Lawrence Ryan

sometimes holding the model about a foot(or 300 mm. if you like) above the ground-damp grass,or metallic elements in the soil may have something to do with it,I have an old Futaba attack (29 mhz. A.M.)that does that but it performs quite O.K.in normal use,but I like to keep an eye on battery level,just in case.I think Dave Ashby has a good point,30 metres is isually considered good enough.Some receivers just freeze if the signal is lost-others,particularly the smaller ones,go troppo.I've seen a few models go in due to a momentary loss of signal,just a momentary glitch but enough to apply a big whack of aileron at just the wrong time,I think the thing to remember if you're using a park flying type model,keep it fairly close and never point the t.x antenna directly at the model.

my mouse finger got out of control when I saw the spekky DX 5 for sale at A$135 from modelflight.I personally don't like computer radios,I tend to forget to select the proper program-old-timer's disease,I guess.Anyway,I've got to believe 2.4 gig is the way to go-we(S.S.M.E. at Luddenham) have been having problems with apparent interference from the boat club down the road-I suspect there are other factors involved,such as pointing antenna at model,but these problems don't appear with 2.4.As far as the criticisms I've  heard regarding the dry battery usage in the DX6i,I'm still using aJ.R.glint set with loose cells that's 24 years old!Modern 2500 mah NIMH cells are much cleaner than the old loose nicads of 20-odd years ago,I 've been using them for the last 5 years with no problems,and they work fine in the DX5.Perhaps the only criticism I can offer is the apparent shortage of spare AR500 full range receivers.