Mode One

I have seen or heard very little in the way of problems with spread spectrum equipment. I've been to fun flys where it has beeen in use and talked to the flyers using it and they seem very happy. Running the impound at our Fun Fly this past August, we let people hold onto there spread spectrum equipment, but did make them post, simply so we could monitor the amount of flyers flying and so people shifting back and forth between 72Mhz and spread spectrum would not forget to post their frequency when they went to use their 72Mhz equipment.

The only problems alluded to with spread spectrum was some receivers inability to bind to the TX at initial start up. Whether this was really a problem, I do not know.

Does anyone have any input, good or bad? I really believe this is the future for R/C systems; but, am not quite ready to make the jump, believing the prices will come down more and the technology can only evolve to a better level with time.

Mode One

Never had a post that went to the second page without response before. Must be asking this question in the wrong forum topic, or, no one has an opinion on the subject? Naw, can't be!!!

chopper man

I've heard nothing but good. Mostly about the Futaba. I've been wanting to get one but just can't swing the $$ yet. Maybe when I have the $ the prices will have dropped.
chopper

RCKen

My Feedback: (9)

I've been flying the JR X9303 since last May and have had absolutely zero glitches with it. I've currently got 4 airplanes on it and they all fly flawlessly. There has been one problem with Spectrum receivers rebooting if the voltage drops down below 4.8v. But if the user uses a large milliamp battery pack, or a 6v pack, and monitors their batteries there are no issues. I've flown Airtronics radios for 11 years, but after I received the JR radio to do a review on it I've been moving planes over to it as I can afford receivers. It's really a nice system. I went to a fly-in last weekend and it was GREAT to not have to turn the radio into impound. I could go out and fly whenever I wanted to regardless of the other radios out there. Very very nice.

Ken

nobodytwo

A student gve me a DX7, two additional receivers and 3 1500 6 volt batteries back in July and have since added 4 more receivers. They are installed in planes ranging from 1.50 Hangar Nine P-51 to the new Seawind EP. Nary a problem in any of the planes, and I fly six out of seven days a week. Like Ken said "the pin thing is gone" not to mention not getting shot down. The response of this system is almost like describing driving a Mack truck compared to a sports car! All the good stuff you hear is probably true, the bad, well there's lots of folks that can't or won't follow directions.

Happy Landings!

lanpc

My Feedback: (18)

Well, meet the only person that can say they have been shot down while using 2.4. Under all normal conditions the 2.4 is outstanding. We had a special circumstances at our field where a group from the University of Florida were developing an unmanned aerial vehicle for non-military use. The problem was they had a 2.4 video system that was not legal. They had modified their video transmitter to 3 watts to give them better range. Well, this blanketed the 2.4 spectrum and cut the range of our Aircraft 2.4 systems to 50 feet. This caused my aircraft to go into fail safe and crash. Thank godness it was only a small electric, and no one got hurt.

In talking with Spectrum and Horizon Hobbys, their systems have been tested against normal (1 watt or less) systems and have not experienced any problems. So as long as video sytems of 1 watt or less in operation, it should not interfer with our 2.4 Aircraft transmitters.

I still fly today a Spectrum DX-7 2.4 on all my aircraft, including my pattern ship, and my futue IMAC plane. This has no way turned me off to 2.4, I plan to upgrade soon to the JR 9303.

Since we are a model airplane field, and not a movie studio, our club has banned all 2.4 VIDEO transmitters at the field. Only Aircraft 2.4 transmitters are now allowed to operate at our field.

Patrick Lanfri
President, Gateway R/C Club
Jacksonville, FL

Stryker_Viking

I used to trust the DX-systems to 100%, but unfortunately had one strange experience recently.
Was on a road trip in Nevada, made a stop at this beautiful Pyramid lake located inside a Indian reservation to fly my modded Stryker.
Everything was fine until I, after a slow low altitude passage, first heard the motor stop, then realized that I didn't have any control over the plane at all...???
All communication with the plane was lost...
I had to helplessly see my Stryker slowly turn right and go out over the lake and SPLASH... )(*#% &)_@ %^#$%
It was however a quite nice 400 meters swim out to the innocent looking Stryker floating out there like a silly duck~~~
Everything survived, radio ESC etc... No explanation possible at this state.
I wonder what happen?
Stryker_Viking

plasticjoe

My Feedback: (22)

I dropped over to the field at lunch one day as I usually do, and one of the better pilots in our club ( XFC Participant ) was there with his dad and they were flying a couple new 40 sized combat planes. He was using the module that goes with the JR hi end radio ( can't remember what model it was ) but he was coming torward us at a slight angle about 25 ft off the ground at full throttle and then WHAM full down elevator and the motor was buried in the dirt to the backplate ( supertiger .40 ) parts everywhere...... we pulled the receiver modules, plugged the battery into the receiver bypassing the switch, and no response at all. Helped pick all the pieces up, and went on back to work. not a good lunch that day

Campy

My Feedback: (1)

Awhile ago (right around the time some of the other manufacturers were announcing their 2.4 systems ) there was an article from one of the shows/meets where they were using the 2.4 Spectrum systems (I believe the article was in Fly RC magazine). The article said there were some problems and glitches and implied it was due to the high humidity at the meet. This was the only negative thing I have heard.

I do know that 2.4 cordless phones suffer range loss during rain and high humidity. It seems (to me anyway) that the 2.4 radio systems would be effected the same way.

Perhaps someone with a background in electronics and 2.4 cordless phones could chime in and provide a better explanation of this.

jetmech05

I have heard there have been problems with the 2.4 gig systems...to be fair though 2.4 is the future..and on any given day you're going to find less 2.4 gig systems getting hit than 72 meg. too bad we can't trade our old equipment in for 2.4 gig on a one foe one basis. nice to dream isn't it

Giant

I've been flying my DX 7 now for 8 months and have never had problem untill today. I was training a student when he began to lose contoll of the aircraft, so I took over only to find that I was having a great deal of difficulty also. I did get it back safely and felt that the student must have a battery or instalation problem. Upon examination nothing could be found. Then another club member who was also flying at the same time came over and told of haveing the same kind of control issues he was also useing a spectrum radio. We have in the past had strange events happening with garage doors opening uncomanded. There was a article in the local paper about it being caused by a military transmitter. Don't know if there is any connection. I'm in south Florida less tan 2 miles from the Loran transmitter.

WILDCRASHWILLY

I noticed in the radio forums there seen to be several problems surfacing. you might go there and research for any additional problems. I have personally witnessed two issues with the 2.4 but I think one of those issues was operator induced. One person had no control over his plane which thank goodness nevar left the ground. Upon inspection we found a fuse inside the Tx was blown. The other issue was an edge 540 that went in on it's maiden flight. Not sure what the owner found at this time, his tx just lost contact with the plane.

jaka

Hi!
I have been flying my DX-7 Spektrum in Q-500 racers since beginning of May 2007. No problem what so ever...but those American Spektum 2,4GHz radios arn't allowed over here in Europe anymore due to too high transmitted output power(1Watt). []
PS!
I use mostly small 4,8V , 600-1000mAh NiMH cells in my racers. No problems!

khodges

My Feedback: (1)

I've got the DX-7 system, two planes on it. One I have over a dozen trouble-free flights (I have a 2800 mAh NiCd pack for it); the other crashed due to no elevator response while exiting a loop. After the crash, which left the rear of the plane undamaged, the elevator and other control surfaces worked perfectly. I was using a 1450 mAh NiMH battery pack, and it was fully charged just prior to takeoff. I've wondered if this was a case of the Rx re-booting. I figured that size battery would have plenty available, and it is one of the Sanyo Hydramax Ultra 4.8V packs, which is supposed to be capable of delivering current almost as well as NiCd's. I think, to be safe, I'm going to stick to high capacity NiCd's for my 2.4 Rx's and live with the weight penalty.

lilhachet

My Feedback: (2)

I've been flyin my DX 7 for about 9 months now, and no problems what so ever. In fact due to pilot error, I happened to "land" in the top of a seventy-five foot tree. Well, it stayed there for 5 months untill I figured out how to get it down. I checked everything out and everything still works great! It helped that even with all the rain storms it survived, nice and dry. I did a range check, and now it is flying in my new Kaos.

Giant

Three months ago my Reactor suffered a mid air and ended up in the trees. I just recovered it 3 days ago. I had to rebind it, but it appears to work fine. This was a different radio than the ones we had interference with.

michael bell

I have recently brought a DX7 with 1600e receivers.

I have flown a Piper Cub for a few weeks now (ie 30+ flights and no problem) using the DX7 with another 1600e receiver and no prolems.

On a maiden flight of my easy glider today, we lost complete control of the plane (no response to any cpontrols), and as a last resort turned the radio off and then on ... the glider then responded and we managed to get it back safely. Th only thing we thought was that the battery was getting low - but thet should not stop power to the servos.

Appreciate any advise ... as to what went wrong and how to stop it happening.

carlosponti

My Feedback: (1)

i think its still advised to have an impound for now till 72 goes away to keep people in the habit in case they bring a 72 to the field. And to keep people who haven't been to your field before from bring a 72 and thinking they can not follow the same rules.

sala7

Hi all

I crashed my second Hawk last weekend, but this time with Spectrum !
it was flight number six, i had a AR9000 with 2 satellite one in the nose in horizontal and the other in the back in vertical position and a powerBox sensor for 2.4 with two lipo batteries 3800mAh and my radio in 10X. i thought i had a goos setup!!
after take off just in the second round where i was coming for low pass the engine flamed out and i saw the plane banking to the right with nose down and i didnt have any control for 3-4 seconds where it disappeared in horse barn next to our flying field. i thought it crashed but then it went up in the sky!! where i gain the control back but this time there is no engine so i puched the nose down to have some spead and i leveled the plane and it disappeared again inside that barn, but i kept holding the elevator just little to flare it.
luckely the plane didn't hit anyone there. but it hit the horse track!!
the Hawk has 7 servo's JR digital and 3 electronic valves.

pub

I think you have a barn fly!!!!!!!!! pub