Known bad firmware versions VESC/UNITY [ SERIOUS ]

cool updated the list with that info. could use a link to more details if you have them.

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Is it 5.1 as well? that has the thermal reading instabilities causing people to trigger throttling and faults?
anyone got a link to solid info on that so I can add reference and add it to the list?

this is where I saw that:

wondering if the 4.0-4.2 claim is wrong of if the range includes 5.1

which versions had these bugs?

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Why can’t it just be perfect?!?!?

Yes, 5.1 has an issue with the median filter on the motor temp sensors. @BenjaminF ran into this testing on mk3 VESC6 as well.

You can see the spikes on the log i posted there, faults towards the end.

Afaik this is fixed in 5.2 but I’ve not updated yet on my SC100S to test.

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got a link to @BenjaminF’s coverage of the issue? or any best reference link about it?

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Didn’t (trigger happy) VESC FW 5.0 have the reverse no brakes issue? Worthwhile immortalising that one IMO.

/edit Yes it was. The now infamous “PPM bug”.

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I just looked through my post history. I had a discussion in the reply to pictures thread about it with someone else who was getting the same issue, but im not sure if I ever posted the metr log from that ride, so here it is.

The fault is right there at the end (ride was over because street face). As you can see, my motor temp reading looks like my heart monitor when I’m methed up on Adderall. I de-pinned my motor temp sensors from the sensor plug, and its all be dandy since then. Didnt feel like taking the “its fixed in the new FW” frank approach, as I prefer a devil that I know to one that I dont. And this was an easy fix.

Jesus i was going 32mph when I crashed. Fuck.

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What’s the issues in 5.2 FW?

so @BenjaminF @DerelictRobot is this a problem with VESC not handling noisy input or is the vesc somehow making the input noisy? was the issue actually understood somewhere and claimed to be fixed in 5.2? any references to that?

because I had the same kind of problem (and crash) on firmware 3.65

https://forum.esk8.news/t/fault-code-over-temp-motor-feat-crash-at-47kph

but I had considered it a hardware issue?

I note @Deodand saying a fix was in 5.0 for a similar issue.

so… feeling a bit confused what versions to place this issue in. and also if it’s only an issue in combination noisy temperature sensors or something intrinsic to vesc firmware.

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@Venom121212 you are the most recent person I know of to run into issues with fw5.2 on Unity. That was something to do with max duty cycle?

There’s some uncertainty on what can cause a cutout of power from a fault vs triggering a throttle-down response.

In my case I didn’t get a cutout but I had the motor that was hotter spiking into the soft temp limit, causing it to throttle. It caused wobbles at just shy of 30mph but I carved out of them like a champion and then stuck a backflip dismount as I stopped to check my logs.

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Yeah not temp related.

My issue was the motors oscillating back and forth at full remote throttle. I could be going full speed at 75% throttle but would start feeling insane speed wobbles start up if I pushed the remote throttle 1mm further.

The suggestion was to turn down the Max duty cycle limit start to 85% but that made my board feel like a mule reaching top speed.

No faults recorded after my crash.

Not sure? Not sure it matters? What I read is that the data-smoothing was removed from the temp value, which caused all the noisy data. If that noise jumps for even a second above the hard temp cutoff, then you’re eating street. I dont remember where I read that, I have had a bunch of conversations about this across several threads. Im pretty sure I read that in the FW4.x thread. Not certain though.

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Can confirm. I hit the same issues you did, mine just throttled at soft rather than cut out at hard.

It was a software filtering issue on the analog input for temp sensors. The fix for it is in 5.2, but given @Venom121212’s reports I’ve not personally tested my SC 100S yet.

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It sucks having to make tradeoffs and workarounds to make the best of a bunch of bad options for firmware.

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In my experience in that thread the flakey temp reading definitely jumped in and out of throttling zone and you could feel it like a stuttering. when it jumped far enough to throw a fault you get the full fault cutout. you could see it in metr.

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Did we ever had a data smoothing for the temp values in earlier fw versions?
The ones I used for a long time (3.61,3.62) didn’t seem to have had it. As minimum you could see the temp jumping ±10degree depending on how close the temp wire was routed to your phase wires and depending on the acceleration for sure.

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Ok, I think I see that in the code.

on apr 9th. there’s specific commit to fix a motor temperature sensor bug. Introduced on mar 15th. Both of these commits are in firmware 5.0. I’m not sure who would have picked up the bug because it’s not clear to me when releasees were made. but it’s both introduced and fixed in the changelog for 5.0

As I read the bug, and I could easily be wrong, it would have meant for those configured to use NTC 10k thermistor, temperature filtering would be bypassed.

In more detail: the current sample would have been used immediately as temperature, and the temperature 0 would have been merged in using the low pass filter. instead of merging the current sample in with the previous temperature using the low pass filter.

fixed:


introduced:
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I think Yes. as early as 3.17

However, it’s true that several of us have seen more noise than desired anyhow.

and I note that @Deodand slowed the LP filter down for stormcore and unity and Benjamin seems to have applied that change to all hardware a few days later. all that is in fw5.0

So… I think that fw5.0 might actually be a fix for wild temperature sensor values that existed from the beginning of vesc. hw and cabling dependent obviously. or it’d be a bigger deal than it was.

Except… there’s the median filter bug, introduced the in the same fw5.0 commit that added the slower LPF,

and then fixed later in fw5.2 (on dev branch)

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So based on my code spelunking just now, I think this is “not enough low pass filtering for motor temp” and it’s existed since low pass filtering was introduced and of course prior. unless there’s something specific introduced in 4.0 I didn’t find it.

So I updated the list to note it’s all firmware versions up to 5.0.

Also updated the median filter bug to be 5.0 - 5.1

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