[moved] 3.7v 500mAh LiPo battery to AC adapter

[Nate Vaughan]

Hi! I'm hoping someone can answer this question for me, it's kind of an odd one. I have a quad copter, the Syma XC5C that I would like to convert to run on an AC adapter. The copter would be tethered to a 5 sided prism, and continually hover. The sound produced by the copter would then be sampled and played back with an LFO that would slightly alter the sampled sound's frequency to create varying degrees of dissonance and harmony. Anyways... I'm having trouble with the power. I have a voltage regulator for an AC/DC adapter, which I've set at 3.7v. I've tried two adapters, one with 500mA and one with 600mA. Both produce the same result: the copter turns on, blades start spinning, but it doesn't take off and the lights flash, indicating (what I only assume) insufficient power. My guess is that there aren't enough mA? Before I cut up another AC adapter, I thought I'd ask for help. Anything thoughts would be very much appreciated. Thanks!

 

[wade_hassler]

Your copter will need more current to get aloft: amps, not milliamps. The standard battery is 500 mAh.
Here's an interesting write-up on flight times vs battery capacity.

Speculating here: Maybe an open-frame 5VDC supply could be turned down to 4.2 volts?

 

[Audioguru]

Why are you using an adapter with a current rating of only 500mA or 600mA when the 500mAh battery can fly the helicopter for about 6 minutes (1/10th of an hour) then its current is 5A?

EDIT: I forgot to show a graph of smaller Li-PO battery cells. It shows that cheap Chinese Turnigy cells are garbage.