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Asked — Edited

Ez-B Heatsink Overheat

Once again, my barely used ez-b is overheating. All the wiring has been checked, the ez-b is sitting on the back of the battery case so no shorts can happen, and all the wiring is tied together held away from the ez-b. I have the following plugged in:
4 standard servos
2 continues rotation servos
1 ping radar
1 camera(hacked)

What could be causing it? Its been working fine before! *confused*:(

Note: with out even connecting the ez-b to the computer its heatsink heats up to untouchable temperature. Not even moving the servos!

I tested twice, the second time with my fan blowing on it and still nearly burnt myself.


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#1  
Update: Something is very wrong. I tested again and its only the one heatsink closest to the power plug.
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#11  
So could I wire the camera to turn on via the ez-b through keeping only the signal cable connected?
United Kingdom
#12  
Yes and no...

it's complicated as timings need to be correct and I've had little success with it on Melvin (it works but not all the time)

The best way I found is to power it with the EZB by soldering the red and black wires of an extension to where the battery connects (after removing the battery). Once powered up and switched on it remains in the "on" state even after powering down, at least it does on Melvin.

But if you wanted to use the signal to turn it on and off then you need to use a script, have it Set(digitalport,on) for roughly 5 seconds then Set(digitalport, off) to change it's state. Timings are a bit of a mystery and sometimes it works sometimes it doesn't. Search the forum and there is a discussion where it was mentioned.

This is assuming the signal wire is soldered to the correct place on the camera.
#13  
The camera is soldered correctly. So something like this?:

Code:

Set(d4, on)
Sleep(7000)
Set(d4, off)
#14  
Then for off

Code:

Set(d4, on)
Sleep(17000)
Set(d4, off)


Ill leave the signal wire on and the usb end for power I will cut off.
#15  
Do you still have the battery installed in the camera? If so, remove it. If your powering it from the EZB you don't need it.
#16  
So if I take off the battery and hard wire the camera to the ez-b, it won't overheat anymore and I can keep the wiring pretty well the same? Or would just using the signal wire to turn it on and off be a better choice?
#17  
I removed the battery completely and hot wired it to be powered from EZB. I used the signal wire to turn it on and off. I never had an issue with overheating with this setup. Could be your asking too much from EZB to power the camera and charge the battery. Could be something else like needing a blocking diode between the battery and EZB if you want to keep the camera's battery for any reason.
United Kingdom
#18  
I read on a few topics that leaving the battery in can cause other camera issues too (not sure what, I just saw it as a problem so removed the battery when I did the mod, I didn't exactly care for the reasons behind it).
United Kingdom
#20  
Never had a hot regulator on either of my EZ-Bs and both have the cameras done this way.
#21  
Rich has already stated that his EZB does not heat up and he did remove the camera battery.
#23  
Ok so just solder the ez-b +5 and gnd th the battery in and out?
United Kingdom
#24  
+5V to Battery +Ve, Ground to battery -Ve, Signal to the switch (if you want to use the signal to turn the camera on and off).
#26  
Have you had a chance to see if this solved your problem?
#27  
Ok so I removed the battery and hard wired the camera to a servo extension. This has cleared up the issue.

how ever the camera runs at 3.7v so to directly put 5v into it is hard on it.

What I think is causing ez-b's to overheat is the micro usb plug. I believe the plug creates resistance in the servo extension and that resistance moves to the ez-b's regulator. the micro usb has to adapt the 5v down to the 3.7v that it is built for. that is hard on the ez-b. Using regulators I think will be able to solve the micro usb issue, but unless you have a spare regulator laying around, I see the hard wire way to be much simpler.
#28  
Glad everything is running cool again. Thanks for letting us know it worked.

However I don't agree with your theory of the USB adaptor causing your heating issue. The micro USB pins are very small but the power-carrying connectors, pins 1 and 5, are rated to carry 1.8 amps at 5 volts DC. That means that the maximum charging power that can safely flow across the connector is 9 watts. I haven't put the amp meter on the camera but I really don't think it will draw anywhere close to 1.8 amps even with the battery still installed.

Also an extra 1.3vdc should not cause the camera to over work and be "hard" on it. Where did you find info that the camera runs at 3.7 vdc? :)
#29  
The battery is a 3.7v 400mah battery. it says so right on it.
United Kingdom
#30  
The battery is a LiPo battery, which are labelled 3.7v but can hold 4.2v when fully charged.

I have to agree with Dave, wiring the camera via the USB or direct with 5v has not been an issue for many people. 5V to the camera has not been a problem either and poses no cause for concern, I have done this to two cameras and many others have done it also.

Wiring via the USB also poses no problem, this is another common method and also the method DJ uses and made a tutorial on.
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