ESC Repair: Replacing Capacitors (and how to measure them)

If you only want to see how to remove a capacitor from a unrepairable ESC and put it on a good ESC then fast forward through the video.
Amazon................................
Hot air reword station - amzn.to/2sbqnJc
Flux paste - amzn.to/2r7Gq7z
Solder paste - amzn.to/2rfmS55
Capacitance meter (I have not tried this one) - amzn.to/2sqXl8N
Capacitance meter (The one I use, also has other functions) - amzn.to/2sR8q07
Ceramic tweezers - amzn.to/2shqzaK
Ebay.............................................
Solder reworking station - rover.ebay.com/rover/1/711-53...
Flux paste - rover.ebay.com/rover/1/711-53...
Solder paste - rover.ebay.com/rover/1/711-53...
Capacitance meter (I have not tried this one) - rover.ebay.com/rover/1/711-53...
Ceramic tweezers - rover.ebay.com/rover/1/711-53...
Banggood............................................
Solder reworking station (be aware it's 220v, the power plug is different) - www.banggood.com/YOUYUE-858D-...
Flux paste - www.banggood.com/50G-Welding-...
Solder paste - www.banggood.com/XG-Z40-10cc-...
Capacitance Meter (Tweezer style)(I have not tried this one) - www.banggood.com/Mastech-MS89...
Ceramic tweezers - www.banggood.com/Heat-Resista...
All my playlists - / @projectbluefalcon
Video editor - amzn.to/2n7sUiF
My personal vlog channel - / jcofficial3

[@BrassStacks]

Sure do miss the man and his knowledge. RIP JC

[@lokisdream8438]

Used this for reference yesterday. Thanks JC. Miss you terribly brother.

[@infinitemindedone5281]

Thank you for providing these videos. Hope you still fly!

[@TheKetsa]

Enjoying the repair series... Thanks !

[@Tappotuoppi]

Impressive accuracy in your soldering job, i see that you have done this more than once

[@sadigov]

I learned something new today. Thanks for the vid!

[@FarmerFpv]

I miss you so much buddy 😥 you were always my favorite Channel and will always be my favorite ❤️ but God do I miss you so much 😢 I hope you are in a happy place 🙏

[@rl2109]

Thanks for the demonstration! Great job!

[@tommysmith2908]

That was awesome JC!!! Thank you...

[@fishballfpv9063]

Whew.. Now this is in depth.. Thanks.. I know ur up there.. Thank u thank u thank u..

[@FarmerFpv]

You sir are amazing!

[@jeffvenable3845]

Man that was awesome! ive got a few large screen monitors to repair too :)

[@MrSmithFPV]

Still great and helpful content! 👍

[@FoFrx]

yea man, great work and I like the Bardwell version as well as the cliffnote version :)

[@Dav2112]

Nice video man, I have a couple things that I need to surface mount solder components onto them here, but I don't have the tools to find out what the rating is of the components. I really want to fix them though, mainly my x4r receiver, a small diode went up in smoke on me, it is screened D3 right next to where the diode was on the pcb, do you have any x4r's that you could check to see what sort of diode it is that I need to sort it? Thanks in advance

[@jordanharris8672]

I have a 30amp little bee esc that connects with blheli just fine everything seems to be good on it i've tried updating it and no problems but it is sending no signal to the motor at all any idea on what could cause this all my solder joints are fine i've double and triple checked them? On a side note i upgraded the quad that these esc were on to the blheli32 wraith esc and all 4 were working great before i moved them. I've even put a different esc on and it worked perfect so not wiring or motor.

[@collin5353]

Good stuff! For those of us with just a soldering iron, would would you recommend going about this process? I might have access to a rework station at a local maker space, but the guys there aren't too friendly :/

[@KyleLi]

What temperature do you typically run your hot air station? trying to figure out an ideal temperature thats not high enough to damage, but not low enough to never melt the solder.

[@youeladamas7840]

Nice work around the camera. What's your temp on your rig that works good for you?

[@Tracks777]

Good video!

[@xtim1974x]

hi jc i have some simonk escs i tried to flash with blheli when i was doing it the led on them started dimming and now they don't work any ideas? ps thanks for all your help keep it up.

[@juhopulkkanen]

does it matter if you flip a ceramic cap 180degrees or does it have to be the right way up

[@kevinlloyd3403]

Hi could you also do diagnosis as well for esc,s etc so we can all learn what parts are faulty I have an esc that just stops at random powering the motor and would like to know how to trouble shoot it so the parts can be replaced many thanks Kev

[@177jam]

Would replacing capacitors help if a ESC is causing motors to desync?

[@Fpvfixit]

Omg it's the dead legend again 🥺 💋 rest in peace j.c

[@WingStop1234]

Hey could you do a video on VTX pigtail repairs, I have broken several of them and I'm tired of paying to replace them!! SMA pigtail for the TBS Unify PRO 5G8

[@kip383]

Hey JC, I know this has nothing to do with the video, but can you tell me where you get your replacement motor bearings. I'm looking for some for my emax red bottom.2205 2600kv.thanks man. keep up the good videos.

[@lexxington98]

lol the bardwell moment killed me haha.. keep up the great vids - alex from canada

[@ProjectBlueFalcon]

I chuckled a little at myself after that. I love Joshua

[@Dav2112]

Alex Persaud it cracked me up too, brilliant!!

[@drumrboynoid]

Nice video JC. I've got an idea for a repair video. How about a video showing how to repair a board that s had one of its solder pads ripped off. I know most of the time it's unrepairable, but it's possible to tap a wire directly to the last component the solder pad was connected to. It's a bit ghetto, but it's saved me waiting time and money. Most of the time I can just see and follow the trace on the board to find out where it went. Other times its just obvious. anyway, just an idea.

[@Dav2112]

drumrboynoid I had to solder the negative power wire for my littlebee esc onto the legs of a chip that was next to the ground pad that tore off, it's been flying great and I've had no issues at all with it. JC's videos are great, I wish that he would be able to answer my question I posted on here regarding my x4r, as I want to try fixing it, but I'm not sure what type of diode it was that went up in smoke.

[@adrianau4246]

What are the black flat things? I need to replace that..

[@dominikkammer2478]

I have a airbot f4 clone little bee 20a bl heli(normal not s), Dys mr2205 2300kv, X- Faktor(like Alien 5). When I go to th motors tab and throttle up, at around 1300 it starts oscillating really badly. At around 1500 it starts fliping out com letely(slow twitching). It does the same thing when it's unscrew and l hold it in my hand strongly pressed so it doesn't get the high freequenc noise already did the most radical filtering but ljust won't go away. PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE help me.

[@h2o-fpv623]

Great video thank u

[@PaulSokolov]

Is it possible to use this ESC without one of this capacitors ? (for example - ESC has 19 pieces - if I remove one broken capacitor)

[@missing.no_8724]

Might be a dumb question but what would happen if you put in a slightly different capacitor?

[@CapApollo]

alt+m is the symbol in µF for micro farads .... you learn something today! :P

[@peterkjellstrom3100]

Nice video, I enjoy your repair series :-) However, you don't really have to figure out the actual capacitance in this specific case (main input bank on ESCs). Just put on as much as you can fit for the size. What is important is that you get ones that can take the voltage (battery voltage plus a healthy margin).

[@ProjectBlueFalcon]

Thats true. Any size will work and the bigger the better. I just know some guys want the exact size so I turned it into a lesson. But you are correct, the bigger the better and as long as the voltage rating supports it.

[@ehunter2010ed]

Peter Kjellström for sure they don't all got too be the same unless ur ocd...i tape mine so can't see the different sizes anyway😀

[@jeffdeakin4507]

hi JC great video keep up the great work ! could you do a video on escs that stop working when you update with blheli and it crashes in the middle of an update to try and bring it back to life . i have a dshot dys 30amp that did this ! cheers jeff

[@ProjectBlueFalcon]

Will do

[@Markitos203]

dude any tips on how to prevent neighboring components from shifting away? for example: you need to get a component out of a mobula6 highly populated board without everything melting away on you? putty?

[@Venom97Official]

Where I can buy those capacitors?

[@TeamBlindMouse]

how about one to show us how to figure out WHAT in the esc is fried..I have two KISS esc I'd like to fix but dont know where to start. I fried one trying to flash it ..the positive lead touched a component...the other one I dont know what i did.

[@UNLOCKEDANDOVERCLOCK]

❤ Awesome video I don't have any of the paste stuff. Is there a way around that?😂 Maybe just put some blobs of solder on each side... And also, can I use a jet lighter? All I have is a regular soldering iron.😂

[@2663540]

Show us how to replace the internal xjt modules amplifier.. alot of guys has damaged it when doing the antenna mod..

[@gunsmithfiamma4788]

Hello my friend, thank you as always for your tutorials. I liked this video a lot, but what I want to know is, why would you change a capacitor on your esc? There is some specific issue related to a bad capacitor? Like stuttering, brown out, or similar issues? An high five from Italy

[@ProjectBlueFalcon]

Capacitors dont really go bad. They just break off often, especially if you dont use a ESC protector and just have a zip tie on heat shrink. The zip ties will break them off easy. So this is just for if you're missing any

[@gunsmithfiamma4788]

oh, I got it now. Thank you for the explanation.

[@ProjectBlueFalcon]

Yea I should have clarified. When I said the caps dont really go bad I meant the ceramic caps. With the tantalum caps you can visually see when they are bad because like Joe said, they explode or pop.

[@mchaves7663]

usually what happens is the caps fall off when bad crashes happen. In one of my quads I found a capacitor stuck to the eletrical tape while disassembling.

[@gunsmithfiamma4788]

The only time I had a problem with a capacitor, was a 220uf Polarized. I heard a loud pop while it was hovering and the quad started to behave very funny. when i opened the quad (I use almost always sandwich type frame) it was a mess inside: The capacitor puked all of its content on the ESC and I had to take it off, for cleaning and changing the capacitor.

[@JasperTielen]

When measuring in series, does it matter if one is broken?

[@ProjectBlueFalcon]

If the caps are in series and one is broken then no voltage will make it through any of them. But almost all ESCs have caps in parallel. The ones I showed in series are a rare case.

[@danielpassmore5026]

why didn't you mention temp and fan speed on rework station? I feel like that is need to know for anyone attempting rework

[@ProjectBlueFalcon]

Sorry about that. I use 450 degrees with the fan speed dial set to 2

[@MaxBeamer]

How do U know if a capacitor is toast? U never mentioned that lol, would it not have continuity with the lead?

[@RectifiedMetals]

Only thing I'm unsure of is indication of polarity of a ceramic cap. Does it matter anyway?

[@dho9yds]

Project Blue Falcon tantalum caps are polarized.

[@dho9yds]

Oh! And good video. well explained.

[@althuelectronics5158]

wery naise your case amm stading this video (sir) sooper speeche wery naise your clas am wery happy to waching this video

[@subhanhasbiyudha5448]

How to verify a mosfet works well or not?

[@ProjectBlueFalcon]

I'll be talking about it when I do the mosfet video

[@Jay_Seven]

Is there a way to install firmware if it is updated to the wrong firmware in BLHeli_s?

[@TOPPeet]

Yes you can with use off a FTDI32 ore a USBASP V2.0 flashing directly on the chip.

[@Jay_Seven]

The solder pads are in a L shape any way to differentiate what pad is what with out shorting something out?

[@rotovicious1156]

so how do I know witch capacitor to replace?

[@ProjectBlueFalcon]

The ceramic caps dont really go bad. This video is for is any of them have broken off. The tantalum caps pop when they go bad and you can clearly see that they exploded.

[@nashnazer]

Hi mate good video. when is the other 2 videos coming up please?

[@DKFPV]

unfortynately, never. he had a motorbike acident 3 months ago... he is not with us anymore

[@ISLAMguidanceful]

hey man, i actually been looking all over for this, great video, i have 3 kiss esc's that look perfect but they just dont work, nothing is fried or anything, but a component failed. do you have any videos on how to diagnose an esc, because without knowing whats wrong i dont know how to repair it.

[@OutaTimeFPV]

Hussein Elsherbini Unfortunately, JC passed away a few days ago. Needless to say, he won’t be making anymore videos.

[@ISLAMguidanceful]

Such a great loss, so sorry to hear that :(((

[@TheDownloadfreegames]

how do you know which capacitor is burnt when there is no clear evidence of it burnt , in fact , when do you know which electronic component i burnt when its not clear , but you still have an identical replacement

[@darkwinter6028]

eBay has cap assortments that aren't terribly expensive, it's a good idea to keep a few sets on hand...

[@painedragon128]

Hi First

[@alloutofdonuts3998]

I was almost to tears after I pushed a cap off my teeeny tiny micro build, after rebuilding it for the 3rd time. Then I saw this...then I thought wait a sec, that sounds like PBF...then I had to take a moment...

[@j.finesseflights1403]

Gr8 shit!!

[@Wtf_drone_productions]

RIP thanks

[@bluehawk2051]

😀

[@danielpassmore5026]

Hey that's my flux paste

[@BuzZ.]

;(

[@ImaginaPower]

sorry but your knowledge in electronics is at best very limited....

[@youeladamas7840]

Nice work around the camera. What's your temp on your rig that works good for you?

[@ProjectBlueFalcon]

I use about 450 degrees