Good afternoon all!
Quick question, what is everyone using for fusing in their beetles? Both in terms of rating and the type used. Vortex BW ran a 30A blade fuse, which seemed okay but I’m worried it’s a little weedy and soldering directly onto the blade tabs is a pain.
Thanks everyone.
30A is pretty normal. The way fuses work means that it won’t blow as soon as you put more than 30A through it, instead it’s guaranteed not to blow no matter how long you run anything less than 30A through (ignoring temperature dependent stuff). You’ll probably find you can run 40A through it for a full fight without any issues - the fuse will get hot but would probably take 10-20 minutes to blow. I’d only start worrying if you are looking at 50-60A bursts.
In terms of soldering, most people crack the plastic case open and cut the thin piece of wire in the center out. Then they solder that fuse wire into their links
You can also buy the fuse wire on its own rather than using blade fuses
I’ve used those fuses but soldered onto the contacts - you can get PCB mount holders for them:
Weirdly the pitch of the contacts didn’t quite match the fuses themselves, but actually just using the contacts without the body of the holder is easier to handle.
I am using a length of 30a fuse wire soldered directly across the terminals of the xt30 connector I use as my removable link. In the rare event the fuse blows? New link and boom done. No rewires, no headache.
This is the same as me, fuse wire in the link, have a couple of spares for when you lose one or a fuse blows, and you can get the wire from Halfords in a pinch - EZ PZ
Thanks for the input everyone, very helpful! Will probably move to something across the link
Question for those of you going down the link angle - are you just heat shrinking the fuse wire and replacing the entire link when it blows?
Could you add a fuse blade box behind the link connector to reduce effort if blowing a fuse?
I just stick some leccy tape around the fuse wire. Can resolder if I need to, but I usually have a spare link just in case. It’s super rare for a fuse to blow mind, I’ve only seen it happen once in all the comps I’ve been to.
yeah unless you’re running a build that is especially super current hungry (conventional sawbots for example), then blowing fuses shouldn’t be a particularly common occurrence.
I’m also a big advocate for simple fuse wire in the link. I run a single length of 30A fuse wire in most my links, but have two in my links for The Chilli Daddy - giving a capacity of 60A - as the weapon motor in theory can peak significantly above 30A.
I usually make a number of links, also just fuse wire in the link. I’ve yet to blow a fuse, but I replace my links fairly often just because I keep losing them.
I use a little piece of 30a fuse wire, bent into a U shape, across the terminals of an xt30. I then tie a cable tie onto the wire to make it easier to pull out (its recessed fairly deep in the robot), and heat shrink over the wire and half the xt30.
