Repairing My Radian Glider

[Rick Devonshire]

I piled in my Radian Eglider a week ago in what looked a near vertical dive. The fuselage front was reduced to four chunks of foam and I have spent the last few days repairing it with epoxy resin, fortunately I had collected all the bits.>>

The Rx and servos have survived and function correctly, the prop and spinner assembly too surprisingly, are undamaged and initially I thought the power train would be KO until I connected it up and tested it......>>

I ran up the motor five or six times and all seemed well but the next time the motor started to oscillate (rather like an over compressed diesel engine) then smoke and flames billowed from the ESC at the motor end of the unit. I think the ESC may have fetched up against the rear of the motor during the impact and damaged the leads that supply the motor.>>

I have made a through visual inspection of the motor and all looks to be in order. The spindle is not bent, the rotating part of the out-runner rotates truly and all seems OK here. >>

However I have been told (over the phone) that there may be internal motor damage which caused the failure of the ESC. So my dilemma is this do I purchase just a replacement ESC and risk that burning out or do I go for a new motor as well.

Rick

[Tom Wright 2]

Hi Rick

From your account of what happened ,i would get a new motor and esc ,are you sure the motor was not running at over the continuous current rating?

[Rick Devonshire]

Thanks Tom,

I'd be surprised if it was over the continuous current rating as I was only giving it short runs but as I am new to Eflight and have a lot to learn, maybe that was the case. One thing that has caused me some concern is that there is no provision for fuses in the circuit with this design, is that the norm with PNP aeroplanes? Nor is there a master swich.

Rick.