GWS ICS50 Tail Esc & 3 cells of Kokam ???

Steve was running a 3 cell Kokam 1020mah on his PIC PRO using the GWS ICS50 for the tail Esc on his PIC PRO.

Isn't the GWS ICS50 only rated up to 9.6 Volts.

So how does he do it ???

Here is the link to his setup http://rceheli.com/flying/1044461900/index_html

Hello

I may say only 9.6 volts but that doesnt mean that it cant handle 12 under certain conditioins. Remember, Steve is only using it as a tail ESC and he is not using the BEC.

My Schulze only is rated up to 8 cells when using the BEC, but I still run it with 3 Kokams and I use a very powful Hacker setup. Also, I only use the Schulze BEC to power all the electronics in my Piccolo Pro and it does it with out any trouble.

Carlo

[gambit]

I'm not an electrical engineer at all, but from my experimentation, Eco8gator is right. Most of the cell rating for an ESC does have to do with the BEC. The BEC chip works by dividing the input voltage. If it has to drop the output voltage less than about half of the input voltage, it will start wasting power as heat. So, if the BEC is rated at 5v, don't put much more than 10 volts as the input. You could, but the chip is not usually rated for that. Also, by putting more load on the BEC (servos, etc), the harder it has to work and it becomes even more sensitive to the higher voltages.

If you don't use any power from the regulator, then the limit is on the other components. The capacitors and FET that control the output are also sensitive to higher voltages. Generally speaking, they are rated for higher voltages than the BEC is. So, that is why Steve and others are able to use some ESCs beyond their rating. Having said that, be careful. Using anything beyond it's rating is risky.