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HeliHobby . Ron’s HeliProz South . Century Helicopter

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After Market Accessories > Does Duralite Regulate??
 
 
2atlo8
Senior Heliman
Location: Cedar Park, TX -- USA

I recently bought a Duralite 5.1v regulator and 1900mah pack. I'm an engineer. Engineers test things, so I did. I put a resistive load on the regulator output so it would deliver 1.7 amps to the load. The voltage at the load was 4.65v, not 5.1v!! It stayed at 4.65 plus or minus 0.1v for the whole pack discharge, but 4.65v is not 5.1v.

Next I increased the load so the regulator would deliver 4.5amps. I didn't want to put this kind of continuous load on the puny Duralite pack so I powered the regulator from a 2-cell LiPo that has no trouble delivering high current. The result was that the regulator delivered only 4.1v at the 4.5amp load!! If you try this yourself be careful not to overheat the regulator wires and connectors. You can only run this much current through them for a minute or two before they get very warm.

My conclusion is that my Duralite regulator doesn't regulate against changing load conditions very well at all. It did regulate well against voltage drop in the pack as it discharges. But I bought this because I wanted to get rid of voltage excursions I have seen in my NiCd system during servo operation. My Rap50 system draws an AVERAGE of 1.7amps during flight, so I know the peaks can be 2 or 3 times that much. (If you don't know how to figure the average current draw let me know and I'll post it.)

I'm fairly disappointed in these results. Has anybody else looked at this? Do I have a bad regulator? It is rated for a current of 7.5amps, but it is already down to a very low 4.1v at only 4.5amps.
12-05-2005 Over year old.
 
 
kym
Senior Heliman
Location: american fork Utah

You need to call jeff that Duralite. He will help you out.
(877) 744-3685
Very good service.

Team Duralite
12-05-2005 Over year old.
HOMEPAGE  
 
 
Tom DeWinter
Veteran
Location: Quad Cities, IL

2alto8,

Imagine that! A regulator that doesn't regulate. That was my experience with the Duralite regulators, too. I returned the first two before I figured out that it wasn't going to get any better. The gragh below is of the third one.

If you want a quality regulator you might consider the Fromeco Arizona regulator. It simply works as it should.



Regards,
Tom

Quad Cities RC Whirlybirds -- FunFly July 12 & 13, 2008 Davenport IA
Plan Now to Attend!!!
12-05-2005 Over year old.
 
 
Saint728
Elite Veteran
Location: Sydney Australia Sponsored by: Quick UK

I don't have anything to test my Duralite 5.1V regulator with, but on my 601 gyro amp it does say 5.1V all the time. So I assume it is regulating my Li-Ion 7.4V battery to the right voltage of 5.1V?

Take Care,
Cheers, Patrick

MA Fury Extreme,YS 91,MPII,V-Blades,601
Raptor 50 SE,OS50 Hyper,MPII,QUK Head,TT600 Blades,601
12-05-2005 Over year old.
HOMEPAGE  
 
 
RobRoy
Key Veteran
Location: Huntsville, Alabama

I've been the lab manager in a calibration lab for the last 3 years, and for your average non percision voltage regulator + or - 10% is acceptable.

Ignorance is curable, stupidity is for life.
12-05-2005 Over year old.
 
 
2atlo8
Senior Heliman
Location: Cedar Park, TX -- USA

4.1v at only 4.5amps on a unit rated at 7.5amps isn't plus or minus 10%, its closer to 20%.

The Duralite guys are looking into it via email. We'll see what they come up with.

Don
12-06-2005 Over year old.
 
 
Ace Dude
Elite Veteran
Location: USA

Try the same thing with the Fromeco Arizona regulator and then let us know what happens....

I'd recommend the higher gauge wire with the Fromeco setup as well.
12-06-2005 Over year old.
 
 
2atlo8
Senior Heliman
Location: Cedar Park, TX -- USA

I emailed Duralite with the results of my tests above. Was contacted today by the designer of their regulator. Interesting conversation. I am going to run a couple of more tests we discussed this weekend and get back to him with the results. Will post the outcome of all this, but the Duralite folks have been quite responsive so far.

Don
12-09-2005 Over year old.
 
 
2atlo8
Senior Heliman
Location: Cedar Park, TX -- USA

The rest of the story: Problem resolved, but with disturbing implications!

I spoke with Charles Merriwether, whose firm designed and manufactures the regulators for Duralite. He called me on behalf of Duralite. After discussing my results, Charles encouraged me to re-run my tests but this time to strip the shrink wrap insulation off of the regulator and probe the voltage directly at the regulator output points on the PC board. I did that this evening and guess what....the regulator output is solid at 5.1v plus or minus 0.1v all the way up to my 4.5amp maximum load.

So, all of the difference between the 5.1v at the regulator output and the 4.1v measured at the load is lost in the wiring and connectors. This was in spite of the fact that most of my wiring was done with 18 ga zip wire. The connectors consisted of a normal servo extension connector and an Anderson powerpole connector.

This is disturbing because the wiring systems and the mickey mouse connectors our servos use were never intended for the kinds of current loads we are putting on them by running 4 or 5 digital servos. Think about the fact that your gyro probably runs a 12-14 inch lead to the receiver, and then the tail servo has another 12 inch lead with a connector to the gyro. The round trip from battery to tail servo and back to battery is probably 4-5 feet of 22 gauge wire with 2 or 3 connectors in the stream. When that servo loads up and really puts a demand on the circuit it probably isn't seeing more than 4 volts across the actual input to the servo circuitry. The fliers of big planks have it even worse because their wiring runs are so much longer.

It's also true that the little connector block on your receiver is actually acting as a power distribution buss. And at peak demands of multiple digital servos it may be handling several amps of current. I wish I knew it was designed for that. The servo connectors we use to hang everything together have been around for decades and clearly the current demands we have now weren't in place when they were designed.

I don't have a solution to this problem other than the recommendation to use big wire. And anyplace you can readily replace a mickey mouse connector with something like a Dean's, do it. And even then recognize than even with a finely regulated power source you may not be getting what you think at the servo itself!
12-10-2005 Over year old.
 
 
Jafa
Elite Veteran
Location: Sydney, Australia

The SmartFly regulators have two power leads from the reg to the rx for this very reason - halves the resistance and doubles the current capability

The other thing I don't like about the Duralite regulator is that the input and output wires are not stress relieved, the Arizona and SmartFly are. The wires just shaking pull at the root of the wire where it is soldered to the PCB - eventually it will snap off. Predator crashed because of this. The wires should have a blob of hot glue over them on the PCB (the MPI regulators have this) or a tie down should secure them to relieve the stress (the SmartFly and Arizona have this)...imho


Lepton | TRex600Nitro | Sceadu | Freya | Avant | Predator Carbon Max
12-10-2005 Over year old.
 
 
tyuditsky
Senior Heliman
Location: Where the grass is green and the girls are Pretty.

My first Duralite reg did not have any form of stress relief and this concerned me. However, when i got my second one it did have stress relief in the form of folding the leads over the unit before heat shrinking. Not the best way but effective enough for me.

I also noticed a pot on the board.......and guess what, the regulated voltage is adjustable. I never knew this before. I can't recall the exact numbers i read on the old voltmeter but i want to say i read from 5.3-6.4v without a load.

So i guess in a sense you could battle the voltage drop issue through the wires/connectors by tweaking your voltage up a little. I tweaked mine up till it read 5.8v at the unit without a load and when i power up the system my 611 now reads that it's getting 5.4 rather than the previous 5.0....

Just thought i'd share.....

Evo90, HyperRaptor, T-Rex
12-10-2005 Over year old.
 
 
Tom DeWinter
Veteran
Location: Quad Cities, IL

2alto8,

My testing also confirmed that connector resistance is a major problem at the currents we are running.

Admittedly, I didn't remove the shrink and measure the voltage at the pcb on my Duralite tests. I did, however, measure the voltage at the end of the power lead, before going through the connector. There were no connector losses skewing my results. If the poor regulation had been caused by the resistance of the output lead the voltage drop would be linear with increased current. I've noted before that the results shown in my graph are of one sample and may or may not be representative of the norm.

The power and servo connectors are long overdue for a change to reflect the current requirements of digital servos. What manufacturer will be bold enough to make this change?

The Fromeco Arizona regulator address this problem by supplying power to the receiver through two pairs of leads and connectors, and a separate power source to the gyro / yaw servo. This separate source to the gyro / yaw servo reduces the receiver buss load by a significant amount (around 20% ???).

But what does all this have to do with how the heli flies? If I set my Arizona output to 5.1 volts and go fly I can't tell the difference between it and flying the Duralite. But, if I set the Arizona output to 6 volts (gyro / yaw servo still at 5 volts) I see a definite increase in control response on cyclic and collective.

Tom

Quad Cities RC Whirlybirds -- FunFly July 12 & 13, 2008 Davenport IA
Plan Now to Attend!!!
12-10-2005 Over year old.
 
 
Ace Dude
Elite Veteran
Location: USA

Quote 
So i guess in a sense you could battle the voltage drop issue through the wires/connectors by tweaking your voltage up a little. I tweaked mine up till it read 5.8v at the unit without a load and when i power up the system my 611 now reads that it's getting 5.4 rather than the previous 5.0....


I'm using the Fromeco Arizona regulator which has a fixed 5v output for the gyro. The display on my 611 is rock solid at 4.9V.
12-10-2005 Over year old.
 
 
KCT
Veteran
Location: Ontario, Canada

Guys, try the LIPO Controller. Quality Made in Germany.

Check out what the RR critics say

Cheers

Kay


That's not flying, that's crashing with style...

TeamBob00, WildCat, Helitron
12-19-2005 Over year old.
HOMEPAGE  
 
 
Flying Tivo
Veteran
Location: Monterrey,NL,Mexico

Kool Bec

Fromeco regulator are linear regulators, i keep hearing
that switching regulator are better.KoolBec

What do you guys think of this one.

Felipe

PD: I did return the novak regulator
01-19-2006 Over year old.
HOMEPAGE  
 
 
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