JasonP

My Feedback: (1)

There will be no Official Meetg at the community center.
We have a sanction and permit for the field.
We will take over the facility cometime between 4 and 5 PM and we will probabely fly till 10:00 PM
There is no fee to fly. Just need to be AMA.
We will also have Pizza and Soda for a small fee to cover the cost.
Bring your night flyer if you have one or a few glow sticks on the airplane will do the job


All the Best
Jason Pakfar

JasonP

My Feedback: (1)

Gentlemen
I would like to bring to your attention a brewing problem regarding the 2.4 Gigahertz Technology.
It’s been brought to my attention that there is a small Manufacturer of these radio equipment by the name of Xtreme Link
That has been selling Modules and receivers for various radio’s as a 3rd party add on which will make your standard transmitter into 2.4 gigahertz.
As of now based on my immediate knowledge, there has been 4 of these devices used at the basin with poor results.
The last one resulted in a lockout crash on Woodley Blvd.
This issue has been forwarded to AMA also and they are looking into it
These radios will be banned at the LA-Jets Summer event. I would like to see them not used at the Basin until
further notice.
This is only for the manufacturer listed above. It is not for Spektrum or the new Futaba or JR.
You will find a draft of different incidents below.
Please forward me your opinion.


All the Best
Jason Pakfar
Valley Flyers President





To Whom It May Concern:


I purchased one of the first production XPS Tx modules for a Futaba 9C and 10Ch Rx from the Toledo show several months ago. After installing the equipment per manufacturer recommendations, I flew it on a 40 sise Zero at the Sepulveda Basin in California. While flying the airplane, I felt the controls to be “sluggish�. This did not inspire confidence. I immediately landed the airplane after approximately two minutes of flight. I removed the Rx from the airplane and replaced it with the original 72mhz rx. I flew the airplane again and everything was back to “normal�. The controls felt solid without and perceived “sluggishness�

In conclusion I do not feel confident in the XPS system as it is now. I would not recommend the system to be flown at the Sepulveda Basin.



Vahe (Mike) Arabian
AMA 734177
Turbine Waiver FW12620









From: Joe Kelley [mailto:[email protected]]
Sent: Thursday, July 26, 2007 3:25 PM
To: Jason Pakfar
Subject: XPS





Jason this is the report from my flight log the day of the incident.

After 28 flights I had a lockout with my jet shortly after takeoff. Mushy controls etc then total loss of control. I pulled up my gear switch and off turbine switch as pre-crash procedure. Just as it was about 15' in the air I got it back pushed the nose down and got enough speed for an ok flair, the rough ground and impact messed up my new jet pretty bad but it might fly again. Fixing all day yesterday and the day before. Test run engine and all systems seem to check out. Batteries charged, all connections made, radio seemed to work post mortem.
XPS and Jim are well aware of this and have requested my module and receiver to be shipped back. I had 28 successful flights on this plane with absoulutly no changes at all to my plane or accidents. Not sure about what any of that means as I don't have real equipment and training to measure 2.4Ghz Whatever happened I am out an airframe even though it may fly, it looks really bad for a new jet. Bottom line no one physically got hurt and there was not fire, (normal in some situations.)
I'm bummed about that and that I really though I found a new way to fly and my very very busy field where shoot downs and signal conflicts are the norm. Both my and jets are back on futaba PCM for now.

Since this incident early may and I well over 100 flights on this cermark F16 using futaba PCM 72.


Joe Kelley





From: Dave Searles

The following is my experience and MY OPINION ONLY:

Based on previous reports of pilots who have used the XPS system at Apollo Field Sepulveda Basin, CA, and now my own direct experience, use of this system at this field is an ABSOLUTE NO GO!!

This install was range checked, at my home with the turbine running, I stopped walking away from it in excess of 300' with complete control. Range checked at the field for over 200' complete control. I began my first flight with a plan of keeping the plane in relatively close and at reduced throttle settings to make sure everything worked. After going thru initial retrimming of the aircraft I flew several circuits at no more than 75% throttle and relatively close in for normal turbine flight. Everything seemed rock solid. I had one minor slow response on the last circuit prior to setting up for landing, but it was so minor it could have just been the plane still needing a little more trim set.

Landing was perfect, so I refueled, recharged and began flight two with the intent of extending the flight envelope a little farther outbound and depth away. I took off, turned outbound and then downwind climbing with the turbine at full throttle, allowing it to pick up some speed. I let it proceed a little further downwind this time before beginning the base turn to upwind. At the point I wanted to make my base turn to upwind I felt no response to input. Then the landing gear extended, which was my indication that the receiver was in failsafe. It continued for what seemed like an eternity, and then I saw the gear retract again. I immediately put the plane into a hard bank to the left to bring it back towards the field. Just as the nose came around to approximately pointing at me, still in a bank, the gear extended again, FAILSAFE. This time the nose tucked straight down, with the belly towards me I could see the gear still extended. At about 30'-50' above ground the gear again retracted, but it was too late. The plane impacted, turbine running at idle, and a full fuel load. EVERYTHING BURNED!!!! The XPS receiver ejected from the plane on impact and appears to have no damage. Everything else, TOTAL LOSS!!

My previous experience with this receiver consists of watching Darcy Wingo fly the Hell out of it in his Flash at Buttonwillow and Phoenix, with absolutely no concerns! So I felt relatively comfortable putting it into a proven airframe and installation with well over 300 flights on it with never a glitch. I installed the receiver high above everything else in the aircraft and had freshly charged batteries which were topped off between flights. All to no avail. In the same area of the field that others had reported problems in reception with their XPS systems, I went into lockout twice, and lost my aircraft!

I have no idea what the problem is or why. I am not an electronics expert! But I will give my absolute support to the concept that this system is UNSAFE, to fly at the Apollo field location.

David Searles

outssider

My Feedback: (23)

Jason....

You mentioned in your post "4" incidents that you are aware of but only listed 3 !!!

Could you give any details of the 4th......

Thanks...Ron

JasonP

My Feedback: (1)

Hi Ron
The 4th one was a guy that traveled from Arizona to the Sping LA-Jets a few months ago.
He did a few flights with some lockouts. Fortunately he got control of his airplane and landed it on the runway.


JasonP

MikeRuth

I guess this is a touchy subject that no one wants to comment on?

JasonP

My Feedback: (1)

Hi Mike
Did not mean to ignore youe post.
You are asking all the right questions.
I will have more details in the Club Newsletter soon.
The only 1 answer I can give you now is that you will not have to be a club member.


Jason Pakfar

Billy

My Feedback: (15)

Has anyone seen Ron Russell? I haven't seen him in a while and was wondering if he's OK.

Billy

Kriptonic69

My Feedback: (1)

Jason there was another 2.4 lockout but I belive it was on the JR module, Jason S. was flying one of the Airworlds Turbine powered gliders (big sucker) and after about 5 min in the air the glider controls froze up and the engine went to failsafe and shut down in the air about 200 feet up, then it nosed over and went pretty much strait in. I'm not sure what the reason was but lucky there was no major fire in the inpact site (other than some lipos which caught on fire) and nobody hurt, the lipo fire indicats that there still was plenty of electical juice to the glider, maybe they know what caused the crash.

Gene

JasonP

My Feedback: (1)

Hi Gene
I beleive they narrowed down what the problem was.
It was not in the radio.

JasonP

HellcatAce

My Feedback: (6)

Jason,

With the Scale Masters event coming soon, and the potential for folks travelling from outside the area, it may be a good idea to let the CD's know about the XPS problems and the club's position in regards to their use. It may be too late for much to be done, but those who are calling the CD for further information or checking the website might appreciate knowing they better plan on using something else. Sorry to hear of the loss of aircraft, but some radios or more to the point, certain modulation schemes on a given band, just don't work in certain areas I guess.

I used to race 5th scale cars at SVM or whatever they are calling it this week and had to switch radios due to some sort of interference that seemed to only hit Airtronics radios. I didn't wanna believe it and chalked it up to inexperience of those affected. Well, with my Airtronics and an add on failsafe it would always go into fail mode at about the same spot every time. I switched to a Futaba and the problem went away. BTW my Airtronics has been flawless at the basin so no dig on them.

Too bad though since I was probably one of the few who thought XPS had a great idea going and liked the single receiver idea. Maybe they should go the route of Futaba and make the Rx antenna a dipole rather than a single whip. They could keep the single receiver and double the exposure to Tx data.

Anyway, just my $.02.

YLF

My Feedback: (2)

Question, Why did the turbine continue to run after two failsafe occurrences?

pllove

Has there been any effort to contact XPS and work with them to deteremine the root cause? On the postings I have seen I just see a willingness to blane the new radio system without an proof.

I remember a post about a jet that was crashed at a major jet event. After several pages of finger pointing and blaming the radio system (XPS) the owner/pilot posted findings of the investigation about the crash. They had data loggers on board and were able to prove without a doubt what caused the lockout and crash. The problem was the battery/power system was not enough to properly power all the servo's and radio equipment. It would have eventually have crashed with any radio system. He reported that he was putting the XPS ssytem in his new Jet without reservation.

I have seen several post about interfernce at the Sepulveda Basin airfield, not just related to XPS, but also to other spread spectrum and the old 72 Mhz systems as well.

Recently at our field a member had anew plane with a 72 Mhz receiver and new servos. It glitched all over the place to the point where he would not fly. He removed all the radio equipment and put it all in another members plane and it work flawlessly, no glitches at all. He put it all back in his plane and the problem returned. He bought a new reciver and the problem went away. Was the receiver bad? Apparenty not since it work fine with all the same radio equipment, batteries, switches, etc. just in a different plane. He is using the old receiver and a different plane without any issues. He did send it in to be checked and it came back fine. It still glitched in his new plane, but not an older plane.

Has anyone at this airfield taken an old trainter and put the XPS radio sytem and a data logger onboard to capture flight data to try and determine what is happening?

It just seems so far everything is 1 sided and jumping on the bandwagon to blane the new technology, which is not new just new to RC. This seems to happen in all fields not just RC. Quicket and easir to blame the new stuff without proof and replace parts than to troubleshoot what is really causing the promblem.

I am very interested to see how this gets worked out. I did just buy one of the XPS systems to test and see if it eliminates some interfernce i have been having on the 72 Mhz band. At our field we do have a few channels that we do have interferense on and they are not used.

I emailed XPS about these reports of problem to see what his input was and he reported that his emails have gone unanswered. He is interested in helping to figure out what is going on. I do not know who he has emailed.

bradpaul

Oh boy I hope you club is ready to defend yourselves to the army of lawyers I suspect is heading your way...... You better hope you have AMA cover on this (but I doubt it).

CiprianGugu

My Feedback: (17)

Well, if we start banning radio systems, let's ban all of them, since there were problems with all of them. Then we can be sure that no aircraft will crash because of radio problems.

It sounds to me that some people have agendas here.

alanrw

Planes falling out of the sky for unexplained reasons while using a brand new system do not impy an agenda here, but the phenomenon screams for an explanation which is all we are trying to determine here. After all, planes are expensive, planes are potentially dangerous.

alan

outssider

My Feedback: (23)

You guys couldn't be more wrong......

All of us at this field were counting the days till Xtreme Link came out. I would have been the first to buy but I fly multiplex, that module was not available so Joe Kelley got one and used it in his 9c. He got to be the ginipig !
Joe flew the system successfully in a 2.6m extra and had many successful flights. He was so impressed he put it in his jet. It worked great in the jet for a while until one day it didn't. I was there at the field many times with him watching the system in action. I was not with him when the system failed.

Joe is very meticulous in his installations, he dots all his i's and crosses all his t's. I am 100% convinced the failure had nothing to do with anything other than the fact that Xtreme Link failed.

We all would like to know why this system doesn't work well at this field.....I still want one !!![]

CiprianGugu

My Feedback: (17)

Well, then ban all of them since I read a few reports of other 2.4 and 72 equipped planes falling out of the sky for no apparent reason at the same field.

Anyway, has anyone of you (organizers) contacted XPS to try to find the problem if there actually is a problem? I don't think you did, instead you come on here and .........

I guess it is your thing and you can ban and not ban whatever you like.

Kmot

My Feedback: (24)

Got proof? Got links? Where are these reports?

CiprianGugu

My Feedback: (17)

Look for them on the forums. I don't have the time or the desire to find them for you.

Kmot

My Feedback: (24)

That's what I thought.

Kmot

My Feedback: (24)

Have a look at these videos from someone having issues with their XPS system:

http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?t=722690

pllove

Yep and it has been proven that this is related to problems with the pots on the gymbols on the Futaba 9Z radio with the ppm signal. People have sent in their radio to Futaba and it comes back fixed. They have only seen this problem with the 9Z.

Again not a problem with the XPS radio. When he put back his original module/receiver it was pcm. The problem does not happen with pcm just when in ppm mode. This is not a problem with XPS. This has been proven with other users with the 9Z.

Again facts and troublesooting needs to be done. Not just blame the last thing changed or the XPS module.

alanrw

If that is indeed the case then it would seem prudent for XPS to have a big huge dayglo pink warning slip advising Futaba users of this incompatibility and the need to get the radio modified, no? The only thing worse than having the critical information is NOT disemminating it.

alan

Billy

My Feedback: (15)

Hey Pllove ,CiprianGugu . Why don't you get the facts before you come on here and start runn'n your mouths. Our president, Jason Pakfar has already made contact with Jim Drew. Jim was told that ,if he wanted he was more than welcome to come over and do some testing at the Sepulveda Basin and find out what the reason is. Second of all, I don't know of any problems that involved S.S. ot 72. I fly out there twice a week on both systems myself. The basin is a public field owned by the City of Los Angeles. It can get pretty busy there on a weekend. I don't know of any group of flyers who would be more open minded to a system that prevents getting shot down than the basin guys. We have had 5 guys use the XPS system at the basin and 5 have failed at on point or another. So don't come on here defending a system that you don't have experience with locally and by the way we already contacted AMA, and there response was very grateful that our club has put SAFTEY first. SO you say BANN all the systems, ARE YOU A MORON OR SOMETHING. They work at the basin, XPS doesn't. If you don't fly here it really doesn't concern you so stop trying to stir the pot.

Billy Edwards
Valley Flyers Turbine Director

pllove

If you search the forums you will find the infomation on the 9Z. I do agree it needs to be in the manual and/or on the FAQ page of the website and have made the suggestion.


Would also seem prudent for Futaba to disemminate the information as well right???