RC Car - How To Install Capacitors Onto Electric Motors

Installing Electric Motor Capacitors

Capacitors are used to reduce the radio noise that can be created by an electric motor that can cause radio signal interference and glitching. It is a very simple and necessary installation that sometimes confuses people. You should use three 0.1 micro-farad capacitors on every electric motor that you have. There is a different process of installation for both stock and modified motors so I will cover both here.

MODIFIED MOTOR CAPACITOR INSTALLATION

There is no polarity to the 0.1 micro-farad capacitors to be used here so there is no need to worry about positive (+) or negative (-). Simply solder your first capacitor from the #1 pink dot to the #2 pink dot. Solder your second capacitor from the #2 pink dot to the #3 pink dot. Finally, solder your third capacitor from the #1 pink dot to the #3 pink dot. Keep in mind that it is not necessary to leave the capacitors' leads at their full length. It is actually advantageous to trim the capacitor wires so that they are just long enough to fit from one motor tab to the other. This will prevent the capacitor leads from bending and twisting and possibly shorting the motor out. It also reduces the chance that they will break off in a crash.

STOCK MOTOR CAPACITOR INSTALLATION

Stock motor capacitor installation is exactly the same as modified motor capacitor installation except there is no ground tab to solder to (pink #2 dot on the picture above). Since there is not a ground tab, it is necessary to ground the capacitors directly to the motor can. To do this you must file a rough spot on the motor can where the green #4 dot is in the second picture. Now follow the instructions above for the modified motor capacitor installation except replace all references to the pink #2 dot from the first picture with the green #4 dot in the second picture.

That's it, you are done. Be sure to use a good hot soldering iron with a large, flat tip for all of your soldering jobs so that you don't have to leave the heat on the components for a long time. You may also want to use some sort of a heat sink between the soldered joint and the component (in this case the capacitor) to prevent component damage (a small pair of needle nose pliers work well). Also be sure to use a good quality electronic solder available from your hobby shop or electronics store.