New Freewing Afterburner lights

[Gordone]

After installing the tail light kit, I realized that I'm using Gen 2 Smart Batteries which have no balance leads. I've tried adding on a little 2S cell to power the unit but it seems to be too little power and the LEDs only produce a faint glow. I'm assuming that the unit was designed to use 4 cells of a 6 cell battery for power. Do I need to connect two 2S batteries in series to get enough juice to produce a satisfactory light? My two 2S batteries would add 3oz. including a homemade series connector.

[Evan D]

The white wire is ground, then the red is three spots over. At 4.2V per cell that is 12.6V so it's designed to operate off 12V. A 3S to 6S LiPo balance lead can be plugged in to supply that 12V.

[BenOzzy94]

After installing the tail light kit, I realized that I'm using Gen 2 Smart Batteries which have no balance leads. I've tried adding on a little 2S cell to power the unit but it seems to be too little power and the LEDs only produce a faint glow. I'm assuming that the unit was designed to use 4 cells of a 6 cell battery for power. Do I need to connect two 2S batteries in series to get enough juice to produce a satisfactory light? My two 2S batteries would add 3oz. including a homemade series connector.

I'm using one of these in my Eurofighter to power the afterburner as my lipo has frsky telemetry on it does me for about 6 flights before it needs re-charging

https://www.motionrc.com/products/admiral-250mah-3s-11-1v-30c-lipo-battery-with-jst-connector-epr02503

[kallend]

After installing the tail light kit, I realized that I'm using Gen 2 Smart Batteries which have no balance leads. I've tried adding on a little 2S cell to power the unit but it seems to be too little power and the LEDs only produce a faint glow. I'm assuming that the unit was designed to use 4 cells of a 6 cell battery for power. Do I need to connect two 2S batteries in series to get enough juice to produce a satisfactory light? My two 2S batteries would add 3oz. including a homemade series connector.

Make one of my Do-It-Yourself afterburners and you can run it directly from the 6S pack. And it works better than the FW unit too.

https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?3313547-Make-a-Do-it-Yourself-EDF-afterburner

[TonyTaff]

Hi any one had this experience. I have the 8s version of the freewing typhoon. I installed the freewing afterburner. Everything seemed ok until with two 4S batteries in series I hooked up the afterburner to one of the balance leads as recommended. I immediately let the smoke out of the control board Ouch.I should add i'm using the SMC HiV batteries.
I fitted a new control board and this time I hooked it up to 2s 300 mah battery.
it appears to work except it’s not very bright,may be i'm not either!!
I tried a different lamp through a different esc and bec it’s not bright enough to be effective.
don't know what to next next except may contact rcgeek The unit is designed to run on 3S 11.1V its hard to fathom that 12.9 volts would smoke it.

[kallend]

Hi any one had this experience. I have the 8s version of the freewing typhoon. I installed the freewing afterburner. Everything seemed ok until with two 4S batteries in series I hooked up the afterburner to one of the balance leads as recommended. I immediately let the smoke out of the control board Ouch.I should add i'm using the SMC HiV batteries.
I fitted a new control board and this time I hooked it up to 2s 300 mah battery.
it appears to work except it’s not very bright,may be i'm not either!!
I tried a different lamp through a different esc and bec it’s not bright enough to be effective.
don't know what to next next except may contact rcgeek The unit is designed to run on 3S 11.1V its hard to fathom that 12.9 volts would smoke it.

See post #44, immediately above yours. Works on 8S, doesn't turn on at idle like the FW unit, customizable to work the way YOU want it to work.

[Evan D]

If you bought the FreeWing AB why say "don't know what to next next except may contact rcgeek The unit is designed to run on 3S 11.1V its hard to fathom that 12.9 volts would smoke it." Maybe a lack of punctuation and you mean "don't know what to next, except maybe contact rcgeek. The unit is designed to run on 3S 11.1V, its hard to fathom that 12.9 volts would smoke it."

The FreeWing one has a plug that plugs into up to 6S battery balance connector. You have to make sure you are plugging it into the battery that has the black (ground) wire plugged into the black ESC lead. This may be difficult if using some series adapters.

It sounds like you plugged yours into the wrong battery. Doing so puts the afterburners ground onto the positive (about 17V for 4S) of the first battery in series which is very bad for the light controller.

Hi any one had this experience. I have the 8s version of the freewing typhoon. I installed the freewing afterburner. Everything seemed ok until with two 4S batteries in series I hooked up the afterburner to one of the balance leads as recommended. I immediately let the smoke out of the control board Ouch.I should add i'm using the SMC HiV batteries.
I fitted a new control board and this time I hooked it up to 2s 300 mah battery.
it appears to work except it’s not very bright,may be i'm not either!!
I tried a different lamp through a different esc and bec it’s not bright enough to be effective.
don't know what to next next except may contact rcgeek The unit is designed to run on 3S 11.1V its hard to fathom that 12.9 volts would smoke it.

[TonyTaff]

I am using 2 x SMC 4s HIV batteries in series, so yes I probably connected it to the wrong battery, I subsequently found a short video explaing the dangers of doing that.
today I tried a single battery (4s SMC HIV ) and i still burnt our the control board. Now im looking for a replacement control board. Then I can modify the connector to connect to lerror voltage. It was super bright on the 4S but it didnt last long before the control board got hot and quit.

Does any know if Motion RC or Freewing sell just the control board? I now have two sets of lamps with all the adapters that are of no use to me without them

[TonyTaff]

Ironically the controller is clearly marked 12.5V / 1A 24v / 3A not sure how that figures either.

[kallend]

Here is the $13 fix. It works better than the original, too.

https://www.hobbysquawk.com/forum/rc-airplanes/rc-jets/372281-freewing-tail-flame-afterburner?p=373491#post373491

Also see post #36 in the same thread.

[kallend]

Photos of the fix described in my previous post:

https://www.hobbysquawk.com/forum/rc-airplanes/rc-jets/372281-freewing-tail-flame-afterburner?p=373545#post373545