I fly a lot of the Featherweight stuff in many configurations, and the battery orientation should not matter. As
@Buckeye says, the battery needs to be secured well enough no matter what orientation it is in during boost or deployment. With the PowerPerch, I use a jumper cable between the battery and PP so the battery isn't plugged directly into the board. It's just been too hard to keep it reliably secured otherwise in my opinion. With a short jumper, I can place the battery in a box that is secured to the AV bay mounting plate. If the battery moves, the jumper has plenty of slack.
Thanks for the Idea, Tony ... I'll take a look at the power perch battery connection too !
I think I've got the LiPo locked in place axially and laterally but that female LiPo connector is going to wear out eventually.
Now that I think about it, a sacrificial male-female extension cable would be a good idea to reduce wear -n- tear on her.
For the Featherweight AV bays, I've designed and printed 3D mounting plates that secure the battery in place instead of the pre-cut mounts that come with the kits. That allows me to accommodate some of the batteries I've purchased that are slightly different lengths than the included mounts are designed for.
As for different Batteries and the AV-Bays ...
I broke my 38mm AV-Bay last weekend when I installed a new E-Flite 150 mAh 1S Battery and tightened the nuts on the passive end.
The breakage was odd ... when I tightened the passive end nuts, the APO squib lost the connection but the voltage returned when I loosened the nuts on the passive end.
MAIN and 3RD were fine but I didn't try 4TH ...
After I figured out what was happening, I measured the length of the new E-Flite LiPo and it was about 1/16 inch longer than the old one I used to set up the plywood LiPo pieces.
I am thinking I damaged something on the active-end underneath the female battery connector.
I ordered a new 38mm AV-Bay from
@Adrian A and it should be here Friday.
I was also thinking I needed to come up with a different way to secure the battery and I have been messing with ideas too.
While I am at it, I also want to find a way to prevent any wiggle on the free-end of the Blue Raven down ( or up ) by the passive end.
Any wiggle at all in the Blue Raven would definitely mess with the quality of the accelerometer and gyro data so it needs to be locked down without placing any strain on it.
So I messing with ways to lock down the free-end of the Blue Raven at the same time I secure the LiPo in the female connector.
I would LOVE to see what you came up with for battery retention !
Lately I've been using all 4 outputs of the Raven to fly redundant charges with a single altimeter. I fly a lot of high value (to me anyway) carbon fiber minimum diameter rockets where I don't always have room for two altimeters, but I like the security of a backup charge. It's a bit of a challenge, but worth the effort. Adrian has been good about adding an extra solder pad on the small AV bay lids to make that possible.
Yes, I imagine I'll keep flying without redundant charges until it doesn't work one time ( well ... maybe twice
)
As long as your connections can handle the forces that a sharp motor burnout or deployment charge can throw at it, you should be good. But I like to be prepared for the hard knocks of flying extreme flights.
Thanks for all the input Tony !
Good stuff here !
-- kjh