Numbers in Castle Creations motor model numbers..?

[GorillaZilla]

im more of a fan for the Ezrun 150amp Pro V2's than those old blue xeruns

How good are these Ezrun 150A pro v2's? Whats better about them than the Xerun? As I was looking at getting a Xerun at one point.

[ebo]

What you doin' with your 80A ESC then mate?

Edited September 23, 2011 by ebo

[GorillaZilla]

I think I'll retire it to the spares box for now. And just buy a new top end brushless combo :-)

I'm thinking of pairing Either an EZrun 150A-PRO v2 Or a Xerun 150A V2.1 with a CC1515

As castle undoubtedly makes the best "affordable" motors, but I'm not too sure about their ESCs from generally reading all the "This esc VS that esc" threads out there and averaging them all out....

Apparently the Mambas are great hardware wise but the firmware sounds to be a little rough & retro.... And for some reason the Xeruns and EZruns are ahead software\Firmware wise. Still researching and still not sure as it's such a controversial subject...

Seems like the performance of these hobbywing ESCs now days is getting equal to the Mamba in pure power. And strangely are reported to be more reliable. Is this because they are not constrained so much by physical size limits as the Mambas seem to be? (Though the Xerun is more towards the MMM size now...?)

It feels like they try to compact the MMM too much.....

Just don't take anything I say too seriously as it IS just the rambling of a mad ape trying to make sense of a confusing world X-D

And editing as more information is dug up....

Edited September 23, 2011 by GorillaZilla

[Revorocks]

I think I'll retire it to the spares box for now. And just buy a new top end brushless combo :-)

I'm thinking of pairing Either an EZrun 150A-PRO v2 Or a Xerun 150A V2.1 with a CC1515

As castle undoubtedly makes the best "affordable" motors, but I'm not too sure about their ESCs from generally reading all the "This esc VS that esc" threads out there and averaging them all out....

Apparently the Mambas are great hardware wise but the firmware sounds to be a little rough & retro.... And for some reason the Xeruns and EZruns are ahead software\Firmware wise. Still researching and still not sure as it's such a controversial subject...

Seems like the performance of these hobbywing ESCs now days is getting equal to the Mamba in pure power. And strangely are reported to be more reliable. Is this because they are not constrained so much by physical size limits as the Mambas seem to be? (Though the Xerun is more towards the MMM size now...?)

It feels like they try to compact the MMM too much.....

Just don't take anything I say too seriously as it IS just the rambling of a mad ape trying to make sense of a confusing world X-D

And editing as more information is dug up....

I think that is one of the main reasons they have problems with them blowing up. If they allowed it to have a larger footprint then maybe they would hold up better.

Getting a 6S 120A ESC in that space is quite an achievement!

Not sure you mean about the firmware/software being behind, it works lol, and features like datalogging aren't really that sort after. Once you know your setup's good then you don't look at the logs again.

Only gripe I have with the MMM's is their reliability. Lets face it, they don't have a good record generally for being reliable.

Some people run them for years with no problems, others have them blow up one after the other. Castle are constantly trying to improve them, as this problem is loosing them money, but atleast when they do blow up and it's not your fault, you know that Castle WILL replace it for you

[GorillaZilla]

Agreed, Hard to beat that castle warranty and customer support. As I've read time after time how epic it is, and easily makes up for any of the reliability issues

Anyhow, about ESCs and software,

I don't care that much for data logging and other gimmicky bells & whistles that don't affect actual behavior or performance that much either, handy bonus though they might be if they are included.

But what I'm really talking about when I say "ESC Software/Firmware" is the actual software "drivers" that run and determine the basic behavior of the ESC's hardware, and help determine how well and in what manner the ESC performs.

ESC Hardware And software are separate, and Both in a way equally important....

I'm thinking aloud here (and I'm quite insane ) so don't take anything I say too seriously.... And it doesn't help that I never actually "remember" anything... just vaguely recollect things... So....

An RC world analogy would be...

Like a Varying quality of Car(1) and varyingly skilled Driver(2)

1= The FETs and all the other hardware Mcgubbins inside an ESC

2= the software\device drivers ect loaded onto the micro processor (without it ESC would be an unresponsive Brick)

I'd suppose (in my perception of it from what I've read) the Mamba Monster Could be described as A top quality car Like Mugen MBX6 Or Kyosho MP9 being driven by just an alright and competent driver....

(I might just be seeing shapes in clouds though.. BUT... they "might" just be real SU 27's coming to bomb my Gnomes!)

And other certain ESCs out there (Newest 150A EZruns and Xeruns ect?) could in theory be more like an older lesser pedigree cars like a Hyper ST Pro ect... but being driven by a REALLY good driver, and would perform as well on the track as the higher quality car with a less skilled driver.. And might even innately know a trick or two about handling quirks of their own particular car that help them achieve smoother more consistent lap times, ect *

* = other Qualities of an ESCs performance Beside raw power? Smoothness and linearity of power delivery, ect?

And some drivers might know something special that helps in some other way....

eg. Tekin RX8's software/Driver apparently combines the Coggingless start up and super low rock crawling like speed smoothness of sensor'd operation with the high RPM speed efficiency of sensorless, by operating in a sensored mode at low RPM then seamlessly switching to sensorless at higher RPM....

The Xerun can run both sensored and sensorless motors Just like the RX8... and can even switch seamlessly to sensorless when running a sensored motor when the sensor cable is broken...

But by some odd quirk IT'S "Driver" Does NOT know that one simple crucial little trick the RX8's "Driver" does... That is when it sees that the RPM of the motor reaches a certain RPM... to do what it would do when the cable is broken.... and go sensorless...

And theres new "Supercharged Software" firmware out for certain Hobbywing Xerun ESCs That is apparently having a dramatic effect on how the ESC's behave (results start coming in further into the thread, not read it much myself yet though) . Something to do with dynamically adjusting the motor timing on the fly in real time...

I'm still reading up on this one.....

I've Read further in, and if what I'm reading is true, Even I'M taken aback at how much difference that new software update made. And I KNEW how much software mattered already....

Heres a PDF that explains how one of the new features (superCharger) in the software update works

Weird stuff...

So in the end the quality of the "software" makes a very real and concrete affect on all aspects of an ESC's realworld performance and personality/other qualities....

Just kind of trying to outline what I'm thinking about here..... I think it kind of makes sense, but how can one be sure that what makes sense to a sanity-challenged ape makes sense to anyone else?

Yet.... I suppose the craziest thing about this post is, all of that I've typed so far is just so those that Actually KNOW a lot about this sort of thing will understand what I'm actually asking with my next question ....

We all know the actual hardware of an MMM is very good, barring whatever mystery gremlin is making them smoke, insufficient caps to smooth out ripple from under-rated batteries ect whatever it is.... Thank the Castle for their excellent Quality of Warrenty/Customer Service

But how does the castle firmware stack up to whats out there driving other ESC's like Xeruns And EZruns ect, In the way of Innovation, sophistication and refinement?

Edited September 24, 2011 by GorillaZilla

[snoop1050]

has anyone ever tried to make a custom firmware for any ESC's? like with computers some routers have custom firmwares made by the users which add new features usually they are open source projects

[GorillaZilla]

I Do admit thats An Excellent question! as ESC firmware is just a software package flashed onto the ESC..... And I do like the Idea of open source ESC firmware... Open source can be amazing stuff, I'm typing this on Mozilla firefox running on Unbuntu for example X-)

Edited September 24, 2011 by GorillaZilla

[suicideneil]

Castle firmware programming options are the best out there, you only need to look at the CastleLink software and the relatively new HobbyWing software to see Hobbywing completely ripped it off- kinda sucky really but then again, most 1/8 motors on the market now are just clones of the castle versions ( only Medusa, Aveox, Pletternberg & Megamotor had 4 pole motors for years, then castle makes a cheap 4 pole version of the Neu under license, and suddenly there are zillions of 4 pole motors around for even less- go fiure there are lots of 1/8 escs too... ).

As for custom firmware for the escs, Castle have enough issues making firmware which doesn't produce glitches & low speed control issues for every revision of their escs, don't imagine anyone else will have much luck unless they have vast programming experience & r/c software experience to boot...