hello,
let me start out by saying that this is my first time working with something like a VESC, i took the motors from a old swagatron hover board and have mounted them to a reel mower, the end goal is to make a remote control reel mower, i purchased one flipsky esc and downloaded the VESC software, when i hook up the esc to my motor and send it a command with the RX the esc a beep noise and the wheel shows that it is getting power as it is hard to spin and then the esc shuts down, im assuming this is a safety mechanism, when i hook it up to the VESC software it will detect the ESC but then look connection to it shortly afterwards, i tried wiring up the hall sensor wires but im not sure i did that properly as the VESC software wouldn't detect the motor with CAN, im using the battery pack from the hover board, im sorry if my description hurts your head a little, like i said im very new but i learn fast when motivated.
here are what i could find for specs for the motors and battery
Motor: 2x direct drive 3-phase brushless DC electric wheel hub motors, 36V 350W, 700W total
Battery: Lithium-ion rechargeable 18650-cells, 10S2P 36V 4400mAh 158.4Wh pack with XT60 connector
Probably worth posting a picture how you've connected it all together.
Flipsky make many ESCs, do you know which one in particular you're using?
Have you run any of the wizards for tuning the ESC to your motors? Hoverboard hub motors are a little different to the usual outrunners so tuning is really a must.
What are you using CAN for?
here are the pictures let me know if you can get to them
i thought can was referring to the hall sensor
i did run the motor setup wizard but it would never complete
Jonathan Crabtrey
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1BeD0xkGeUaWyevSyB4urhHtQeLdtpsI0?usp=sharing here is the link to the pictures, i have modified the permissions so that anyone that clicks on the link should be able to see the pictures in the folder.
Jonathan Crabtrey
Hey Jonathan! Welcome to the forum. We are actually running the same FSESC's and Identical motors like yours. At first it was hard to get them working, but later it all became a pretty easy process. You need to first update your FSESC through VESCTool, there's a manual in this forum on how to do it. Then you need to set up your motors- for this use the Set Up Motor FOC wizard in the "welcome" tab of the software. Make sure you fill in the correct amount of poles- your motors have 30 poles in them and your Battery series number is 10. Make sure you select "Direct Drive" in the set up menu. After you get this done, make sure to write motor data into the VESC (letter M on the right of your screen with an arrow pointing downward). Then go to the "FOC" page in the software and do the FOC calibration manually. Right next to every function there's a button with a question mark, press it and it will tell you how to do a specific part of the process. Hope this helps.
To simply test your motor, go to the wizard, input all data, run the process and then press the keyboard button on the right side. This will enable you to see if the motor spins by pressing a button on your keyboard arrows.
Hope this helps,
Cheers!
Did you have to wire in your hall sensor? If so can you verify that I have correctly wired the conversion from 6 wire hall to 5 wire hall? To my understanding the yellow wire on the 6 wire is a temp wire and not needed
Jonathan Crabtrey
Did you have to wire in your hall sensor? If so can you verify that I have correctly wired the conversion from 6 wire hall to 5 wire hall? To my understanding the yellow wire on the 6 wire is a temp wire and not needed
Jonathan Crabtrey
I am running same VESC with a hoverboard motor. I am pretty sure the white wire from the VESC is for the temp sensor. The other three wires are for hall sensors on that connector.
If you don't make it successfully through the FOC wizard, you will not be able to control your motor. Solve for that first.
In the FOC Wizard, switch to the advanced tab,
Motor poles = 15 (15 is the number of pole pairs)
Gear Ratio =1
Battery type, etc per your batery.
i was able to make it through the firmware update and the motor setup wizard but when i started trying to go through the FOC portion it would disconnect and i would get the below error
2020-07-21 16:20:55: Status: Connected (serial) to COM4
2020-07-21 16:20:55: Status: VESC Firmware Version 5.1, Hardware: 410, UUID: 28 00 2B 00 06 47 39 32 39 34 39 36
2020-07-21 16:20:59: Status: Serial port error: The I/O operation has been aborted because of either a thread exit or an application request.
Jonathan Crabtrey
What number are you using for Motor Poles?
I'm using the settings suggested above, so 30 poles and 10 cells for the battery, I'm kinda thinking my battery is right at dead and maybe that's the reason for the error/disconnect, I'm going to buy an XT60 connector and make a charger out of the mini 3 pin XLR connector on the hoverboard main board
Jonathan Crabtrey
ok, i am pretty excited, after i rigged up a battery charger and charged the battery up i was able to see the hub sipn up for the first time with the VESC, i was able to complete the FOC set up and i was able to set up the RC TX and RX to the VESC, the new problems are i have to give it full throttle with the RC remote for it to spin up and it doesn't seem to be able to carry any load at all ( placed wheel on the carpet and tried to get it to roll forward with the RC remote) every time i tried to spin with load it would squeak and stop, below is a screen shot of my current settings
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Z9aHTX8Xrzus8gW2xJmCdCseWeNpn5Ug/view?usp=sharing
Jonathan Crabtrey
After some tinkering with the settings I think it's pretty much ready to go, still have some choppiness when the motor hits about 50% throttle that I don't know how to fix but the I have forward and reverse with the controller and I can put a load on it, thank you to everyone who helped me figure this out, still open to suggestions if anyone has some for improvement.
Jonathan Crabtrey
Was able to eliminate the choppiness and no longer have to give it full throttle, the issue was I did not see the direct drive check box in advanced settings so I did not check it, I found the check box about three tabs down after the battery set up, thank you to everyone who helped point me in the correct direction, was able to take the robomower for a spin yesterday, now it's on to designing the track system
Jonathan Crabtrey