Cicada 4 in one esc and BEC

Help
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1

Hello there I am in doubt if I should buy Cicada 4 in 1 ESC. I already own an F3 controller. In order to match it with this sweet piece of electronics shall I use a regulator? F3 should get powered by 5V. Also as I get I shall not use any PDB? Then how can I power my VTX and camera?

2

Yes you will need to still use a BEC to power your FC, and camera gear, either from your PDB or via a separate mini BEC

3

Do you have any wiring diagram or tutorial? I am willing to buy the FC and the rest gear from Unmanned (great support and resales BTW) but I can’t figure out how to match this ESC with the appropriate wiring in order to power my VTX without any PDB.
Any feedback will be highly appreciated.

4

Thanks for your kind words :slight_smile:
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​We dont have any wiring diagram :frowning: , but all you would do is solder two smaller wires (positive, ground) from the battery pins on the ESC to the BEC, and then from the BEC you connect the two wires to your FC (usually on the motor output rail 5V, Gnd)
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​If you want to power your VTX/ camera depending on their voltage range you could either connect them directly to the battery power or you can use the same bec (if they work on 5V) or you might need another 12V as most FPV gear works on 12V. But if its 12V then you can just power directly from your 3S battery.
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​Hope that helps.

5

I want to piggyback onto this thread for a moment;

Say I have a 4 in 1 ESC, and an AIO FC/PDB combo (or similar), could I simply run the power cables to both in parallel? That way it’d power both boards with the same leads and battery, and both boards would be able to take 3s/4s, and would make for some super small, clean builds (I’m looking for 130mm and less)

6

Yeah that is definitely possible and should make things nice and neat :slight_smile:

On a side note, I have been talking with sunrise model (manufaturers of cicada ESC) and they have said that they are working on some alternative versions of cicada 4in1 ESC that will include a 5V BEC

7

That is super exciting! Couple with some FlySky A8s micro RX (please stock! I want all of them :stuck_out_tongue: ) and I can see some very clean, lightweight, small builds in my near future!

8

Hi,
I have a question. Is it possible to use a PDB that have a 12v and 5v fr the VTX and camera with an 4 in 1 ESC?
If so, is the follwing setup will work:

  1. The battery plug is on the 4 in 1 so I will connect 2 wires, the positive and negative from the ESC to the PDB, at the same place where I will normally plug the battery on the PDB.
    2 Now from the PDB I use the 5V output to connect the FC and the camera and I use the 12V output to connect the VTX
  2. I will connect the signal wires from the 4 in 1 ESC to the FC.

I hope my question is clear :slight_smile:

Thanks a lot for your help!