I’m meant to be going on a group ride today in London but my board has decided to stop working. Not sure why, but it’s just unresponsive.
I start up the board and I get a solid blue light on my FOCBOX. I’m fairly sure this is meant to be blinking? I turn my remote on, it seems to connect like normal but the motor doesn’t spin when I push the throttle forward. A red light blinks 3 times when I do this. Everything’s connected as it should be but for some reason it’s just not doing anything.
Thoughts? I’d still like to go on the ride today.
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Fault : FAULT_CODE_DRV
Current : -0.9
Current filtered : -0.1
Voltage : 37.35
Duty : -0.003
RPM : -0.0
Tacho : 1
Cycles running : 2
TIM duty : -22
TIM val samp : 2
TIM current samp : 4200
TIM top : 8400
Comm step : 0
Temperature : 25.06
definitely looks that way, i would inspect the board just to make sure some debris isn’t causing it to short, if it is, its a quick fix, if not your looking at a repair job/ new vesc.
interesting. (also the site is borked for pictures at the moment)
can you get a closer look at the one circled in green.
as for the large object with the copper showing, I dont remember if its supposed to have any showing - i.e it might be missing a bit of its shell, as if I remember its supposed to have a solid top piece.
as for the fets. i cant truly make out but is that water damage/corrosion, or just left over flux?
I’ve had a closer look at the copper ring does look like it’s snapped off but i don’t know how as it’s never been out of the FOCBOX case before. The only time it was taken apart was do remove the bottom part of the case so I could attach it to my heat sink plate.
I’ve tried taking a close up picture of the one circled in green but I’m struggling to get my phone to focus on it.
The 2 silver bits you’ve highlighted (I take it these are the fets?) - I’m not sure if it’s corrosion or not. I’ve given it a clean up with a tooth brush and they look the same as the others.
im putting my money on that copper coil. I just took apart one of my spare focboxes(its a dead one (i uploaded the wrong firmware)) and it does indeed have a full top with no copper showing.
pretty sure that component has caused these problems.
Is the entire thing meant t be covered or just the top? How could missing that part cause this problem? I’m not 100% on the workings of circuit boards etc
The copper thing thats the inductor…Its a very vital part. The stuff thats broken off is ferrite. An inductive material that helps to create the magnetic field which stores energy. Well, thats the short verision of explaning it anyway. Its damaged, but my gut says that it should work anyway. Probably the DRV that is fried.
If you had the plastic enclosure on all the time, I cant imagine how its been beaten up. Wonder if that was mounted damaged… Its easy to replace however. Just two pads that needs to be desoldered. think its 38uH if im not misstaken.
My apologies linsus. I’m really not very good at the PCB side of things! I’ll come up with nick names and you can decipher it
It was first kept in the original box and then I purchased a heat sink so I undone the 3 screws and attached it to the heat sink straight away. The device worked so I had no need to investigate it further.
I’m fairly decent with a soldering iron. Where can I get the new fet(s) from? If I had instructions I’d be more than capable of following them I’m sure.
Im not so sure the FETs are the issue, if you are familiar with how the FETs are connected you can find out if theyre fried or not with a multimeter. Look up the schematic for the vesc 4.12 on github. You should have a certain amount of resistance between the terminals. See if any of the fets gives you a value that differs from the others.
If the drv is fried you need a hot air soldering gun. And a new DRV ofc. I usually shop from Mouser.
either you shop some pare components there untill you reach free shipping, like a few MCUs, som extra FETs, few DRVs and you learn to repair the VESCs yourself. Or you send it to someone who can repair it for you. Think we have a few on the forum that still does that
thats the inductor…Its a very vital part. The stuff thats broken off is ferrite. An inductive material that helps to create the magnetic field which stores energy. Well, thats the short verision of explaning it anyway. Its damaged, but my gut says that it should work anyway. Probably the DRV that is fried.
If you had the plastic enclosure on all the time, I cant imagine how its been beaten up. Wonder if that was mounted damaged… Its easy to replace however. Just two pads that needs to be desoldered. think its 38uH if im not misstaken.