Dead pro modeler 470

[Motorider]

I think I'm the first one to kill one. It lasted all of about 2 hours run time. Totally not what I expected given its strong following and history here. I know shit happens, I just seem to have a shitty target on my back. We are in the middle of a 5 hr trail run now I get to carry the last 4 hours.

The good news is I know for a fact Jim will take care of me. It's just stinks to miss another round. Every time I go out with this wraith it dies. Anyone else have any problems with these?

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[JatoTheRipper]

My Wraith was a problematic POS too. It seemed cursed so I stopped running it.

Did Pro Modeler respond quickly?

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[mikemcE]

First one I've heard of.
John was down for IRMA, not sure of his current status.


Hang up and Drive

 

[Motorider]

Yep, despite the hurricane he told me to send it in and he would get me another out asap. His computer is still out due to Irma. Took a total of 5 min from death to get him on the horn. Great customer service.

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[snapon boy]

Yes he doesn't mess around.

149 r/c worx/scalerfab/team brood.

 

[Motorider]

Yes he doesn't mess around.

149 r/c worx/scalerfab/team brood.

I was just shocked that it died. I was bragging it up a lot. In fact, I probably would have sold 3 of them for jim. I'm afraid that was not the ideal situation to show off a new product. And the terrain was just trails, so there was no demand on the servo. It just seized up. I will say this, it seemed weak from the beginning. My shv500 is way faster. The specs show otherwise. Either way I am confident jim will get me a new one out asap.

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[snapon boy]

I use mine on my pro trucks with rock magnets and not having any problems with them. I have vp brass knuckles along with 9 weight slugs on each weight hangers.

149 r/c worx/scalerfab/team brood.

 

[Motorider]

Can't wait to get it back and put it through the ringer. No weights on this very light wraith

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[mikemcE]

I chewed up my holmes, the PM is still strong and fast.


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[MattySlimz1987]

Sucks to hear. Mr. John will take care of ya in a jiffy I'm pretty sure of it. My 470 is still pumping strong and fast, has been dunked in the drink quite a few times and been in some tight binds. Mind you I have it in a scaler where this servo has enough power to actually jerk the whole truck out of some rocks or in a bind. What voltage where you running it at since you got it?

 

[Motorider]

Sucks to hear. Mr. John will take care of ya in a jiffy I'm pretty sure of it. My 470 is still pumping strong and fast, has been dunked in the drink quite a few times and been in some tight binds. Mind you I have it in a scaler where this servo has enough power to actually jerk the whole truck out of some rocks or in a bind. What voltage where you running it at since you got it?

8.0v. Max on mamba x. Never been close to water. It's locked up tight tight. Will not budge.

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[MattySlimz1987]

8.0v. Max on mamba x. Never been close to water. It's locked up tight tight. Will not budge.

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That makes me nervous now, as I'm running my 470 on the Mamba X's max internal bec setting at 8.0v also. I did make sure to set my end points exactly where they need to be and even gave them a little bit of extra lee-way just to be safe, full lock to the left had to be brought down to about 85 due to the new shock hoops pan-hard flange being just a little to big. Not an issue at all, I'm still getting plenty of radius, I'm just not going to let it buzz even the slightest bit especially since I plan on running it for the rest of its life in on 8v.

 

[mikemcE]

Run my 420 at 8v and my 470 at 8.4..........


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[durok]

The best thing about having an issue with ProModeler (of which this is the first I've ever read!) or Holmes Hobbies servos is that they both have excellent customer service and are located in the good ol' US of A...

They are premium servos and supported as such. John Beech has noted that failed servos get diagnosed and analyzed.

MattySlimz1987 - quoted from the product description:

"Essentially, it's been outfitted with a stronger/faster motor and the whole PCB (printed circuit board) has been optimized for 8.4V because - despite our reservations - some folks prefer to operate servos off of a BEC instead of a battery. Speaking of batteries, on a 2S LiPo (7.4V nominal) the torque output is up from 420 oz-in to 440 oz-in. At 8.4V the torque output is 470 oz-in and while an extra 50oz-in is nothing to sneeze at, 3D pilots who are always wanting faster servos will be please with a significant decrease in transit time from 0.12 sec/60° to 0.09 sec/60°."

I would take that to mean technically you can run 7.4-8.4 safely.....

He has said before he personally recommends a standard JR-type connector from servo to a small 350mA 2S LiPo pack instead of to ESC w/built-in BEC (no matter how high it can be set) or even a separate BEC.

"Cleaner" power delivery, and because it is separate from main battery it doesn't run below optimum voltage anywhere nearly as quickly.

But - servo shouldn't be damaged if it's run within the range mentioned above... (that's my take-away)

 

[MattySlimz1987]

The best thing about having an issue with ProModeler (of which this is the first I've ever read!) or Holmes Hobbies servos is that they both have excellent customer service and are located in the good ol' US of A...

They are premium servos and supported as such. John Beech has noted that failed servos get diagnosed and analyzed.

MattySlimz1987 - quoted from the product description:

"Essentially, it's been outfitted with a stronger/faster motor and the whole PCB (printed circuit board) has been optimized for 8.4V because - despite our reservations - some folks prefer to operate servos off of a BEC instead of a battery. Speaking of batteries, on a 2S LiPo (7.4V nominal) the torque output is up from 420 oz-in to 440 oz-in. At 8.4V the torque output is 470 oz-in and while an extra 50oz-in is nothing to sneeze at, 3D pilots who are always wanting faster servos will be please with a significant decrease in transit time from 0.12 sec/60° to 0.09 sec/60°."

I would take that to mean technically you can run 7.4-8.4 safely.....

He has said before he personally recommends a standard JR-type connector from servo to a small 350mA 2S LiPo pack instead of to ESC w/built-in BEC (no matter how high it can be set) or even a separate BEC.

"Cleaner" power delivery, and because it is separate from main battery it doesn't run below optimum voltage anywhere nearly as quickly.

But - servo shouldn't be damaged if it's run within the range mentioned above... (that's my take-away)

Thanks Durok for that reminded me of what I read when the new 470 was released. With Mr. Johns recommendation of running it cleanly off a constant DC is definitely good advice, BUT being a first year electrician apprentice I've been learning a lot! One of the first sections in our text book is volts compared to amps.
One of the Mamba X's biggest things to bring to the table and probably why it has semi high price tag (besides its programmable aux wire) is its 8amp peak internal bec. With high spikes when the setting is at 8v it should still stay pretty linear and constant with that new higher amp rating. With that said I feel more confident with it being set at 8v and using the esc's bec. Further research on the matter made more sense as to why he would recommend running it on a stand alone bec.

 

[durok]

Yeah. I have one for possible installation into my Ascender later on as well as a Mamba Monster X (too big - goes in the Bomber someday). I don't think his preference was to use any BEC (internal or external), just a separate battery.

That being said, Castle makes high-performance internal and external BECs - for sure!

I'll be testing an SHV500 (1st gen) in the Bomber, direct from 3S, hoping I don't break a pin too quickly - mine's not from the newer upgraded batches.

 

[Smokin' Joe]

I guess we're slightly off topic, but I'll throw in my 2 cents. I took John's advice and run my 420 off a 260mah 2S battery. It's a little bit of a hassle having to charge two batteries to run the truck, but it works well otherwise. My main battery (3S 1000mah) pretty much always runs down before the steering battery so I just change them both at the same time.

 

[Motorider]

Run my 420 at 8v and my 470 at 8.4..........


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I assume you are using an external bec to get the 8.4v?

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[Motorider]

That makes me nervous now, as I'm running my 470 on the Mamba X's max internal bec setting at 8.0v also. I did make sure to set my end points exactly where they need to be and even gave them a little bit of extra lee-way just to be safe, full lock to the left had to be brought down to about 85 due to the new shock hoops pan-hard flange being just a little to big. Not an issue at all, I'm still getting plenty of radius, I'm just not going to let it buzz even the slightest bit especially since I plan on running it for the rest of its life in on 8v.

Don't be nervous. Shit happens to the best electronics in the world. So I got a dud, it's my luck. Best part is John is taking care of me. Oh and of course my endpoints were set correctly. Dang thing still had lots of sweep left, but I had to turn it down due to tires rubbing on the links. Mines in my wraith.

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[Ditchrat]

I guess we're slightly off topic, but I'll throw in my 2 cents. I took John's advice and run my 420 off a 260mah 2S battery. It's a little bit of a hassle having to charge two batteries to run the truck, but it works well otherwise. My main battery (3S 1000mah) pretty much always runs down before the steering battery so I just change them both at the same time.

You need to remember that John comes from the aviation side of RC. For a plane that a small failure can cause a crash of a very expensive plane, running a second battery for clean power is sound advice.

However if you ran a dedicated BEC from the battery to the servo you will not have any noticeable voltage drops. A second battery is very much overkill in a crawler. Voltage regulators have come a very long way, mostly due to the advent of the computer and the need to run very tight voltage tolerances.

Just think about your wall charger for your cell phone, not only does it go AC to DC it does so within the mA range. Those refinements have carried over to things like BEC's and generic voltage regulators.