Ian Holme Posted September 19, 2008 Share Posted September 19, 2008 I have flown rc for many yrs, mainly ic but some fairly basic electrics too.When I saw a RTF Rafale at the cosford show drom Sola Distribution i thought it looked great. Whilst appreciating that at the price it was likley the elctronics were pretty basic, I thought it worth a go.Go it home and was pleasantly surprised at the accuracy of the way the airframe went together. I have various Futaba radios but thought i would use the supplied grear initally. All went well at the field, range checked and plenty of power. I went for a fast taxi and was surprised when it lifted off much earlier than expected, opened her up and performance was good. The control throws were obvioulsy set up for low speed flight, where lots of movement is needed (there are no rate switched on the transmitter) making high speed flight a somewhat twitchy affair, fantastic roll-rate tho!I did notice a few glitches occurring, but none too serious, and brought it in for a lovely first landing. The flight performance of the airframe is truly excellent. Next time out i used a futaba transmitter, set up the rate switches and hoped overcome the glitching. Whilst the rates smoothed out the flying the glitching was still there, and I was lucky to avoid disaster.Back home I swapped the reciever for a futaba item, confident this time of sorting the problems. Sadly not. Despite range checking and careful re-routing of the reciever ariel (it runs next to the esc as standard) the glitching still occurred and this tim i was terminal.A vertical descent from 100ft lft the fuselage forward of the main wing only recoverable by a dustpan and brush! Further examination at home showed the remainder to be intact. Given the inherently good flight characteristics I am keen to rebuild the nose and give it another go, however, i do want to avoid throwing good money after bad. And this is where you lot come in......Can any of you electronic./electric experts point me in the right direction. I am assuming that, having replaced both the receiver and transmitter with known quantities, the next likley culpit i would assume is the esc? it is currently fitted with (i think)a 25amp one running the std 1300 3s lipo. Alternativley should i be looking at the motor for the cause of the glitching? or even the batteries (tho it did the same with two different standard batteries)I obviously dont wish to spend any more than i have to to sort this, and the flight performance as std is satisfactory for my needs.Any help appreciated!As an aside, the batteries supplied with the model are again suspect, with one swelling dangerously after only two flights. I ahve to say the back-up from Sola has been poor to say the least, with emails ignored and the promise of despatching replacement battery not fulfilled. In the ned i only got it by turning up at the nats and requesting the long promised battery in their busy tent!What a shame, it could and should have been a lovely model, let down by poor quality electonic components. Any help much appreciated. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ian Holme Posted September 19, 2008 Author Share Posted September 19, 2008 just been back on the sola distribution website. I had put two revies on there. The first put on when first flown was a generally positive one, with the proviso of concern over the supplied electronics.The second an update along the lines written above.Guess which one they have retained and which one they have removed?!You have been warned! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mark S Posted September 19, 2008 Share Posted September 19, 2008 Most likely a bad ESC if your using decent radio gear. I lost a new Funjet to a bad HXT ESC that worked fine on the ground but went bad at distance. Another flyer thought that the esc wasn't providing enough power to the radio gear so the RX reset itself. Glued the bits together, swapped out for a decent ESC and it was fine! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ian Holme Posted September 29, 2008 Author Share Posted September 29, 2008 Spot on Mark!Got a new esc from Foamy jets........flew it yesterday, no glitching, no problems at all.Shame the model now looks rather second hand, but at least its up and flying again.Still no response from Sola distribution though............. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mark S Posted September 29, 2008 Share Posted September 29, 2008 Great news! Cheap ESC's are just not worth the grief. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andy Harris Posted October 29, 2008 Share Posted October 29, 2008 I'd definitely go with ESC problems but would be wary of accusing cheap ESCs. I have some opposite experience where full cost Dualsky ESC's do not perform as well as cheap ESCs from BRCHobbies and Budget-RC.When buying ESCs I tend to give a reasonable current margin and review the BEC current on the specs.Of course one might consider my ESCs to be 'value' rather than 'cheap' as is sometimes found in RTF models. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tim Mackey Posted October 29, 2008 Share Posted October 29, 2008 I agree with Andy. Some of my best ESCs are the turnigy brand from H/City and at under £18 for a 60A unit with 3A BEC the last one purchased performs very well indeed. I used to buy Jeti or Hacker ( pretty much the same thing ) but these days, especially using 2.4G I only ever use "cheap" ESCs. They have simply got better over the last few years, and I never buy anything showing a designer label ! Some of my models ( especially EDF ) just simply refused to be glitch free no matter what I did - the only cure being 2.4Ghz radio gear. Never had a single glitch EVER since going Spekky over 18 months ago.PS sorry to hear of the crash Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mark S Posted October 29, 2008 Share Posted October 29, 2008 I have 3 of the 60amp switching BEC Turnigy's and they are ace. The cheap HXT ESC's are not worth the grief in my experience. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom Foreman Posted October 30, 2008 Share Posted October 30, 2008 I agree with Timbo, 2.4 Gig is the way to go on EDF's, never had any glitches on Futaba 6EX. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mark Jones Posted October 30, 2008 Share Posted October 30, 2008 I know its extra cost but i STRONGLY agree with the above fellows 2.4 spektrum is in my opinion the best thing to be inside EDF's never so much as had a single blip ever! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David Martin 2 Posted December 12, 2008 Share Posted December 12, 2008 You know you're all dooming yourselves talking like that..... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eck Posted December 13, 2008 Share Posted December 13, 2008 Thank you, Private Fraser... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phil Winks Posted December 13, 2008 Share Posted December 13, 2008 There can be no doubt that 2.4 is a certain way to ensure totally gklitch free operation in high powered electric models however with proper lay out and some fore thought and the odd ferrite ring I've got six electric models all on 35mhz and not one of them glitches and in fact all my past problems have been proved absolutely to have been interference from another tx that had drifted off frequency or down to failed servos (stripped gears on rough landing) and one duff esc that was "tripping" the bec out momentarily due to overheat causing tempory loss of control and that wasn't a cheap one either and those probs would affect even the most secure off 2.4 radio links Having said all that I will be going for a Specky as soon as finances allow its just the cost of rx's thats holding me back at the min Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Terence Lynock Posted February 19, 2009 Share Posted February 19, 2009 One of the biggest culprits I have found is cheap servos that do not centre properly and spend too much time hunting and buzzing away, the best of the cheapest servos I have found are Vigor from Hobbyking or whatevr they are called, smooth and good centreing and much quiter than the blue 500 and 900 type, regards, Terry Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ken anderson. Posted February 19, 2009 Share Posted February 19, 2009 hello ian-from what i can gather-the people i know who use edf set up's all go the 2.4ghz route-reporting glitch's galore with 35mhz-hope this help's...................... ken anderson................... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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