Voltage tolerance on receivers/servos

[dusty IV]

Just how much voltage can a receiver and servos handle? I was going to go to the complexity of adding a 5v regulator to a pair of the Black and Decker or DeWalt drill batteries. Seems to be a lot of claims that this is not needed because a 5 cell nicd pack has almost as much voltage at peak charge. A lot of people use 5 cells nicds for added power in the servos and most servo mfg list performance at 5v and 6V as I remember.

I for one am a bit on the conservative side and hate to push the limits on a $100 receiver or even worse a big airplane. Anybody here using High Voltage 5 or even 6 cell nicd packs? I'm not in any hurry to plug in my new 2Gig receiver and digital servos to find out the hard way.

[alexcmag]

The receiver is not a problem itself, since any receiver I ever saw in my life has a internal regulator, usually 3.3V or 3V, but many can work as low as 2V!!!

The problem is with servos.

Most of them don't like to go below 3.3V (they get weak and then the control circuit halts...), so 1S LiPo or A123 is only usefull for small indoor servos.

And not every servo likes to work at 5-cell NiCd (5 * 1.6V peak = 8V peak).

But... if you get a servo designed for use at 6V nominal (8V peak) ans use it with 2S A123 (7,2V peak) it will not burn, because even the peak of the 2S A123 pack will have less Volts then a well-charged 5-cell NiCd pack.

Of course if you're planning to have a long life for your servos, it is a good idea to make their job easier, by using light linkage, light hinges, 5V or 6V power, ...

[arocholl]

Easiest possible solution: Use Lipo 2S or A123 2S. On Positive battery connector, use 2 or 3 diodes in series to reduce voltage to the amount you want. Diodes should be power rectifier, supporting beyond 5A to extra safety.

This works extremelly well and can't be cheaper.