Configuration and telemetry for VESC [iOS, Android]

I have been loving all the data metr has been giving me about my board. Thanks for all your updates!

Yesterday I went for a ride but was shocked when I saw the scale of some of the data. I didn’t get any warnings or faults durning the ride so I decided it was a glitch and didn’t think much of it. Today I went to use my board and am getting constant over current faults causing the FOCBOX to reset after the motor barely twitches (aka unusable).

Do you feel there could be any correlation to the weird data and my ESC being fussy? I have done over 200 miles on this setup and it has been super stable. I’m going to dig a little deeper after work but appreciate any thoughts.

My setup: FOCBOX 12s 5,00mAh LiPo with SuPower BMS Turnigy Aerodrive SK3 - 6364-190KV

Looks like some super high current

Exactly! But there is no way the hardware would survive that… much less act normally for 7 miles.

Looks like some values are multiplied by 1000 (all the time). What version of the firmware are you running? Can you connect with USB and run a bench test to see if BLDC Tool (or VESC Tool, if you are using new firmware) also has x1000 or not?

I’ll be checking it out tonight and I’ll report back. My goal with a 12s system was to keep currents low :stuck_out_tongue:

I remember I already saw some faulty values in this topic (not such mad as yours but the idea is the same). Once VESC was connected to BLDC Tool, it displayed the same garbage. Which leads us to conclusion that VESC has gone crazy and needs repair.

Hey @rpasichnyk i was thinking about a cool feature. We mostly use eboards for commuting and records back and forth create a lot of them and when you wan’t to find a specific ride it’s not easy when you record a lot.

  • create files to separate the type of rides : commute , fun ride

And for the commute record i would like a feature to « consolidate » two record like one since it’s basically the same ride, just a few hours later when you have to go home.
What do you think ?

Just got off a screen share with Enertion support and they will be sending me a new FOCBOX. I had fortunately purchased the warranty as I have had bad luck with first tries with new hardware. So no new info/conclusion, but am itching to get back on my board.

metr has been great though this process. thanks!

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@rpasichnyk Would it be hard to make an Pin(lock) option for the web interface so it doesn’t move along with the mouse cursor ?

I feel like the maximum RPM is off. Supposed to be 190kv motors on 12s limited to 60k ERPM. Anyone have thoughts. Everything else is pretty close since I compared metr stats to a separate wattmeter.

So 190kv * 45.7v * 7 pole pairs = 60,781. So the motors may be slightly less than 190kv which is fine but it’s not close to the max RPM of 49k by metr stats.

Edit… So I think it’s less the metr and more like witchcraft.
i plugged my numbers into this skate calculator. Changed motor efficiency to 83% which mirrors my top speed and I get the same 49k loaded RPM as metr shows. Why does it go to 49k and not 60k. I’ll tell you. Witchcrafts. Pure witchcrafts.

This is the theoretical maximum rpm, you probably never gonna get it in real life, one of the factor is as you said the motor Kv may be slight of, you can measure it by using the terminal os VESC tool

Second is duty cycle, the VESC works by default at a maximum of 95%, so you max theoretical ERPM is 0,96 what you calculated

And last, is you are running FOC you tend to loose a little bit of top speed

So unless I took this board downhill faster than the theoretical max top speed, I’ll never reach the 60k ERPM with my current setup due to all the loses combined, duty cycle, friction, heat, and of course witchcraft. I just think it’s weird it just peaks at 36mph. Once it’s there amp draw isn’t even that high. It just cruises

So after time spent on the forum researching motor kV ratings paired with cell count it seems like most people say for 12s 190kv is the max. Because of you do the math you get 60k unloaded ERPM roughly. So why this magic number of it doesn’t even apply. Vedder says 8600 motor rpms is the efficient zone of the motor but you can’t reach it if you use 190kv on 12s as it sits at theoretical max not loaded max.
With that said and nothing changed other than motor kV increased to 240kv the loaded ERPM becomes ~ 60k and motor rpms to 8600. I get higher kV speed goes up and torque down so there is for sure a difference, including new factors for drag and motor efficiency but it seems like exceeding the theoretical max to reach the loaded max would be fine. At a minimum to reach the motors full potential.

People run 12S on 190kV, but really that is too high for Vedder’s recommendations. If your voltage is greater than ~45V, you will be over 60k ERPM. On a fully charged battery you can easily go over 60k even after accounting for voltage sag. 170kV is much better for 12S. Keep in mind that 60k ERPM is not a hard limit but more of a guideline. People have taken Vedder’s suggestion of keeping it under 60k and made it a hard and fast “rule”

That said… Not to be rude, but this thread is about Metr. Your discussion would be better off in its own thread…

Yeah. I originally thought it was a metr error. I quickly digressed.

@rpasichnyk

I am upgrading to VESC Tool, but I can’t remember if we still need custom firmware (3.xx) to configure the VESC with Perimetr or to use the new “Modes” feature in Metr? Or does it work natively with Vedder’s new 3.xx firmware?

Also, does the modes feature work with Ackmaniac’s modified firmware?

No need to use custom, please use official Vedder firmware. Both Modes and Perimetr work fine with original firmware starting from v3.29. You can also use Ackmaniac’s, but his implementation of Watt control is separate and does not use limits set by the VESC Tool. So this will not work.

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Latest update adds Celsius for temperature while keeping the speed in miles per hour (if you select Imperial). Thanks @rpasichnyk for this!

Bug list time:

  • There is a spelling mistake, it’s saying “Celcius” and not “Celsius”.

  • In the new Modes mode I’ve noticed it does something weird to my settings. Watt control values (maximum/min) gets reset every time you write a new mode. I’m sure these did not get mangled in the previous version because i used that version to change motor min/max and it never changed other values… but now every time I write a new mode, maximum wattage remains 15000 but maximum braking wattage gets changed to 0.0W.

  • I’m not sure about this but I’ve noticed that after writing a new mode, my motors don’t both start at the same time (looks like the hall sensors values are skew?) What happens is that I write a new mode, turn the board upside down and slowly pushing the trigger will cause one wheel to spin but not the other. Even full throttle won’t cause the other to spin, sometimes. However, if I redo motor detection and never write a new mode, it never does that. So it looks like something changes while it shouldn’t change when writing a new mode? (this is FOCBOX dual on FOC with hall sensors)

A quick list of other possible improvements:

  1. Send record by email. I know you can connect your phone to iTunes and download the files, but it’s much more convenient if you can send the telemetry file with the built in email client to yourself or somebody else.

  2. I calculate the efficiency in Wh per mile very often and was wondering if a new widget can be added on the main screen to do that…the calculation ofc is simple, total Wh used / distance… but it would be nice to have a widget that shows efficiency in Wh per mile/km.

  3. The stats shown when you tap the bottom bluetooth status widget shows your overall total distance/wh/etc. If would be nice to have another section underneath that shows the same but only for the last ride. So even if you don’t record a session, you would see the overall totals but also the stats for the last ride. I think temporary BT disconnects need to be taken into account here… if it’s a short one it should not reset the last trip stats. If the app was disconnected for a longer time, it should consider it as a new trip.

As always, big thank you for the app, it’s really useful (and a big thank you for the TCP Bridge, really helpful)!

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Thank you for the bug reports and suggestions! Which firmware are you running?

3.100 @Ackmaniac