Since commercial brushless motors became available, they have always been popular. Their high efficiency, low weight, and impressive power output over traditional brushed motors showed great potential within the RC community. As a result, their high demand was rivaled only by their price tags.

Back in 2002, in search of a more economical alternative to pricey motors and driven by a disease-like affliction to tinker, a small group of RCers discovered the potential of using the small brushless platter motor from a CD-ROM drive upon which the CD itself sits and spins. Modification after modification widened the power band of these little work horses, and after a short while hobbyists were gutting not only CD-ROM drives, but hard drives, DVD players, hard drives, kitchen appliances, power tools - anything with a brushless motor - to extract their guts and convert them to RC powerplants. While the term "CD-ROM motor" stuck, this term now applies to the wide range of limited and medium production brushless outrunner motors currently available to the RC community.

Since their emergence, a new hobby-within-a-hobby has been established and people are seeing more and more DIY brushless motors at fields, meets, and fly-ins. The affordability, availability of parts, and huge following has solidified the reputation of DIY motors in the RC community and has even driven down the cost of high-production "commercial" motors. With many pilots now having more motors than planes, the "CD-ROM revolution" has even sparked the manufacturing of low-cost electronic speed controllers.

Why not?

Aside from DIY motors being substantially less expensive, all mass-produced "commercial" brushless motors are designed to work with a wide range of planes, helis, boats, cars, etc. From a business or marketing perspective, that makes perfect sense. In this situation a company wants their product to be as versatile as possible. As a result, many pilots own several planes that may have very different flight characteristics but only a small number of motors, and thus swap motors around as they need.

But imagine for a moment that this wasn't the case... Imagine that you could have an ideal motor that was matched perfectly to not only your plane or heli, but also matched your flying style. It played nice with the capabilities of your battery pack and speed controller so you didn't have to go out and spend hundreds of dollars on more hardware, and could be optimized and tailored to match YOUR SPECIFIC PLANE instead of a range of planes.

It could be upgraded and repaired. Modified and rebuilt. All by you.

Now imagine that motor being inexpensive to the point that you could put one in every plane you own, or even build multiple motors for a single plane that you could swap out based on your flying mood.

If that doesn't convince you, how about the thrill of building a high-performance brushless outrunner with your own two hands and seeing it not only run, but fly your plane better than a motor several times the price?

Perhaps that's why one customer referred to our DIY kits as "crack cocaine"... ;)

For some, I suppose it could be. Our kits are tailored to certain skill levels -- the GBv™ kits being the easiest to assemble with minimal skills and ideal for learning the fundamentals of motor building, and the GBx™ kits intended for folks looking to build a more efficient, much more powerful motor. But as we tell everyone who asks this question, we have received countless emails from customers telling us how easy it was to build their first motor. In fact, one of those customers fessed up to the fact that his kit was actually assembled by his 10 year old grandson! And it runs perfectly!

All mail order payments should be sent to:

GoBrushless.com
Attn: Billing
PO Box 843
Lexington Park, MD 20653

We've actually been doing this all along (you'd be surprised how many customers place multiple orders in 1-2 days time!). If this happens, we will do our absolute best to catch it, but as order volume increases it becomes harder and harder for us to do so. Bottom line is this - if we see it, we'll combine them and refund you a shipping charge. If we miss it, we apologize and hopefully we'll catch it next time!

Upon placing an order at GoBrushless.com, an email is automatically sent to the email address we have on file for you, which conveniently is the same email address you use to log into your account GoBrushless.com. We ensure that these emails are sent by having ourselves CC'd on each and every outgoing email.

If you didn't receive your confirmation email, first check to make sure that it wasn't intercepted by your SPAM filter. If you need us to redispatch your confirmation email, send us an email with your name and order number.

Some email account providers utilize a "white list" SPAM filtering system that responds to our confirmation emails with an email requiring us to go to a specific web page and fill out a form adding GoBrushless.com to the recipient's "list of approved senders" before our emails are delivered. It is the policy of GoBrushless.com - due strictly to time restrictions imposed upon us by order volume - that we disregard these requests. If your email account provider uses this method of SPAM prevention, please add "shipments@gobrushless.com" to your list of approved senders prior to placing your order. Nevertheless, should you forget to do this, just send an email requesting us to redispatch the confirmation email by clicking here.

Just add the desired products to your shopping cart and then click Checkout. By the second step you will know your order total including whichever shipping option you prefer.

In addition, GoBrushless.com also offers a "Wish List" that allows you to save desired items for purchase later when you're ready.

If you find a problem with your order, email us immediately so we can put a hold it before it ships. We can't guarantee that we'll be able to change your order though, as we're sometimes a victim of our own mind-boggling efficiency :). Best we can say is let us know as soon as possible if you need to make any changes to your order, as it's not uncommon for us to ship orders within mere hours of being placed.

GoBrushless.com offers various methods to pay for your order. We currently employ a 100% secure e-Commerce solution that utilizes AES-256 256-bit Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) encryption technology to safely process transactions with the major credit card issuers listed below:

• Visa
• American Express
• MasterCard
• Discover

We also offer the following secure payment methods:

• PayPal
• PayPal Express Checkout

We also make it easy for customers to pay via check or money order. Simply place your online order as normal and select "Check/Money Order" from the available payment methods during checkout. Print out either your confirmation page (presented to you at the end of the Checkout process) or your order confirmation email, include your payment, and send it to our mailing address. Please include your GB order number on your check/money order.

Please keep in mind that we require 3-7 business days to allow personal checks to clear. If you are outside the United States, please remember that all payments MUST be in USD and checks can only be accepted that are drawn on a US bank. We strongly recommend against sending cash and cannot be held responsible for nor aid in recovering funds lost during transit.

Orders are processed and shipped within 3 business days of being placed, though typically orders are shipped the day after we receive them. All domestic orders are sent via USPS Priority Mail, while all international orders ship via either USPS Global Priority Mail or Air Parcel Post (depending on location). We reserve the option to ship any backordered or replacement items via USPS First Class mail.

All domestic order shipments are processed online, and as a result all domestic customers will receive a shipping confirmation email sent to their email address on file at the time of their order. International customers will receive a separate email listing their order shipment information.

Most domestic orders ship for .60 and typically take 3-7 business days to arrive at their destination. International shipping starts at .25 depending on the method of shipping selected and, in the case of Global Priority Mail, take usually 7-10 business days to be delivered.

You can determine your total shipping cost by adding the desired items to your shopping cart and completing the first few steps of the Checkout process.

We offer the option of USPS Express Mail to many locations during the Checkout process. This service typically takes 1-2 business days domestically, and 2-4 business days internationally. Be aware that we usually ship all orders around 8AM EST (GMT-5) Monday through Saturday, and if you place your order between 6PM and 8AM, it usually won’t ship until the following day. Keep this in mind if you select Express Mail and expect to see your package the next day…

Example: If you place your Express Mail order at 11AM on a Tuesday, your order will ship Wednesday morning at 8AM and won’t be delivered until Thursday. The same order placed on a Friday night or Saturday for Express Mail shipment won’t actually ship until Monday for delivery Tuesday. Please keep in mind that USPS Express Mail is not offered to all areas.

All APO/FPO-bound orders ship with the appropriate Customs documentation. The same applies for all international orders.

Due to USPS policy and regulation, all required Customs documentation is completed accurately. We will not honor requests to do otherwise so please don't ask. If taxes and duties on inbound orders are less than ideal, encourage your local hobby shops to carry GoBrushless.com products!

Yes, but contact us via email prior to placing your order so that we can work out the details. Insurance options on certain international orders may be limited. For example, orders to Germany cannot be insured for more than USD0. These limitations are established by the United States Postal Service, not us. We encourage all large international orders to ship via insured mail (where available) as well as via a trackable means such as registered, certified, return-receipt, or delivery confirmation. Contact us prior to placing your order should you have any questions.

USPS provides tracking information for international orders shipped via USPS Global Priority Mail and International Express Mail only, and even then it is only up to the point at which your order leaves the USA. For this reason, and in all cases like this, it is the option of GoBrushless.com whether or not to reship overseas orders that have, as per the USPS, left the USA bound for their destination, but are delayed from delivery due to customs-related issues.

Domestic orders can take up to 2 weeks to be delivered. To maintain visibility, we ship all domestic orders via USPS Priority Mail with Delivery Confirmation. If your order does not show up in a reasonable amount of time, you can track it at USPS.com using the label number provided in your shipping confirmation email.

International orders can in very rare cases take up to 3 months to be delivered. If your order has not shown up in a reasonable amount of time (10-14 business days), print out your order confirmation email and take it to your local post office. They should be able to assist you. Most of the time, the order is sitting there waiting for pickup. In cases where the order is held up by Customs, there are unfortunately no other options but to await clearance of your order.

Note to international customers: While we can keep a close eye on all domestic orders, once your order leaves the US we can longer maintain 100% visibility of it. For this reason, GoBrushless.com is not responsible for orders shipped overseas via non-trackable/traceable means that are lost in transit. We encourage all international customers to keep this in mind when ordering.

Well that depends. Some motors are considered "hot wound", which means they have very few winds and produce very high RPMs while drawing high currents). For those, heat is normal. Some of these "hot wound" motors generate so much heat that you can't even run them in static conditions (on your test bench or in any condition other than in flight where there isn't substantial air flow over the motor) or they can become damaged and even inoperable due to the excessive heat.

For most of us though, while our motors may get warm, they shouldn't get very hot. If this happens, it is most likely the result of an electrical short. This is almost always caused by winding your stator too tightly or too quickly, damaging the heavy poly-nylon (HPN) insulation that coats the copper wire. Unfortunately, the only sure-fire solution to a short is rewinding the stator. If your motor gets hot, do not run it for very long - the high temperatures can damage other parts of your motors (namely the neodymium magnets). For this reason we suggest testing for shorts with a multimeter prior to fully assembling or firing up the motor.

An alternative to rewinding the stator is a method known as blowing away a short which involves connecting one lead from a battery to the stator and another to the shorted coil for a very short time. This method is dangerous, though, and as a result we suggest rewinding the stator as opposed to attempting to blow away shorts.

This is most likely caused by a poor feedback signal from the motor to the speed controller. Check your wire connections. Another reason, although most folks are embarrassed to admit it, is an incorrectly installed magnet.

For example, if your magnet configuration consists of N-S-N-S-N-S but you goof up and glue one magnet in backwards (i.e., N-S-N-N-N-S) it’s definitely going to confuse your controller. While it may not be a noticeable issue at low RPM (although start-up may be jittery), at higher speeds a crystal clear feedback signal from the motor to the ESC is critical for smooth, efficient operation.

When winding your stator, consistency is of the utmost importance. Realistically, though, we all slip up on our turn count here and there. Lets say you were watching TV while winding and you think you may have ended up with something like 20 turns, 20 turns, and 21 turns on the first phase... is this going to cause a problem?

Well, consider this: the magnetic field created by the motor is (put on your thinking cap now) the current being drawn X the number of turns.

Magnetic Field Strength = (Current) X (# of Turns)

We call this "amp turns". If your current is, say, 5 amps, then let's do some math. Stator arm #1 has 20 turns, so...

• 5 (amps) X 20 (turns) = 100 amp turns for Arm #1, Phase #1.
• Same goes for the next arm that had 20 turns too. 100 amp turns for Arm #2, Phase #1.

Since you were paying more attention to the Victoria's Secret commercial than your motor on the last arm of the phase, you ended up with 21 turns (well, at least you think you did...). Well, how is this going to affect the motor? Do the math.

• 5 (amps) X 21 (turns) = 105 amp turns for Arm #3, Phase #1.

Yes, there's a difference here, but it's only 4.7% - we can typically consider this negligible. Not ideal, but not a show stopper either and usually not a reason to demand rewinding. So at 5 amps you probably won't even notice anything.

BUT let's say you were off by 7 turns... that comes out to 135 amp turns, which gives you a 26% difference when compared to the first and second arms. This will most definitely be noticeable.

As far as what difference % is the point at which you should start worrying, there's always room for argument there. A good rule of thumb is that if you think you miswound your stator, it doesn't take THAT long to rewind it - plus then you have one less thing to troubleshoot should you have any other problems.