Talion Firma 150 fire- Talion 6s

[Nbum89]

So I just got done putting 30k in my front diff, last week I added 300k to my center. 18t pinion. Stock everything else. Did a couple speed runs. Everything was nice and well under “hot”. Bumped up the timing to 26, made 1 full throttle pass, turned around and got halfway thru the second and it shut down. Thinking that was weird I still had steering, plenty of battery I was walking up to get it and it started smoking like it was a smoke bomb so I ran up ripped the body off unplugged the battery and the esc just had a little flame coming out. I’m thinking that it either had to be from me bumping the timing up, the 30k in the diff, or the little bit of rain on the road. I still have my receipt for this esc the date is 4/8/22 hopefully somebody will work with me, but I honestly don’t want it to happen again. Anybody have any ideas or input ?

 

[RCbuzz]

Bummer! not another one ..
Seems when people push these Firma 150's past their limit you might have a problem...

I would get it replaced, sell it and buy a Max6.

Sorry that happened to you, glad you caught it quick!

I also hear there is a revised firmware revision, perhaps that may help as well?

 

[Hector_Fisher]

If I had to guess, I'd suspect it was the timing change. I think the default (22 i believe) is already high up there. Timing increase can give increased performance, but at high power costs. Think like OC'ing a computers CPU. You get 5-10% performance (maybe) but power usage goes up 30-40%. I feel like there might be some correlation between why the 150a firma esc's die all the time and what their default timing is. Just my two cents.

 

[Adiabatic]

Second the timing guess. 26° advanced is very high and will greatly increase the motor's current draw. Even the stock 22.5° setting is too high for my liking. You should still be able to get warranty coverage though.

I feel like there might be some correlation between why the 150a firma esc's die all the time and what their default timing is.

I suspect so too.

 

[jkflow]

Always thought default was 15, but yes, it's 22, which is crazy high. 26 is plain insane, and I'm sure that was your issue. Should have gone the other way.

 

[Nbum89]

Yea I shoulda known better. It just ran so good on 22.5 I just had to see what 26 would do, well I found out lol it sure was a smoke show. That crap really stinks too!
Also. Even after the fire my motor still wasn’t real hot

 

[jkflow]

Timing is always a bit of a mystery, but 95% of the time it should be in the 12-15deg range for Y-wound motors and 0-5 for D-wound.
Anything outside results in huge current spikes, but could give a little performance boost if you do need that extra little 2% and have a very specific need (speedrun). There is no known rule as to what to do otherwise, and varies by motor model.
For bashing, it should stay default or in this case reduce to the 12-15 range. No idea what they were thinking setting that high of a default unless their print is wrong (wouldn't be surprising).

 

[Adiabatic]

Might be an effort to squeak out a bit more top speed to meet the claim on the box. I reduced mine after noticing the motor would overheat after 5 minutes of moderate bashing. It helped the problem, but I lost a couple mph. Completely unnoticeable without a GPS measurement, but bad for YouTube marketing.

 

[Hector_Fisher]

Always kind of wondered if it would be better to lower timing a few steps and then just up the pinion tooth by a tooth or two. I have to think the folks at arrma/spektrum are at least half way smart and do some research, so it definitely makes me wonder why they upped the timing instead of lower timing and a using a higher pinion tooth as standard (13t maybe?).

I've considered this myself. Currently running a 14t on the stock spektrum stuff for my kexb. Heat wise I think it could handle a 16t (I barely get to 120f). So I might try a 17t and lower the timing to 15 degrees.

 

[Adiabatic]

I wonder if Arrma even really tested it. The Firma 150 manual shows 22.5° as the default setting programmed by Spektrum, so it's possible they just plopped in the electronics and designed around them without any tweaks. In that case I definitely think you could drop the timing to 15° and up the pinion by a tooth to get a similar top speed with less heat and less stress on the ESC.

 

[morrjr71]

When I had the 150 ESC in my Kraton I saw with the programming card it was set at 22, so I backed it down to 15. After reading about all the issues with the 150 I decided to replace the motor and ESC with a Castle MMX 8s and 1650 motor. Best decision I could have made.

 

[@9G]

When I had the 150 ESC in my Kraton I saw with the programming card it was set at 22, so I backed it down to 15. After reading about all the issues with the 150 I decided to replace the motor and ESC with a Castle MMX 8s and 1650 motor. Best decision I could have made.

Same here! When I see orange I swaps it out immediately!! The MMX8S is probably the best do it all ESC out there at the moment. You probably get 85 to 90 percent of what you’d get in an XLX2 and it fits in just about every vehicle. Bit more on topic…the stock Castle timing is 10! I don’t even think you can get the timing to 26 on a Castle ( may be wrong cause I would never try it) as 20 may be the highest. They just perform…can’t say the same about the Spektrum stuff unfortunately.

 

[Velodromed]

I’ve been wondering about timing, what it does and why. Finally googled it and this made the most sense…but is it that simple?
‘Increasing timing increases rpm and motor temps but decreases torque, efficiency and run time. Decreasing timing does, as expected, just the opposite’.

 

[Adiabatic]

I’ve been wondering about timing, what it does and why. Finally googled it and this made the most sense…but is it that simple?
‘Increasing timing increases rpm and motor temps but decreases torque, efficiency and run time. Decreasing timing does, as expected, just the opposite’.

Not that simple unfortunately. Timing changes the shape of the torque vs RPM curve and there's an ideal range for different motors. jkflow posted accurate numbers above. In general, lower timing will cause the motor to make peak torque at a lower RPM and higher timing will make peak torque at a higher RPM, so this can mean that lower timing translates to more bottom end and less top end, and higher timing the opposite, but the relationship can also be more complex and less predictable. There's a degree of black magic and necessary experimentation here. Too low and you can lose a significant amount of performance, too high and you greatly increase current draw and reduce efficiency.

 

[Hector_Fisher]

Not that simple unfortunately. Timing changes the shape of the torque vs RPM curve and there's an ideal range for different motors. jkflow posted accurate numbers above. In general, lower timing will cause the motor to make peak torque at a lower RPM and higher timing will make peak torque at a higher RPM, so this can mean that lower timing translates to more bottom end and less top end, and higher timing the opposite, but the relationship can also be more complex and less predictable. There's a degree of black magic and necessary experimentation here. Too low and you can lose a significant amount of performance, too high and you greatly increase current draw and reduce efficiency.

Preach.