The battery cables coming out of the penetrator that connects to the battery are splitting the plastic sheath around the wire. The sheath gets bent alot when installing the battery into the housing with the 18ah battery. The sheath is more plastic than rubberery so is prone to splitting.
Are the wire sheaths on the newer BR2’s the same or of a more flexible rubber sheath?
If they are the same plastic sheath, then this will be an ongoing issue that should be looked at.
Since the wires are potted into the penetrator, i’m not sure how to resolve without full replacement.
That insulation looks like HDPE. If that is indeed the type of insulation … it doesn’t handle a lot of flexing. It has very good electrical properties and that is about it.
@hscadden
If it is hdpe then my point is, should it be used on the one cable that gets bent the most??? The battery cable is the most flexed on the rov since it connects the battery to the electronics case and it bends every time you need to swap the battery out.
What is happening to these cables under the outer sheathing connecting the 2 cases where I can’t see?
Will I eventually get a short that cooks the 18ah battery and associated electronics???
This rov is less than a year old so finding this sort of degradation concerns me about the life expectancy of my investment. @force10windsurf
I have liquid tape and it will fix the problem for now but the question is, should I have to deal with what seems, a design flaw the could be potentially fatal for my rov?
This problem won’t go away and will get worse over time.
Hello Kaos, I’ve had mine for over a year with more dives than I can remember and have no deterioration in the insulation. I’m always careful not to over bend or pinch the wires as I’m closing the battery compartment and has worked well. Hopefully this is an isolated case, hope the liquid tape works for you.
The insulation on the battery cable conductors is made of Teflon (FEP), which can handle high temperatures and water immersion, but is fairly hard. It’s thin because that’s the only way to get two 12AWG wires through a single penetrator. Together, those make the cable a little more fragile than we’d like. We are hoping to resolve that but we haven’t had too many issues like this recently.
I’d suggest the following:
Putting heat shrink over each conductor would increase protection and limit bending to prevent any further damage.
If that doesn’t work for you, we can send a replacement cable and install this heat shrink.
Let me know what you think and feel free to shoot an email to rusty@bluerobotics.com if you’d like.
