Bitcraze Forums

Hi,

I'm currently impatiently waiting to get my CF and have been reading a lot in this forum.
It seems that inexperienced pilots (which I most definitely am) have a tendency to trash motors in crashes.

So I have been wondering if it wouldn't maybe be a good idea to not solder the motors onto the board but instead use pin headers and connectors on the wires. Should this work? Do I have to be concerned about the power amount?

Thanks
UloPe

This topic comes up now and and then and in theory it's a great idea but I don't think anybody has been able to find any suitable connectors. Probably a wire to wire solution is more feasible.

I was thinking of using standard pin headers:

You'll need a very small pitch (~1mm? have neither the calipers nor the CF at hand right now to measure), and with the connectors being on the bottom it might get tricky to find something keeping some clearance to the ground if the CF is sitting on it. Plus: weight. I'd also be a bit worried about the connection coming lose.

From my personal point of view: Yes, a connector would be nice, but on the other hand so far I only ever had to exchange one motor, and that wasn't because I crashed and destroyed it, but because... let's just say I had more force than I thought when I tried to remove a propeller. Just use some bumpers for your motor mounts, try to remember to cut throttle when crashing and from my personal experience you should be fine, the CF takes a lot of abuse.

There is a possibility to use connectors which we have tried, not perfect but works. The PicoBlade connectors fit on the top side if they are oriented in a specific way. I'll try to remeber posting a picture of it tonight when I get home.

The motor holes have a 1.27mm pitch and are 0.6mm in diameter.

Here's a sample picture. The M1 and M2 connectors need to be facing upwards and the M3 and M4 downwards for them to fit. The tricky part will actually be the mating connector on the motors as it is hard to attach them without proper tools. Also they will not fit through the motor mount if the connectors on the motor wires are added first. In the end I think it is easier just to solder/resolder, but the connector option is possible. A 1.27mm 2 pin header pin is another alternative.

How much weight does that add?

Out of curiosity I looked around for something like those little cable clamps (where you push in a small screwdriver to open a spring mounted clamp thingy, push the blank cable in and remove the screwdriver again, thus "trapping" the cable), but I guess in that size there just isn't anything like that.

@tobias: Thanks for the image. I was indeed thinking more along the lines of using 1.27 mm pin headers as I would assume that to be option with the least weight overhead. Of course then I will probably have to mount the battery below the board and add some kind of feet (or maybe one of those "training wheels" kind of things).

I was thinking just pins sticking up, no socket. and then put female jumper connectors on the motor leads, like this: http://www.basicxandrobotics.com/tutorials/jumpers/

@dogs: Yes, thats exactly what I mean