Quadcopter, Unable To Calibrate ESCs In Latest CleanFlight

[kpixels]

It's an Illuminati FC with built-in OSD and flashed with the latest Naze32 CleanFlight. On quadcopter everything else works fine in CleanFlight and it flies great. When I go to the motors page in CleanFlight I can click the button that I have removed the props, input via the GUI and my radio both move the indicators for each motor but I get no output to the motors.
Thanks in advance,
Ken

 

[PsyBorg]

Did you plug the flight battery in? USB will not run the motors mate.

 

[kpixels]

Yes, flight battery plugged in.
Thanks for the reply,
Ken

 

[makattack]

What esc protocol are you using? Pwm or oneshot?

 

[kpixels]

Hi Makattack, I'm using pwm.
Ken

 

[French]

Which escs are you using?

It’s certainly odd that the motors will arm and the quad will fly with the transmitter, but the motors will not spin up using the motors tab in Cleanflight. Do you have an aversion to using Betaflight?

 

[rockyboy]

I have the same flight controller on an old quad running a betaflight version from last spring (not sure of the version number, but can look that up for you tonight) and can confirm it works properly. Haven't tried cleanflight with this FC.

 

[kpixels]

Which escs are you using?

It’s certainly odd that the motors will arm and the quad will fly with the transmitter, but the motors will not spin up using the motors tab in Cleanflight. Do you have an aversion to using Betaflight?

Hi French, I prefer BetaFlight, especially since it went back to desktop (instead of app), but this Illuminati came flashed with CleanFlight so I thought I was being safer there. I do have some hesitance of reflashing a good flying FC, but I might end up having to do just that. Thanks for the reply,
Ken

 

[kpixels]

I have the same flight controller on an old quad running a betaflight version from last spring (not sure of the version number, but can look that up for you tonight) and can confirm it works properly. Haven't tried cleanflight with this FC.

Hi Rockyboy, That would be comforting to know if it works in BetaFlight in case I end up having to ditch CleanFlight. Thanks for the reply,
Ken

 

[kpixels]

French, I missed the first part of your question in my last reply. The ESCs are LHI (30A SimonK). I have several working models with these ESCs but never had this problem. Thanks for the thoughts,
Ken

 

[French]

The ESCs are LHI (30A SimonK)

That rules out a dshot protocol issue

 

[makattack]

I guess I would next try to use BLHeli passthrough and try doing the ESC throttle calibration though that... though, you mention SimonK -- so maybe you haven't reflashed those ESC's to BLHeli. I suppose that could be it as well. I'm not nearly as familiar with SimonK firmware, but I recall that they also had the ability to configure the option to perform throttle range calibration or not. Perhaps the version of the SimonK firmware you've got on those ESC's either have it disabled, or it's somehow incompatible with how cleanflight sends the throttle signal from the UI... which seems like it would be a really odd thing I've never heard of.

If you're adventurous, you may want to consider flashing the more popular BLHeli firmware, but there's quite a lot to it if you're not familiar with it and some amount of risk for permanent damage (and fire) if you mess up.

BTW, I also have the Illuminati naze32 with the integrated minimOSD (running the latest scarabOSD software) on an airframe and I am currently running Betaflight 3.1.7 on it, but have had 3.2.4 on it. I backed out so that I could have access to blheli passthrough, which was removed for the naze32 targets in 3.2.x

 

[kpixels]

I guess I would next try to use BLHeli passthrough and try doing the ESC throttle calibration though that... though, you mention SimonK -- so maybe you haven't reflashed those ESC's to BLHeli. I suppose that could be it as well. I'm not nearly as familiar with SimonK firmware, but I recall that they also had the ability to configure the option to perform throttle range calibration or not. Perhaps the version of the SimonK firmware you've got on those ESC's either have it disabled, or it's somehow incompatible with how cleanflight sends the throttle signal from the UI... which seems like it would be a really odd thing I've never heard of.

If you're adventurous, you may want to consider flashing the more popular BLHeli firmware, but there's quite a lot to it if you're not familiar with it and some amount of risk for permanent damage (and fire) if you mess up.

BTW, I also have the Illuminati naze32 with the integrated minimOSD (running the latest scarabOSD software) on an airframe and I am currently running Betaflight 3.1.7 on it, but have had 3.2.4 on it. I backed out so that I could have access to blheli passthrough, which was removed for the naze32 targets in 3.2.x

Thanks for the thoughtful replies. I am interested in flashing ESCs and maybe switching to BLHeli since most seem to think it's better. I am limited in the amount of time (and$) I can devote to building so I tend to go with what I know works. This quad flies and like you said there is a lot that can go wrong. I think it's something to do with the Illuminati and CleanFlight combo as some have kindly hinted here. After way too much time I could not get a tricopter to work with this FC even after programming motors and servos into CLI.

I'm wondering if removing one power lead from each ESC and calibrating them individually with a radio would accomplish the same thing. I usually do that, but I forgot this time. Something tells me it's probably not the same as calibrating them in the FC. Thanks for the help everyone,
Ken

 

[ElectriSean]

I'm wondering if removing one power lead from each ESC and calibrating them individually with a radio would accomplish the same thing. I usually do that, but I forgot this time. Something tells me it's probably not the same as calibrating them in the FC. Thanks for the help everyone,
Ken

Unfortunately it's not the same thing, they need to be calibrated to the signals the FC sends.

Sorry if I missed this, but if the copter is flying well why do you need to calibrate?

 

[kpixels]

Unfortunately it's not the same thing, they need to be calibrated to the signals the FC sends.

Sorry if I missed this, but if the copter is flying well why do you need to calibrate?

Hi ElectriSean,
Thanks for the reply. I should have mentioned the reason. I prefer to hand launch and twice now I've crashed it because one of the motors didn't spin up. Both times I noticed it lean and one prop not spinning just as I let go and instead of nailing it, I killed the throttle letting it drop. I can compensate for it now that I know it does that. Also though, for tuning the flight characteristics seems like it should be calibrated first, and if calibrated might not need much tuning, was my thinking.
Ken

 

[makattack]

It's not ideal, but you could bump up min throttle until all the motors spin. Test with it level and no props. Just doesn't make sense to me that the FC can let you run the motors via RC commands but not from the configurator.

 

[kpixels]

It's not ideal, but you could bump up min throttle until all the motors spin. Test with it level and no props. Just doesn't make sense to me that the FC can let you run the motors via RC commands but not from the configurator.

Thanks makattack, I'll look into that. I want the min throttle to be zero, so not sure if that would work in my case. Because I hand launch it I have props set to not spin when armed. I appreciate the idea.

I can live with this! I threw this out here because it might have been a known bug or something obvious I was missing with this FC or CleanFlight.
Ken

 

[kpixels]

Problem Solved

It's an Illuminati FC with built-in OSD and flashed with the latest Naze32 CleanFlight. On quadcopter everything else works fine in CleanFlight and it flies great. When I go to the motors page in CleanFlight I can click the button that I have removed the props, input via the GUI and my radio both move the indicators for each motor but I get no output to the motors.

I'm used to being able to spin up the motors before calibrating. Especially on a quadcopter that flies already. I didn't think to go ahead and try the calibration anyways. This was in CleanFlight, but then building a different model with same ESCs I ran into the same issue with a different FC in BetaFlight. Went ahead and did the calibration anyway then everything worked as expected on the motors tab. So went back into Illuminati on CleanFlight, did the same now it works fine.

Hope this helps someone and thanks to everyone who helped.