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Duralite Regulated System Review
Review by
Darren Clark
Having run my models on large capacity four cell Ni-CD and Ni-Mh for many years
now I decided to convert to the increasingly popular regulated voltage set-up. I
already use a
Duralite voltage regulator and Polycell Li-Po battery on my
Turbine powered Fury Extreme
so thought it was the logical next step to convert my two 90 size glow engine
models. There are a couple of systems out there on the market today, the most
popular two systems at present being the aforementioned Duralite Regulator and
the Fromeco 'Arizona' Regulator system. I decided to stick with what I already
knew and opted for two full Duralite systems.
Unlike an unregulated system where the initial battery voltage may start at 5.3v
and steadily reduce to, say, 4.8v after a few flights, the regulated system
remains constant so long as the battery can supply the required voltage. This
means that your radio gear and servo's perform at the same level no matter
whether you are on your first flight or your sixth flight of the day and your
helicopter should perform at the peak of it's ability every flight. Unlike
the pilot :-)
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Wanting to squeeze as much performance out of my radio system as possible I
opted for two Duralite 4000mAH Li-Ion batteries, two Duralite 6v heavy duty 7.5
amp regulators with digital fail safe switch, two Duralite 5.1v step down leads
and a Duralite charger with four outputs. |
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| Duralite 4000mAH Battery The battery pack is
of a 7.4v, 4000mAH, 2S2P flat pack configuration in that is has a
redundancy feature by having four cells in total. (Part
number: PPD-7404FL). The pack comes with two leads, one with a yellow
servo style plug for charging and another with a standard black servo
style plug to connect to the regulator. The pack also contains it's own
Stay Balance Charge Safe Circuitry™ through which the charging lead
connects. This circuit protects the cells by constantly balancing them and
also protects against over charging. Total weight of the pack is around
204grams which is comparable to a large capacity Sub-C Ni-Mh pack.
Duralite 6v Regulator
The 6v, 7.5 amp heavy duty switched regulator is part
number
PPD-65060-HD. The regulator itself is very small (around 25mm x 25mm x
55mm) and comes complete with the heavy duty Futaba style fail safe switch
attached. The regulator has a large heat sink and RF filters on the leads
in and out of it. There are two leads from the regulator itself, one for
the battery and one to the receiver power. The third lead coming from the
other side of the switch is for 1 amp load testing your battery capacity
only - don't mistake this for the power lead to the receiver!
Duralite also make 5.1v and 5.3v regulators both with or without the fail
safe heavy duty switch. (Part numbers: PPD-65051 and PPD-65053
respectively).
Duralite Voltage Step-down
The Duralite Voltage Step-down (Part
number: PPD-55053) is required when using a 6v regulator to step down
the voltage for the tail servo. This is a short (6.75" and 0.2oz) lead
which drops the voltage from 6v to 5.1v. It simply installs either between
the receiver and gyro or the gyro and tail servo depending on the rating
of your gyro.
Duralite Battery Charger
I opted for the four output charger (Part
number: PPD-21070) as Duralite only recommend the use of their
chargers for their batteries. Charging with other brand chargers will void
your warranty. This charger has four 7.4v outputs allowing for charging
four receiver packs simultaneously. The charge rate is only 400mAH/hour
which means it takes over 6 hours to fully charge a 4000mAH pack so you
must plan ahead. It is supplied with a 12volt input lead with two
crocodile clips and four output leads with yellow servo style connectors
to attach to the battery pack lead. It couldn't be simpler to use - just
connect everything up and a green light comes on to tell you it's charging
and goes off when the pack is fully charged! |
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| Fitting & Installation I chose
my Raptor 90SE as the initial test bed for the installation so began by
removing the 3300 mAH Ni-Mh pack that I had been using along with the
heavy duty Futaba switch. The Duralite system is fitted following the
diagram below. Of course if you are using a 5.1 or 5.3v regulator you
would omit the 5.1v step down between the gyro and tail servo.
The switch is identical in size to the standard Futaba
heavy duty item so was fitted in the standard location to the radio tray.
The Li-Ion battery was mounted on foam and sat on the bottom of the radio
tray with rubber bands to hold it in place. Above this the receiver,
inside a protection case, was sat on more foam with the Futaba GY-601
amplifier sat on top. My Futaba GV-1 governor was placed at the front of
the radio tray with the Duralite regulator sat just above that. The
regulator should not be hard mounted with tie wraps so was just rubber
banded in place along with the rest of the radio gear taking care not to
obstruct the cooling vents at either end. The pictures below show the
finished installation.
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Initial set-up and flying
The
installation was quickly done and does not really
take up any more room than before with the Ni-Mh set-up. There were just a few more wires to make sure
were not chaffing anywhere on the helicopter but other than that it was a
simple conversion. There is a slight advantage in weight saving over a
large Sub-C Ni-Mh pack and this could be improved upon even further by
going for one of the slightly smaller 3200mAH or 2800mAH capacity Duralite
Li-Ion packs. The downside of that of course being a reduction in the
number of flights per charge.
Overall the helicopter felt much more agile and quick
to respond to inputs made but then you would expect that when running on
6.0v rather than 5.1v. I'm sure even running just a regulated 5.1v or 5.3v
set-up would improve the feel of the helicopter and there would be no
noticeable deterioration in performance from one flight to the next. I can
fly for a full day without the need to 'top-up' the battery at the field
before reaching it's recommended stop-fly voltage of 6.9v tested with a 1
amp load. All this means less charging and more flying - what more could
you ask for? And finally....
There is
definitely an advantage to be gained here over using high capacity Ni-Cd or N-Mh cells so it is a worthwhile investment
but only if you are seriously committed to flying RC helicopters as
unfortunately it is not the cheapest way of powering your onboard radio
gear! The second Duralite battery, regulator and voltage
step down is waiting patiently to be fitted to the Synergy N9 kit which I will
hopefully be building and flying not long after the 2006 3D Masters. Check back
at a later date for a review of this new model. Now where's my credit card as I need another set-up for
the trusty Raptor 50 too now........ Helicopter Specifications
Thunder Tiger Raptor 90 SE
OS91
C-Spec PS engine
with Hatori 938 tuned muffler.
Wildcat
30% Nitro Youngblood Helimix fuel.
Futaba GV-1 governor.
Futaba digital
9255 servos
for cyclic and collective.
Futaba digital
3152
servo for throttle.
Futaba GY601 gyro with digital 9251 tail servo.
Futaba 14MZ with Futaba
R1054DPS 2049 PCM G3 Receiver.
Radix 710mm carbon fibre main blades.
105mm carbon fibre tail blades.
Miniature Aircraft 4mm 3D white paddles.
Duralite 4000mAH Li-Ion 2S2P battery pack.
Duralite 6V heavy duty regulator with failsafe switch.
Duralite 5.1V step down for tail servo.
QuickUK receiver protection case.
Note: If you are planning on running
a 6v regulated system you must make sure that you're radio gear can handle the
extra voltage. Not every servo can run on 6v so you must follow the
manufacturers instructions. I have used Futaba 9255 and 9252 servo's which are
not intended to run on 6v and have done so only because it has been done by many
other people in the past. By running servo's on a higher voltage you will
improve their performance but at a cost of servo life expectancy. You have been
warned!
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