Motor Recomendation

I am running an ECO-8 on a 10-cell 2000mah battery pack. I have been through several different motors looking for a decent setup. So far, no luck.

The motors I've used so far were all intended for R/C car use so I'm sure that has some bearing on it. I've had the most success using a 16X3 motor but it becomes so hot, the solder melts and the wires come off. This is after only 3 minutes with a 10 tooth pinion. The performance is stellar though for the 3 minutes.

Without purchasing a brushless setup, what are some suggestions for a good motor? I'm using 10 Sanyo RC2000 cells and a Jeti Heli 30 speed controller.

Thanks in advance for any input,

Brian Lane
Terre Haute, Indiana, USA

I wouldn't even think of the brushless setup unless you really know what they are all about, I've had two now in my ECO using what Ikarus recommend, but haven't had more than a couple of weeks out of either before they give up..!

I was pointed towards the Magnetic Mayhem (reverse) motor, and ordered it from Tower Hobbies in the USA. I only just got it over here in England, so haven't had the time to try it yet, but I know it'll be OK.
I was running with a Graupner 600 BB SP before with some success, but suffered with overheating problems. Before that, I too tried many different motors / battery / pinion combinations without any useful results.
I splashed out on the X250-4H and V45 controller in February and initially the performance was excellent - until it stopped doing what it should have been doing! I'm now fed up with packing the thing up and sending it back to Ikarus for replacment.!
At least with a brush motor, you can test the thing by bypassing the ESC and eliminate most of the problems you encounter, with the brushless I am completely clueless.

I know this doesn't help to mention this after you've already had all those problems, but...

If you give brushless motors another try, I highly recommend Kontronik motors and speed controls. Especially the speed controls! Aveox is also a great manufacturer of motors, I can't speak for their controllers since I've never owned one.

My experiences have been pretty good with brushless motors, but I can relate some sad stories from friends of mine.

Ok, first for the recommendation. I highly recommend the Kontronik speed controls. They are sensorless controllers. That means that the only thing that connects the motor and speed control are the three motor leads.

Brushless motors are basically high performance stepper motors. They have three coils in the motor. If you put current through one of the coils, the motor will lock to a certain position. (I wouldn't try this at home!) If you remove the current and put it through the next coil, the motor will lock to a new position, rotating just a little from the previous position. If you repeat this pattern with the three coils, the motor will rotate.

In order to spin the motor properly, the speed control needs to know the position of the armature (I'm not sure of that name, but it's the magnet and shaft on the inside of the motor that spins). On standard speed controls, there are hall effect sensors on the back end of the motor, which tell the speed control the position of the armature.
Kontronik speed controls do it a different way. At any given time, 2 coils are active. I'm not 100% sure of this, but I know that at least one coil is inactive at any given time. When the motor spins, current is induced in the non-active coil due to the interacting magnetic fields. The sensorless speed controls use this induced current in some way (don't ask me how!) to determine the position of the armature.

Big deal, you say. Well, if the sensors on a conventional speed control gets disconnected somehow, the speed control goes nuts and dumps current into the motor, frying itself and possibly the motor. I personally know two people who have burned out their speed controls this very way. One friend was bench testing an Aveox speed control/motor when the speed control dropped from the table, unplugging the sensors and frying the speed control. I think the motor was ok. The case with the other friend appeared to be from the sensors, but we could never really be sure.

By not having sensors in your speed control, it is one less thing that can go wrong. Besides the sensors being unplugged, other things can happen, such as a sensor going bad or the top of the motor can accidentally rotating. I don't know what the possibility is of these things happening, but it is possible. You also don't have to adjust the timing on a sensorless speed control. The only downside to a sensorless controller is that the motor isn't as consistent on start-up as a sensor controller. If you have a prop on it, it wobbles back and forth for a split second before it rotates. That might be a problem for competition F5B, but it's not a problem for a helicopter where the motor is spinning for the whole flight.


I have a Kontronik brushless speed control that I've been using for close to a year now with no problems. I am impressed with how well it works. I also have a Kontronik brushless motor, and the quality is the same.
About Aveox. I have an Aveox motor that I've been using in my ECO for the past 6 months and it works great. I haven't had any problems with it, and I don't expect that I will. I can't speak about Aveox speed controllers, because I've never had one.

I have had 2 X250-4 motor/speed controllers blow up in flight for no apparent reason.

I am now using an AVEOX 1010/3Y with L160 speed controller.

The performance is about the same as for the X250, but I have been using Aveox stuff in fixed wing models for 2 years and have had no problems.

The L160 controller BEC is only rated for 3 servos on 10 cells, so I run the gyro and tail servo of a separate regulator.

Hi Techdude,

I use the Sport engine with 8 cells and a PicoMOS 56 Bec from Graupner.

To avoid overheating, I installed a fan (from a computer) on top of the motor.(the axle is longer then usual on those Ikarus motors)

Results : everything (motor and ESC) is around 40°C after 7 min hovering !!