Quark on 6s

[MetalMan]

Yeah, I know. What I've heard is that brushless ESCs used in car applications should have caps that are rated for about twice the voltage that will be going into the ESC. Obviously this isn't the case with the Mamba Max and 5s Lipo.

[cart213]

Originally Posted by MetalMan

Yeah, I know. What I've heard is that brushless ESCs used in car applications should have caps that are rated for about twice the voltage that will be going into the ESC. Obviously this isn't the case with the Mamba Max and 5s Lipo.

Shawn at CC once said that the caps should be rated 20% higher than the voltage going into the esc. This statement was in response to my question about whether or not the MM could handle more voltage than 4s lipo.

[BrianG]

I've heard most manufacturers of caps underrate their working voltages somewhat as a safety margin. So I wonder if higher voltage caps would do anything at all??

Most circuit designers tend to use caps up to 50% higher that the working voltage. However, higher voltage and/or higher capacitance caps are physically bigger and may not fit in the small spaces found in an ESC. You could add caps outside the ESC, but at high switching frequencies, you want the caps as close to the circuit as possible so that's a limiting factor as well.

The next time someone has their Quark apart to repair the thermal material, they should try installing some higher voltage and higher capacity low ESR caps as a test. IIRC, smhertzog has his 125B circuits exposed so he could install gargantuan heatsinks. Maybe he'll be the guinea pig? :)