Trouble shooting

[Nigelpilot268]

Hi fellow pilots.
I need some help setting up my F8 crusader. I’ve got power to my control surfaces but I’ve got to power to my esc for some reason. It’s my first EDF and I haven’t got a clue what is causing this issue.

thanks for any help and advice

[xviper]

What do you mean by "power to ESC"? Since you've got power to the control surfaces, that indicates that you've got power to the RX, which means you've got the throttle lead plug into the RX. When you plug the battery in, do you get the beep tones indicating how many cells there are? Do you mean that when you increase throttle the motor doesn't respond? Did you do a throttle calibration? You need to clarify what exactly you have done and what is working and what is not working.

[Nigelpilot268]

What I’ve got working is the elevators and ailerons. But I’ve got nothing from the engine. It’s making a constant bleeping noise at the moment. Im on 11.1v 3s

[xviper]

OK, it's a bit more clear now. You do in fact, have power to the ESC. That happens as soon as you plug the battery. I think what's happening here is that your ESC is not responding to throttle commands. This is most likely because you have not calibrated the ESC yet. Calibration must be done to any new plane and anytime the RX is changed or re-bound.
Try this ..................
1. Secure the plane so it doesn't accidentally blast off the table.
2. Turn on TX.
3. Make sure throttle cut is not activated, ie, throttle is armed.
4. Lower throttle trim on TX as low as it will go.
5. Moved throttle stick to the top.
6. Plug in flight battery.
7. As soon as you hear a twin beep, lower the stick to the bottom. Wait for the initialization tones. You've now taught the ESC where zero and max throttle is. Test to see if you have any throttle response (carefully).
8. Make sure you set your throttle cut to whatever default switch for that on the TX. Since you lowered the throttle trim, throttle cut level must be just below that. Test to make sure that you have no throttle respond when CUT is activated, ie, throttle disarmed.

[GliderGuy]

Nice procedure Xviper!

One last item, some ESCs require the throttle channel in the TX is set to REVERSE mode.
-GG

[Evan D]

Years ago Futaba and JR were opposite, one positive shift and the other negative. Since JR designed the first DSM radios they are also opposite Futaba. Most ESCs use the signal input from JR/ Spektrum.

[tab28682]

Continuous beeps may simply mean that his radio is not seeing a low enough throttle setting to arm the ESC.

Try reducing throttle to zero and then reduce throttle trim to zero, or reduce it until the ESC arms. This process fixes this type of ESC behavior about 98% of the time for me.

Throttle calibration is always a good idea, as well.

On the subject of ESCs that work “backwards” to normal throttle position. At least some to many of the Great Planes produced ElectriFly ESCs were up to work with Futaba out of the package. If you used them with Spektrum, JR and other common systems, you had to reverse the throttle channel.

[GliderGuy]

Really? I am aware that some radio sytems (Futaba, I believe) by default operate in reverse from what has become PWM standard (low throttle = short pulse, high throttle = long pulse) but I've not come across an ESC that operates in reverse and I have a bunch of different brands.

Since I fly Futaba, just about all my Freewing and Flightline birds require that my TX throttle channel is set to Reverse.

i haven’t looked at each bird’s set-up as I type, but from memory…pretty sure I got the continuous ESC beeping from just about every bird when first connected to power which required a TX throttle channel setting to reverse to cure the beeping.

-GG