Herelink v1.1 overheat

[Joao_Balao]

We have been using the Herelink remote controllers to pilot our drones for a long time now and we’ve never faced any major issues with them until now.

Recently we have acquired a new set of Herelinks which have the new Airunit 1.1, model name HX4-06211 (the previous model that we were using should be the HX4-06075). With these new devices, on several occasions, we’ve had the remote controllers enter a power-down state automatically soon after showing an “overheat” warning pop-up message:

“Temperature is high
Internal temperature of remote controller is too high. Please pay attention to reduce load or stop operation.”

Furthermore, sometimes the controller gets stuck in this power-down state displaying the message “Power down - shutting down” and becomes unresponsive. After that, the only way to restart the device is to leave the RC on until it completely drains the battery and afterward turn on the RC after charging. This can take a long time and it’s not a valid solution for our pilots.

This has happened mostly under sunlight but it has also happened in the shade and even indoors when we registered temperatures of over 90ºC (stated by the command itself). It’s important to note that this never happened with the old version of the Herelink even after piloting drones for more than 30 mins under direct sunlight.

Installing a fan under the RC is not a valid solution for us at the moment, as well as assembling a hood to provide shade, considering that the overheating message has also appeared even with the RC indoors as shown in the pictures.

Any thoughts or information regarding this issue are highly appreciated.

Thanks in advance,
João

[UlrichC (Christian Ulrich)]

Hello

I once had a 1.1 that after switching on. It started to get very warm on the back.

I had contacted my dealer. In short, the control unit was replaced.
(I had to record a YT video in English, do a system dump and listen to some stories. But maybe your dealer isn’t as dumb as mine. )

CU

[renato-dias]

Hi!

I am facing the same problem.

I am trying to underclock the remote it to see if it reduces the CPU activity to generate less heat.
To do that, I need to root the device and so, I need to access the boot.img file packed on the OEM Image.
I’ve found the official tutorial explaining how to patch the OEM Image (OEM Image Setup - CubePilot) but I am not sure if the OEM Image provided on the tutorial page is the right one because it only has ~9Mb.
Did you notice this already?
Do you know how to root the device, or even better, to underclock it without rooting?

Thank you in advance!

Best regards,
Renato.

[Joao_Balao]

Regarding this issue, we found out that this was not an isolated problem or some manufacturing defect: we had several scaring events, in several clients, in which the Herelink just entered thermal shutdown with the drone flying. Moreover: more than once the RC just froze, leaving the pilot with no other choice but to wait until the battery was drained down because he couldn’t even shut down the RC.

Fortunately, by miracle, these several events didn’t cause any accidents because, by chance, they happened always in situations where the drone could make a safe RTL and land. But it is just too dangerous to leave this issue to chance because it’s a matter of time until something very wrong happens…

Using our supplier, we approached CubePilot, reporting this problem but, to our big surprise, the answers from them were never satisfactory: “reduce the screen brightness”, “don’t use the RC outdoors”, etc. meaning that they are not paying attention at all to this issue…

They even told us that the only difference between V1.0 and v1.1 of the RC was in the screen brightness, which is completely not true, so we found after opening one unit of each!

So, we decided to work on a workaround ourselves: we opened two holes on the remote controller’s back and place a small heatsink + fan on the big metal plate in the center of the board, (which we assume encloses the CPU) this is the major source of heat (we also tried the heatsink only, but it proved not to be enough). Afterward, we tested the RC with a stress test/benchmark app.

Finally, we printed a small outer case that covers the fan and the two holes we previously made on the back:

Here is the .stl of our 3D printed case:
herelink-fan-box.zip (424.3 KB)

We tested indoors and outdoors under direct sunlight at 25ºC using a CPU stress test app and found out what is the maximum temperature at which the Herelink shuts down. We also found out that without the fan, the CPU and GPU reached a maximum temperature of about 105ºC (according to the Herelink Radio Status Menu) before shutting down without any warning. With the fan, it stabilized around a maximum temperature of 93ºC and kept running for 30+ minutes.

The same stress test performed indoors gave a maximum of 84ºC as can be seen in the upper right corner of the following picture:

Finally, we would like to add that this is a major design flaw which must be resolved as soon as possible. We are also aware that opening the remote controller’s case results in the nullification of the warranty, however, considering that we already have clients currently using these products, we deemed it the most favorable course of action.

[sibujacob (SJ)]

cool…but i never faced an issue on the radio GCS unit ( v1.0) but i faced heat issue on the airlink unit on which i placed a cooling fan and the temperature dropped by 10 degree centigrade ! This was only for a fixed wing case. Quadcopters dont require any external fan.

[Joao_Balao]

We never had this happen with the previous herelink v1.0 GCS, and they were used on especially hot days without any problems. But with the newer version (v1.1), we have been getting automatic thermal shutdowns recurrently on different remote controllers, sometimes even indoors. It’s safe to say that there is clearly a major flaw in the new GCS unit.

[srbell (Shaun Bell)]

I’ve been getting thermal warnings and shutdowns on the 1.0 version two weeks back. I ended up taking a much uglier approach for a fix lol. Warnings will pop up around 32c even when out of direct sun. Testing my new, super high-tech mods I got no warnings even at 37c with direct sun hitting the reflective back.

[Petros_Kokotis]

I can confirm that we also have one client at the moment that faces the same issues.
Remote overheating and randomly freezing when running qgc app.
Also with the newest firmware update sbus comms stop working and we are deeply troubled because our product relies heavily on your remote control.
Is there any information that you would like to share in the meantime?

[sibujacob (SJ)]

Hi,
What is your latest firmware version…

[philip]

As mentioned on other threads, update your firmware.

This is not some hidden issue, we announced the KNOWN issue and released a firmware update to fix it.

So PLEASE update your firmware.

We cannot guarantee that it won’t shutdown if overheating occurs, but the issue that was causing widespread overheating has been resolved.

Set up your failure modes… assuming it will fail

[Joao_Balao]

Hey @philip, can you please tell me where the issue was officially announced? And, what is exactly the version of the firmware that solves the overheating problem? Please note that when we had this issues the FW of our RC was updated to the most recent version.

We must say that we have been reporting this (huge) problem since June and so far we haven’t been getting any valid answers from CubePilot. Moreover, we had several incidents in clients that could have resulted in tragic accidents because the RC just shuts down or worse – freezes until the battery drains out – all of the sudden, without warning, allegedly due to overheat . This is a major issue and it is really amazing that CubePilot releases a product with such a problem and doesn’t even pay attention when the clients complaint!
And as we didn’t have answers from CubePilot, we’ve then decided to add active cooling to the RCs that we’ve purchased.
Here are some photos of the remotes we have been modifying:

[philip]

I have answered many threads on this topic, sorry if I missed yours.

The current version that is on the over the air server fixes the issue.

However, as I have said many times, this is an android device, they are not perfect, and you should expect it to shut down sometimes.

Even my Apple iPhone does that.

This is why there are failsafe modes in Ardupilot. Please ensure you use them, and test they work.

Philip