Shaun K

To add my 10 cents worth, I re-covered a long-faithful trainer and used silver solarfilm on the fuselage. First flight out saw lost signal a number of times (with 2.4Ghz and internal antennas). At any further than about 80-100m away it was pot luck and required a very hasty return to the ground, which thankfully resulted in a wheels-first arrival. After relocating the receiver and placing the antenna ends outside the fuselage, all is well again. Hope this helps your decision, but I won't ever put my rx antenna inside silver film again. Shaun.

Thanks Tom, I thought of that and to be honest I think the prop that was with it is too big in diameter. I have done most of the testing with no prop fitted, but aside from the difference in actual RPM, the rate at which the motor accelerates is pretty much the same with prop on or off. Last night I played around with the ATV a little bit and strangely enough it seems to be a softer acceleration with the ATV at maximum, 150%. That's backward to what I expected, but it's softened it up a little... Shaun.

Thanks again gents. Pat - I've already been through the programming steps to set he basics so the idea of an alternative ESC looks to be the solution to poor throttling. Shaun.

Thanks for the quick response guys. I suspect that it may be the fact that the ESC is of the old and cheap variety. I can't do throttle curves with my older radio but I might play with the ATV and see if I can't make it a bit normal. Do the programming cards that Josep mentions suit any ESC or are they all model or brand specific? Still keen to hear any other ideas though. It's very late at night out here in the land down under so I'm signing off fo the night. Thanks again, Shaun. Edited By Shaun K on 28/02/2012 12:07:50

Thanks Olly, I think you're right and I tried the advice given in the Throttle Probs thread but that hasn't worked for me. Shaun.

Hi electric flight afficionados, I'm a keen IC flyer with no EP experience. I recently got a collection of electric flight bits from a friend who didn't realise a shock flyer wouldn't make a good trainer. The fact that I've got the motor, ESC and 3 micro servos explains how that ended up... The ESC is a TowerPro Mag8 18A, motor is a small, cheap brushless bell type outrunner and I'm testing with a 3-cell 800mAh lipo. While I'm generally about as keen on the thought of electric power up front as the esteemed Mr Whittaker, I figured I should make something that could use the gear but in bench testing I just can't get it to run with anything close to a linear throttle response. The throttle needs to be moved 4-5 clicks before there's any action then it speeds away in a great hurry, gaining close to full RPM by half throttle and only a tiny increase in RPM from half throttle to full throttle. Likewise, dropping the throttle back from WOT sees almost no change until it suddenly stops at just above idle position. I'm a computer nerd by profession, so I understand gadgets in general and know the value of organised troubleshooting steps, I just prefer noisy and oily so I don't know much about ESC's yet. I've done a little homework on this and other forums and here's what I've done to date, with no change in the motor's behaviour: Set the transmitter to all default settings - 100% ATV, no trims, no sub-trims, no expo etc etc... Found a programming guide for the ESC and set to 3-cell lipo battery type Set the ESC timing to the lowest and second lowest advanced values to test for changes (more timing advance just did the same thing with a higher top RPM) Tested advice found in another thread in this forum which advised simply putting the ESC into programming mode with high throttle then dropping it to low throttle at the appropriate time. So far, none of the above has worked. Has anyone else had similar experiences with a TowerPro Mag8 18A ESC? Any ideas? Thanks, Shaun.

What a fascinating thread this is for a model flying forum! I've just read the entire thread thus far and I'm surprised that it has only been in recent posts that a key issue in motorway safety has been raised and it was very well described as "lane discipline".   Humour me for a bit while I draw an analogy to another high-risk activity made a whole lot safer with a little "lane discipline" - road cycling in large bunches. Cyclists pack together very tightly to take advantage of reduced wind resistance from drafting behind others. I've been cycling for many years and there are unwritten rules of cycling in large bunches which we call "bunch etiquette". I've ridden many thousands of kilometres in tighlty packed bunches of riders, often with just a few inches from one rider's front wheel to the next wheel in front. More often than not you return home safely from your ride because the experienced riders know and respect the rules - it's a different game when your only protection is a small foam helmet and a layer of lycra that disappears on first contact with the tarmac!   Any rider who is new to bunch riding will be told two key rules of bunch etiquette - ride straight and hold a steady speed. Things can go horribly wrong in an instant when someone suddenly slows or changes their line - I've seen that too many times and it's almost guaranteed to bring down more than one rider.   So what's my point? The Germans got it right with their rules around lane discipline on the autobahns - the figures show the truth. If everyone respects the need to go fast in the fast lane and move out to the slow lanes when you're driving under any specified limit there's going to be a whole lot less tears, regardless of the relative speeds, be it 60mph or 100mph. Order and consistency are key to avoiding incidents.   In my home country of Australia we also have variable speed limits on some highways depending on weather conditions - 100 or 110km/h in the dry, 90km/h when it's raining and it's been statistically proven to be successful in poor weather. It makes sense and it works. Driving at high speeds can be safe, but it's important to choose a speed that's appropriate to the conditions, considering theweather, road or other traffic.  As for Terence's need to drive slowly in which ever lane he so decides - In Australia there are large fines for drivers like Terence. We have signs on all our major highways / freeways / motorways stating "Keep left unless overtaking. Large fines apply".   One final tip I was given by a traffic safety officer at a local Council was to always maintain a gap of at least 2-3 seconds between you and the next vehicle in front. No matter what speed you're travelling at you will have time to process, decide and take evasive action. Try it out - this works too and has saved me a number of times since I was first told this approach.   Stay safe, no matter what the speed limit may be.   Shaun K.

Anyone need a good, healthy Australian kidney?   I'll consider all offers to sell one for a flight in a Spitfire! One only though - I might need the other one...    

Hi Craig,   The esteemed Wizard of Oz reviewed the RCS Turbo Muffler and gave them a good report. See the link below.   RCS Turbo Muffler from Christian Traders in Australia.   Shaun.

Not being a Brit, I don't know your laws, but surely the fact that the club is operating on private land must be a key factor. Am I right???   If the complaints are noise-related then there are DoE/ council rules around this, but if flying models that meet the DoE requirements is being conducted on private land I would think the land owner is key to the issue. Keep him on your side and you should surely have good grounds to continue.   In Australia it's very different picture if you're on private land, particularly if the land is in a rural area. We have different regulations depending on whether you're in suburbia or in a rural area. In short, we've got a bit more free reign in rural areas - you can be asked to stop making noise if it's above the relevant legal limits, but there's no way you could be stopped from carrying out an activity on private land if you're not breaking any specific environmental or other laws or endangering people or wildlife etc.   It's certainly no free-for-all out here in the colonies, but there's a very big difference in your rights to do things on private land compared to public land.   What you want to do is encourage some motorcycling friends to start up a motocross / dirt bike racing club somewhere nearby. Your model planes would soon be forgotten, or at least not heard over the noise...   Good luck!    

Hi Dorset Flyer,   Yes, the 2.4GHz frequency on your home network is the same as the 2.4Ghz used by the new transmitters. What's important to understand is that it's not a single frequency, it's a range of frequencies.   With the old 35/36Mhz transmitter and receiver equipment you used matched crystal pairs to pick an exact point in the frequency range and likewise, the new transmitters do much the same thing, but with 2.4GHz equipment it's done electronically.   The 2.4GHz range is used by everything from computers to cordless phones, industrial telemetry systems and much more. The key is that it's a wide range of frequencies with enough room to share it around.   Hope this helps. Shaun.

Started life as a trainee IT nerd. 17 years later I'm the chief IT nerd (Corporate Information Manager) but I still love the simple low tech of glow engines.

Tim, I've only just seen this thread for the first time (sorry) and I am in awe of both your design and execution. I've no doubt that this will hit the building board WHEN your design is published and I have a sweeeet little OS 32 IC just begging sit in the pointy end to make it sound great as well! ;o) A wholehearted congrats to you and many safe landings. Regards, Shaun.

No full circle for me - just IC, oily hands and glow plugs.   Why?   For me, flying RC planes is a really cool way to indulge in my strange fascination with small engines.   I completely understand the arguments for electric power, but those noisy little glow engines are a genuine part of the fun for me.   The beauty of this hobby / sport is that we all get out of it what we want - for me the fun comes in 3 equal parts - flying, building from plans and playing with little engines.

I'd just like to offer a little word of caution with respect to the cheaper covering options.   From first hand experience I can see that some of the savings are made in the glues used to stick down the film. No matter how tough/light/easy to work the film is, if the glue lets go it's useless.   A couple of years ago I had a large sheet of cheap covering film part company with the top surface of an open frame wing, which really doesn't do wonders for its lift coefficient!   In my case I was seriously lucky that the plane "landed" in 5 foot high grass off the end of the strip and the damage was minimal, but had it landed elsewhere the few dollars saved (I'm an Aussie) wouldn't have looked like such a bargain if I had to replace the whole airframe.   When I started out on the repairs I was quite taken aback at how easily the remaining film lifted off. By contrast, last time I had to repair an airframe covered in Solarfilm it was a painful job to remove the old film.   So for me from now on it's tried and tested Solarfilm or something more permanent like glass cloth and epoxy. I'm quite sure it will save me money in the long run,