Run-in Tello brushed motors ?

[raulvolador]

Hi,

I asked myself: Is there any way to Run-in Tello motors to extend it's useful life ?

Ryze confirmed Tello's motor lifespan it's about 40 hours as you can read here: Brushed motors life expectancy (now with answer from Ryze)

As you must know, little Tello is equiped with brushed motors. That kind of motors are cheap, but due their mechanical components they generate less power and last less than brushless ones.



For years RC hobbyist used to "run-in" their brushed car and plane motors, that's well explained into this interesting thread at RC Groups: Running in brushed motors, do you? - RC Groups

I read that before maiden flight they use to let their new motors running through a couple of batteries at 5-10% throttle, to grind the collectors without them getting overheated.

It's supposed that running motors slowly for a short periods of time let the brushes settle in.

I bet a short period of running motors at low speed is a good idea, even if its only to smooth some Surfaces out, like bearings and brushes, it cant hurt !

When I received my new Tello I followed their advices, after unboxing I started Tello engines using CSC stick position (bring both sticks down fully and to the inner corners) and spent my very first battery stayed on the floor, motors running at low speed.



After this first "virtual flight" I use Tello as normally. I hope performing this simple task I break-in the motor brushes an bushings getting motors last longer.

Its possible that it helps in some way, and it definatly cant harm the small motors, so i figured "Why not?"

Time will tell...

Waiting for your opinions

Raul.

 

[Guorium]

Sounds bogus. Someone popped over a dead motor and the brush was broken, that is the weakest part. These things have a fixed amount of life time and the longer the usage you have the less life it has left. The contacts look like brass with some sort of conductive paste (carbon paste?). Brass has a melting point of 900 Celsius. So you think your tello motors can run that hot in normal operation to do any heat damage to the brushes?

In stead of wearing it out on the ground, why not use that time to actually fly. I think what you described was merely a placebo.

 

[etkaveman24]

I ran a little 1/18th scale car club years ago, and we used to break in motors by running them in a glass of distilled water for 10 to 15 seconds. This will seat the brushes. It will lessen its useful life also. We were only interested in getting our motors to the "sweet spot ". This is where the motors will produce the most power. It's a fine line tho. When our cars were producing the " rat on fire speed" you could count on maybe 3 to 5 runs then you would be replacing the motor. I don't believe this is a good idea for drone applications tho. Just my opinion.