Adding a second FET board to the Quark...

[zeropointbug]

Heys guys, (nudging at Griffin) I have my 'super' Quark here with bad control board on it; and i also have a perfectly working Quark that I am using now. It gets hotter than I would like (well hotter than I am used to compared to my other one...), so I was wondering how I could go about soldering the power board to my working Quark for double current handling, and cooler running?

It sounds easy, but once I thought about it, what do you use to connect the second board to the first one? As the metal pins are only so long, I don't know what to do.

THanks.

[BrianG]

The oly thing I can think of is to maybe change the FET gate drive resistors. Aside from that, replace the existing pins with longer ones...

[zeropointbug]

You mean with higher resistance ones to make up for the fact that there is double?

Any idea where to get these pins? That's my main problem.

[BrianG]

SInce I'm cheap, I just cut leads off resistors (might need to use larger ones to get the wire gauge you need).

[zeropointbug]

Yeah, that will probably be good enough (bigger resistors for wire size, or maybe some oxygen free silver wire I have left over from a audiophile project...?).

The only problem we have still is what are we soldering to? There doesn't look to be enough room to solder to, on the pins that poke through the board.

[zeropointbug]

I can forget about this project... I almost forgot about the row of pins by the power input. Way too much work for me to do, I think I will just throw the board onto my monster heatsink.

[BrianG]

So you're not gonna do this just because of a row of pins? Slacker!

[zeropointbug]

Well honestly Brian! Far too finicky for me; it scares me just looking at it.

I'll see what I can think of, I might just come up with a solution...

[GriffinRU]

The problem with Quark is that you can only add 1/2 of FET's from other controller. And then you need to look for new enclosure...
What I found out about Quark, that with proper heatsink it is as good as mod1 mambamax, and cost ~3 times more than MM making it not a good candidate for such mod.
Quark in copper

Sorry for late response,

[zeropointbug]

Well wouldn't you have to look for a new enclosure anyway?

Feasibility is not an issue, as I already have the second power board from a dead brains Quark. My main issue is the scary row of pins at the back of the board. Can you think of an easy way to do this?

thanks

[GriffinRU]

Originally Posted by zeropointbug

Well wouldn't you have to look for a new enclosure anyway?

Feasibility is not an issue, as I already have the second power board from a dead brains Quark. My main issue is the scary row of pins at the back of the board. Can you think of an easy way to do this?

thanks

Now, looking closely at Quark again, I think you can utilize all FET's if new enclosure is not a problem (I fit my mod into original and it works).

1. unsolder pin by pin old header and replace it with new one with longer leads, find matching one (receptacle with long leads) or solder all the pins (straight pins header)
2. protect power input, pos and neg would be facing each other
3. check for RC elements of motor sensing (if I remember correct they are on the brains side, but check. You might need to remove them.)
4. I do not see any other way, besides soldering for FET's boards.

Adding just middle FET's board (1/2 half of total FET's from one ESC) should fit under stock enclosure, I know you do not have it but just a thought.

[zeropointbug]

Okay, great thanks. Where do I get these longer pin receptacles? I will have to get a new iron as this might be a little tricky without a smaller iron head.

[GriffinRU]

Originally Posted by zeropointbug

Okay, great thanks. Where do I get these longer pin receptacles? I will have to get a new iron as this might be a little tricky without a smaller iron head.

www.digikey.com keyword: headers check pitch 0.1'' or 2mm I do not remember but it is important :)

[zeropointbug]

Okay, found them... I am going to start this as soon as I get a MMM, in case I screw something up, I don't want to be caught without a working controller.

Thanks Griff