Solved ESC overheating. Please help!

Superman11497

New member
Hey all. I'm fairly new to the hobby and not quite sure I totally understand how the esc works. I just built the FT simple cub and I have two LED light strips in the wings. I went to test the lights and after a minute or two the ESC started to get super hot. I have a 30 amp ESC, and the product details for the lights say they should only pull 1 amp. The only things I had connected to the receiver were the ESC and the lights. Nothing else that would be pulling excess amps. I did have a 1200 kv motor connected to the ESC, but I didn't have it running or anything. Does anyone have any ideas on what's happening? What can I do to fix it? I wouldn't have thought that 1 amp would overheat an ESC rated for 30 amps
 

speedy7385

Active member
Get yourself an ESC that use switching BEC, they run a lot cooler than the cheaper ESC that use linear BEC.
And get good air flow to the ESC helps too.
 

Bifi.baarlo

Active member
Hey all. I'm fairly new to the hobby and not quite sure I totally understand how the esc works. I just built the FT simple cub and I have two LED light strips in the wings. I went to test the lights and after a minute or two the ESC started to get super hot. I have a 30 amp ESC, and the product details for the lights say they should only pull 1 amp. The only things I had connected to the receiver were the ESC and the lights. Nothing else that would be pulling excess amps. I did have a 1200 kv motor connected to the ESC, but I didn't have it running or anything. Does anyone have any ideas on what's happening? What can I do to fix it? I wouldn't have thought that 1 amp would overheat an ESC rated for 30 amps
The build in bec is not rated for 30 amp, that is for the motor output, maybe it is a 1 or 2 amp bec, than 1 amp continuous is a lot.
 

Superman11497

New member
The build in bec is not rated for 30 amp, that is for the motor output, maybe it is a 1 or 2 amp bec, than 1 amp continuous is a lot.
That makes sense. The ESC says it has a 3 A BEC in it, but I'm starting to wonder if maybe the lights are pulling more than the advertised 1 amp.
 

Superman11497

New member
Update. I changed out my ESC to one that says it has a built in SBEC, and it runs great. No overheating. Thanks for your help, guys!