Futaba 148 Servos

[Tosh McCaber]

I have a good few Futaba 148 servos, from days of yore, which I used on most of my models.  Never had any problems with them.  I came back into flying, after a 20 year break, a couple of years ago.  I'm now on Spektrum tranny, various manufacturers' receivers, and a variety of modern servos.

However, apart from being larger and slightly heavier than the recent crop of modern servos, can anyone give me advice as to how the 148s would compare with today's servos, when being used on medium sized aerobatic aircraft?  I would look forward not to wasting them!!

[Nigel R]

Use them, they're still perfectly good servos for sport models.

 

[Martin Harris - Moderator]

As near bulletproof as any servo and adequate for anything that doesn’t require enormous torque or speed/precision (i.e. the majority of club models). 
 

Just beware of fakes - may be some still being sold?

[Don Fry]

I still like them. Because they have a plastic bearing collar at the top of the output shaft, when it wears a out, you start to get slop, and it’s time to chuck it out. In high usage servos, it’s nice to have what is in effect a lotofhours meter.

 

[Andy Stephenson]

There used to be ball bearing kits available to convert these servos when the output got a bit loose.

[leccyflyer]

Like Nigel said the venerable S148 might be a little bit larger and heavier than some modern servos but for a medium sized sports aerobat they are perfectly good in general use.

[Don Fry]

Yea, then the become functionally 3001 servos. Same problem comes after more hours, slop comes into the plastic great train. Still good, throw it away.

I like things that fail slowly. 

[J D 8]

 I still have a good number of 148 and 3001 servos in service and recently had some little used ones given to me with much thanks. As others have said still good general use servo's

[Tosh McCaber]

Thanks for the positive replies, guys.  Another couple of questions.  

 

Amongst my regular FP-S148s, in the same shell, I have a Futaba HS-422CW, with,  designated on the label, "Oilite Bearing".  Has anyone any further info on this one?  Apart from the label, it's identical to the 148s.

 

As well, I have a Futaba FP-S128.  Presumably an earlier version of the 148?

[Andy Stephenson]

The 128 was replaced by the 148 about 30 years ago. The older servo is about 5mm taller than the 148.

[Tosh McCaber]

That's the one!  How would you rate the 128 Andy- still reliable?

[Don Fry]

And you now have to ask, do you risk it on a bit of 30 to 40 year old heavy electronics.

[Paul De Tourtoulon]

I don't remember the 128, or heard of the 422, and nowhere to be found, as said,

 the 148 are the equivalent to the robbe fs 100 and are as good at the 3003, but NOT the robbe RS 200 and Rs300 they are rubbish.

 

https://servodatabase.com/servos/futaba

[Tosh McCaber]

Don,  Hear what you're saying- but- to show my age, I still fly my Kraft Series 70 (bought in 1970!) on a regular basis.  EVerything works now, as it did then (including servos)!!

[Alan Gorham_]

HS-422 sounds more like a Hitec servo part number.

[Tosh McCaber]

A couple of things- 

Thanks Alan- Apologies- I've just looked again at the HS-422- It is indeed a Hitec servo.  The servo size and gold logos on the labelling of the servo are almost identical to the Futaba 148s- I just didn't notice the "Hitec" part!!!   

Secondly, to answer my own question, I've found the instruction leaflet that came with the Futaba 128.  It is a "small rugged landing gear servo", with a 3.7 kg-cm torque, as opposed to the 148, which has 2.4kg-cm.

[Andy Stephenson]

128s were classed as standard servos when supplied with the Futaba Challenger radio set in the 1980s. They haven't been available since the 148 came on the market.

[J D 8]

  Or if you want to experience the slow movement of early proportional radio try some FD16's. Move the stick quickly from one side to the other and it will be some time before the servo arm catches up. ?  I have a couple and they still work. [ not in an aircraft ].

[GONZO]

IIRC the FD16 (and FD17) were for early systems with split supplies, +2.4v centre tap -2.4v, and had 4 wires on the plug. If you want slow servos you need to try the even earlier Futaba linear servos supplied for use with the DigiMax systems, they had 5 wires.

[Nigel R]

14 hours ago, Tosh McCaber said:

HS-422

 

Also a perfectly good 'standard size' servo for sport models.

[Tosh McCaber]

Thanks for all your replies.

 

Actually, I need to buy a couple more for another of my old models- to fit into the original servo holders for ailerons, so I'm about to post a query on the "For Sale" threads.

 

Hoping that I can buy, rather than sell, for a change!