Carbon Fiber

A topic that we feel is not understood well in the FPV community is how serious the effects of Carbon Fiber Dust can be on our builds.

So first to explain how serious it is. Typical FPV build workflow, you grab that new frame from its shipping packaging, screw it together, mount and solder your motors and stack, hook up USB, program it, and go fly. Rinse and repeat for every build.

What is going on behind the scenes, is that when you took that frame from its packaging, especially a frame from a smaller manufacturer, there is a high probability that it wasn't adequately washed before packaging. It came from a factory that CNCs a large volume of this nasty black carbon stuff, and microscopic carbon filaments are scattered throughout the packaging, and on the parts.

These filaments get onto your hands during the build, and onto your work area, and eventually make it onto exposed electronic parts, where they are long enough to bridge between pads on the fine-pitched parts that we use.

To make things worse, when soldering wires to the stack for example, these filaments embed themselves into the solder flux, where they stay.

These filaments move with time, and airflow, and humidity changes, and may not cause a problem one day, but cause random failures the next.

How do you avoid it?

1. Wash ALL carbon parts that you receive with soap and water before you use them. After drying, run a piece of white tissue paper down the cut edge of the carbon and ensure that it doesn't end up black. These parts really need to be clean.

2. During a build, especially after assembling the mechanical parts, wipe down your bench, and wash your hands (should be getting good at that with Covid).

3. Try to clean the area around solder joints with some flux cleaner. Acetone works, but keep it away from switches and connectors. The goal is not to leave sticky flux on the board for filaments to stick to.

This may all sound like overkill, but I cannot stress how serious it is. Back in the early days of the Vortex 285 our development was delayed for months due to this invisible electronic killer.

Oh, and finally, if you cut your own carbon frames, especially in the same building as you do any electronic work CUT UNDER WATER. Even the best filters and vacuum systems for CNC machines let these carbon filaments escape into the room.