Just replaced a speed control potentiometer used to control Thruster Commander output to two basic ESCs and T200 thrusters.
Now, when initializing I don’t get the final beep until I turn the potentiometer slightly off the center detent. After initialization, at detent, thrusters are running. I can turn potentiometer slightly off detent to stop the motors.
Was working fine with the original potentiometer (had to replace due to water intrusion that resulted in corroded terminals). Did I get a bad potentiometer? Anything else I should check? Thanks!
ETA: this is a previously unused Blue Robotics pot that came with the Thruster Commander and has been sitting in a box for 6 months.
Given it was working fine before, I expect either your potentiometer is bad or perhaps the pins on your thruster commander are corroded from the water damage and now have different non-negligible resistances.
If you have access to a multimeter you can measure the resistance in each half of the potentiometer when it’s at the detent, to see how close the values are to each other. You could also try using two resistors with the same value (would need a tight tolerance, or to be measured as very close to each other) in the place of the potentiometer, or using a different potentiometer if you have one available.
If it does turn out to be the potentiometer I recommend you contact support@bluerobotics.com to sort out a replacement. If you do so please link them to this thread, and if possible provide your order number or approximate order date.
thanks, I’ll check potentiometer w/multimeter when I get a chance.
I did initially think it might be an issue with the cabling, since I had the pot mounted in a control box that turned out to not be watertight and the wiring was definitely corroded as well, but I plugged the brand new pot directly into the thruster commander (which was in a separate, protected waterproof enclosure and completely dry, no corrosion) with same results.
