Quad motors in park jets - summary after over a year of testing - 13 Sep 2018

Hi Everyone -

This summary has been a long time coming and if you already follow this blog and my You Tube channel, much of what you are about to read or watch has already been covered.  However, I wanted to do a bit of a wrap up to review some of the more important points and some of the items I may not have discussed to this point.😊

I have certainly become a convert to using quad motors in my single motor, prop in slot park jets.  Their light weight and incredible power certainly fits the way I like to fly.  Of course this power does come with a cost in both money and amp draw and requires some consideration about which plane to choose and how to build it, but for me it has been worth it.

Here is a video I shot that this blog supports.

I mentioned three major sources of information that I found very helpful making the correct choices to achieve the power setups I was looking for.  Here they are.

• rcplanepirate's You Tube channel;
• EngineerX's You Tube channel; and
• miniquadtestbench.com. 

You can also find all the my bench test data on my motor test spreadsheet.  Each motor I tested has it's own page, so if you scroll along the bottom you can navigate to whatever motor you want to view.  Also on this spread sheet is test data from the 2212/6 2200 kv and 2212/5T 2700 kv motors which are the two most popular park jet motors around and what I replaced in all my planes.  I put this data there for info and to compare.  Also, rather than providing links to every motor, prop, ESC and battery I used in testing in this blog post, you will find links to all of these on the motor test spreadsheet.  Where applicable, I also put what custom settings I selected on certain ESCs to maximize performance.  All these setups have been thoroughly tested at the field also.

I also started a thread on the RC Powers forum which may also cover some items missed in this blog post or videos.

From the first post of the RC Powers forum thread, here are the advantages and disadvantages of using quad motors over the more conventional 2212 motors in 2200 and 2700 kv.

Advantages

• quad racing motors tend to be much lighter, saving anywhere from 15-25 grams just in motor weight alone;
• paired with the right prop and ESC, they can produce equal to or often far more power than the standard 2212 2200 kv or 2212/5T 2700 kv motors, so very high thrust to motor weight ratios;
• with so much time and effort being put into the development of lighter, more powerful quad racing motors all the time, the performance is increasing in leaps and bounds whereas the 2212 2200 kv motors other than perhaps becoming cheaper, have not changed much in the last several years from a standpoint of weight and power output;
• although quad motors are often more expensive, because there are so many different companies making them, the competition is fierce and you can often find them for a very reasonable price. For example, I have only paid full price on about 25% of the motors I have purchased in the last year, the rest were all picked up on sale (although one could say I might have gone broke saving money😏);
• many quad motors are designed to be run on batteries from 2-6S, so a wide choice of battery options;
• if you find a motor you really like, they are often sold in bunches of four at a more reasonable price.

Disadvantages

• due to their smaller physical size, they often might not have the torque of a 2212 2200 kv motor. Even though the test bench numbers might show incredible performance, sometimes because they are about half the physical size of a 2212 size motor, they just don't have the "muscle" to push a larger, "draggier" plane around or deal with windier conditions. Therefore airplane size and weight becomes very critical. I have found that planes with about 27" wingspan or less and under about 21 oz AUW work the best, as always, the lighter the better;
• when you build your "prop in slot" plane, you do need to adjust the front of the prop slot quite a bit to compensate for the much shorter "bell/can", otherwise the prop will run far too close to the leading edge of the prop slot causing a lot of noise and causing the prop to run much less effectively/efficiently;
• with a couple of exceptions, I have found that motors with a stator size of 2306 or better (2406, 2307, 2207, 2208 for example) and greater than 2600 kv seem to give the best power when looking for equal or better power than produced by the 2212 2200 kv motor setups;
• they are often considerably more expensive than 2212 2200 kv motors which can often be found on Ebay for $5 USD, but there are some fairly reasonable options available that are pretty peppy and much lighter than a 2212 2200 kv motor setup; and
• they are considerably more "amp hungry" than the 2212 2200 kv motor, normally requiring a 40A ESC on 3S whereas you can often run the 2212 2200 kv motor with a 30A ESC.

As mentioned in the first video, here are the final reviews I did organizing the motors into "budget", "middle of the pack" and "serious power where cost doesn't matter"😉

Budget/value

Middle of the pack (includes a couple of motors to avoid)

My top five choices where cost and efficiency isn't an issue😎

I have also created several playlists to organize other "table talks" about motors, ESCs, batteries that I tested during this process.  As time goes on and I have evaluated these components more thoroughly, these play lists will be updated.  Also is a playlist of all the flying tests at the field.

Thorough reviews of individual quad motors can be found here.  

ESC reviews can be found here.

Battery reviews can be found here.

Field testing play list can be found here. 

One thing I should mention that I did not mention in the video, if you don't want to spend money on new ESCs, experiment with higher timing and different PWM settings if you can.  Even if you don't have a thrust stand to evaluate, normally the quad motors I tested all seemed to like a pretty high timing setting for max performance.  Having said that, monitor the heat build up carefully in your ESC as often most ESCs will run warmer with a higher timing setting.

So certainly none of this information is exhaustive and I will continue to evaluate and learn as my park jet journey continues.  I may still test the odd motor that comes along but for now I am pretty satisfied with the setups I have discovered and will continue to use quad motors in my park jets for the foreseeable future😊

Park Jet noise...the "other" sound of freedom😎

Cheers,

Scott