No it's not a loaded question. How do you know when your motor is toast ?
I have a IPS A drive in my plane and I am not getting the same flight duration or power (well relatively speaking) during my flights.
I suspected the batteries at first but, measured a voltage and put them in another plane and they still have plenty of juice.
Do motors suddenly stop working ?or do they wane until they are useless ?
I probably have about 800 minutes of flying time on it.

Either a motor dies quickly which is easy to tell. Or dies a long slow death. You start to notice that the throttle stick keeps creeping up and up to hold altitude and the take offs and climbout keep getting longer. If you fly in perfect no wind conditions, you can drag the motor life out. You can get in trouble though when you go to fight that gust of wind or need that extra uummpphh to get out of trouble and its not there.

I've yet to wear out a IPS motor...and I've flown the heck out of one in particular, but a buddy had one die in a few flights. It just quit working. Power/duration was just fine one flight then the next nothing..... replaced the motor and all was well.

When my speed 400 motors "die" they do so slowly. The power, duration slip is VERY slow. Eventually they make a weird squeeling noise. That's how I know it's time to replace, and then the difference is VERY noticable.

I just lost an IPS/DXA in my Tiny-X. It died pretty slowly. Over about a weeks worth of flights ( 2 a night or so on NiMH) I noticed I had to keep advancing throttle to get same results. Then last week during a glorious day where lift was booming all over, accompanied by breezes and drop, I noticed I just couldn't maintain altitude. Figured I was hitting the falling air as she had been getting bumped about pretty good.
Next day she couldn't fly at all. I think this particular motor was poor from the start. Never had the same oomph of the other DXA's I have.
I thought that these motors died quick. I guess not always. Thanks for this post.
-David-

I wore out my first IPS not long ago. It had 20 hours on it almost to the minute. That's running on 6 nimh cells and 10x8 prop no heatsink. It looks like the brushes just wore out so I don't think a heatsink would have helped in this case.

On it's last throws there was a LOT of glitching. I thought the radio was on the way out. Also a loss of power for the last hour or so. Could barely ROG when normally it would leap off the ground.

I have another IPS with over 22 hours and still going.

One of my IPS A drives is doing the slow death thing. It barely gets my Tiny-X off the ground. It used to fly fairly briskly. I don't know if the problem is using 8x370 packs or it is just a bad motor. Has only 2-3 hours on it, so it probably isn't the brushes. Will take it apart when it finally dies. Will be putting an M100 on the Tiny-X anyway since I want more power!!!

How do you know when your motor is toast
When it works its way off the mounting stick on your Tigermoth and the wires pull off! At least thats how it worked for me. LOL

Originally posted by E-Minn
How do you know when your motor is toast
When it works its way off the mounting stick on your Tigermoth and the wires pull off! At least thats how it worked for me. LOL

I nearly had that happen to me with my Von Baron (plane in the avatar). It was tight when I first jammed it on but temperature and humidity made it loose. Luckily I caught the problem just before it came off. Now I drill a hole and run a wire through the mount and stick to stop it happening again, even if it's tight at first.

My motor is fine! I had changed props and in my haste put it on backwards. I'm amazed it flew at all. With it on right it flies just fine once again.

10Thumbs,
Isn't the Tiny-X just TOOOO much fun???! Ever fly it in the wind? I had mine out in really gusty conditions over the weekend. When it started snap rolling with no input on my part I figured it was too gusty.

In conditions like that, altitude is your friend!

-David-

I have a 300C that seemed a bit down on power and was getting more gitches. I've recently been flying my Beav with a faster, heavier wing and a 10X8 prop so asking for way more amps. Last night I switched back to the stock wing and the 10X47. It flew just fine. Brushes may be almost done I think. It has around 1100 minutes (18 hours) on it.

You have 18 hours on a 300C? That must be some kind of record!? Don't they usually burn up in about 5 hours?

I run several IPS dual D drives on 2c E-tec 1200 lithium with a 12x6 prop. I had 16 hours loged when it started to need more power than usual to hover my sulkayln (lookalike). I poped the rear motor housing off and the brushes were wore out to the metal holder. The 2nd motor still had some brushes left.
I have about 15 hours on another on and it is still O.K. At 22.00 a piece I say 15 hours is good enough for me.

I pull about 4 amps in a hover, don't run very much over that 1/2 stick mark. I also run heat sinks but can't say they have helped.

Brandon