that is the only radio I am aware of that has any issues.

I am not sure what the cause of you issues would be. I am on here to help out as much as I can, but I'm not tech support so I'm not as skilled as they are at diagnosing issues. To avoid talking to tech support on the phone, they can be reached via email at support@castlecreations.com. Give them as many details as you can and I will send them a link to this thread so that they have as much information as they can to help you.

[Thomas Porfert]

Ernie,

Sorry to hear about your issues and headaches with the Monster X.

If I understand correctly, when the ESC shuts down, it also causes the receiver to shut down?

If so, when that happens, is the receiver LED actually turning off or changing colors? And I'm assuming you're losing steering control as well?

It sounds like there may be something going on with the ESC's BEC.

I'd really like to take a look at the data logs from the Monster X. It records things like BEC voltage and error codes. It would be invaluable in helping narrow down the issue.

It appears you have the Castle Link. When you connect the Monster X, go to the "Logging" tab. Click on the "Download Logged Data" button. This will extract the data from the ESC and display it in the built-in Graph Viewer. You can take a screen shot by clicking File > Export Image, which you all you to save it as a .BMP file that you can post here.

Ideally I would want to take a look at the raw data if possible. You can go to File > Save Data, which will save a .CSV file; I don't think you can post that here, but you can e-mail it to support@castlecreations.com and I'd be happy to take a closer look.

Out of curiosity, did anything happen to the stock Traxxas ESC that made you swap it out with the Monster X? Or were you just upgrading the ESC?

Thomas Porfert
Castle Creations
Tech Support Supervisor

[CODYBOY]

Originally Posted by Thomas Porfert

Ernie,

Sorry to hear about your issues and headaches with the Monster X.

If I understand correctly, when the ESC shuts down, it also causes the receiver to shut down?

If so, when that happens, is the receiver LED actually turning off or changing colors? And I'm assuming you're losing steering control as well?

It sounds like there may be something going on with the ESC's BEC.

I'd really like to take a look at the data logs from the Monster X. It records things like BEC voltage and error codes. It would be invaluable in helping narrow down the issue.

It appears you have the Castle Link. When you connect the Monster X, go to the "Logging" tab. Click on the "Download Logged Data" button. This will extract the data from the ESC and display it in the built-in Graph Viewer. You can take a screen shot by clicking File > Export Image, which you all you to save it as a .BMP file that you can post here.

Ideally I would want to take a look at the raw data if possible. You can go to File > Save Data, which will save a .CSV file; I don't think you can post that here, but you can e-mail it to support@castlecreations.com and I'd be happy to take a closer look.

Out of curiosity, did anything happen to the stock Traxxas ESC that made you swap it out with the Monster X? Or were you just upgrading the ESC?

Thomas Porfert
Castle Creations
Tech Support Supervisor

Thanks Robert and Thomas, I e-mailed the info requested.

I know it is a hassle not being able to communicate on the phone, but we would have to do it through my wife and that wouldn't be fun either!
Ernie


Just to keep the info flow going in case this helps some one else, here is what I sent to Thomas:


Ok Thomas, first of all thanks for getting back to me, great CS! Here is the data info you wanted to look at. So yesterday I tried one more thing after posting on RCC. I took of the 6s plug setup and wired the esc for a single 3s battery. I then went in with the castle link and reprogramed the monster for brushed and programed the esc to my FLY SKY Noble and everything worked as it should. So through all this testing the only variable that stay the same is the motor, until making this change. The motor is the stock Traxxas that comes with the UDR. I never ran the truck with the stock esc because I had to have a Monster X in it! I'm trying to get a little smoother start up because I have this crazy idea that I want to do a little rock crawling along with speed runs at Proline By the Fire this year. So could it be the motor??? I plan on taking it out today and hook everything up on the bench and see what I can find. Hope that's enough info to help you figure something out. To answer another of your questions, I can pull the throttle several times before the RX breaks connection with the TX. the RX light goes from solid to blinking. I can then turn off the ESC and back on and the TX RX reconnects.


Ernie

[CODYBOY]

So here is where I'm at right now with my ESC. Everything is working great on the bench on a 3s. beginning to sound like my harness for the two 3s batteries could be the problem! Any thoughts from any of you on how it should be wired????
Ernie


Thanks Thomas, I set everything up on my bench, tested it with the ESC on a 3s, the UDR motor aux wire plugged into Channel 3 and everything worked fine. My channel 3 is a dial switch so I was actually able to dial the drag brake in or out, on or off! So I wired the two 3s battery harness the same as on the stock UDR esc. would you have a diagram of how the Monster X should be wired, cause it sounds to me like that may have been the problem???? Thanks for your help, and I'm posting everything up in RCC hoping it may help someone else.
--------------------------------------------
On Thu, 4/25/19, Thomas Porfert wrote:

Subject: RE:
To: "Ernie & Marcia Ledbetter"
Date: Thursday, April 25, 2019, 2:12 PM

Erine,

The data logs definitely show something weird
going on. I've attached a screen shot of parts of the
log that I zoomed in to the pertinent data.

The ESC is seeing the battery
voltage drop like a rock every time you try to hit the
throttle; this is causing the ESC to go into low voltage
cut-off mode. The battery voltage is actually dropping so
low that it's causing the BEC voltage to drop which is
causing the receiver brown outs.

It almost appears there's something weird
in the series wiring for a two 3s LiPos. Try testing the
Traxxas brushless motor on the single 3s. That will let us
know if it's specific to the brushless motor or
something to do with running the series 6s setup.

The aux wire data shows some
abnormalities as well. Out of curiosity where do you have
the auxiliary wire connected to on the reciever? Is it
Y-harnessed into the shift servo with a reverser? Maybe try
testing things with the aux wire setting disabled and the
aux wire disconnected as well.

I look forward to hearing back from you with
the results. We'll get this sorted out together and
hopefully get you up and running in time for PLBTF!
Thanks!

----
Thomas Porfert | Technical Support
Supervisor
Phone | (913) 390-6939 (125)
EMAIL | WEBSITE | LOCATION