gas or glow and older radio
 

Hi all,
I have not flown in a few years. Looking to get back into it. Gas vs glow- at what engine size does the weight trade off make sense to go gas? Hope that made sense. Is gas a good choice for .40 size aircraft like the 4*40 or is the engine too heavy? I am thinking a 4*60 or similar would be a viable choice for gas??? Saito 82, and 65. OS55ax and 25fx have all been good to me. No local source of glow anymore. I do have a few cases stashed away.

Radio- I have the FM Futaba 7c. I have had good luck with that, any reason to update other than interference on my channel??


Thanks, MikeB

I am mostly electric so can't advise on gas vs. glow but a lot of .40 class planes are being converted to electric. I did a survey a while ago and it seemed anything under 10 pounds was going electric. Over 10 pounds was going gas. Glow, while still in use, is very much on the decline.

As for radio, I presume that 7C is on 72 MHz. It is still legal. Very few people are flying on 72 MHz so you should not have to fight anyone for the frequency BUT, now that 2.4 rules the RC airwaves, frequency control as almost completely gone away so make sure that people know you are on 72 MHz because the next guy on 72 is likely to assume no one else is on 72 and might be on your frequency. Watch for those long antenna and get to know who is still using 72. Likely people are not checking the frequency board.

My opinion is that gasoline is a good choice for 1.20 cubic inch and larger. Glow and electric are better choices for 1.20 and below. The small gas engines are heavy, costly and some say not well behaved. The FM radio is fine. Nothing wrong with using FM, just coordinate with other FM users at your field to avoid frequency conflicts.

Glow fuel is becoming more and more of a problem. If you can find a local source of inexpensive methanol such as a drag strip or fuel dealer you may want to consider mixing your own. You can purchase oil and nitromethane online. A gallon of nitromethane is costly, but it goes a long way if you make 5% or 10% fuel. The engines you mention should be fine on 5%.

I agree with JP above, I will use glow up to a 1.20 four stroke or .90 two stroke. Above that I would use gas. The power to weight ratio is just not good for little gas engines. I do have a 1.80 Saito four stroke on a big mustang, but it came with the plane. The power is great, but it REALLY drinks the glow fuel! I would like to put a 30 cc gasser on it, but who knows when I'll get around to that!

+1

Thanks everyone!

OLD timer here. Been away from R/C for an eternity. I am having to re-learn the entire culture, technologies, supply, and demand. I personally would-not and will-not fly with an old radio system. I got some good info from this thread. I am noticing some of the young culture views anything 10yrs old or older as gone, passed, old stuff, waste of time. Many are totally focused on flying and want a foamy that can be crashed, quickly glued, and put back into the air. I have not tried electric yet. When I look at engines I look at the four cycle glow .70 and .90 displacements. Gas engines I look at the 20cc engines. That is my sweet spot at the moment. Planes are almost non-existent. Not sure about the Transmitters but I am getting a lot of promotion of the Spectrum (claims of more compatibility, owned by Horizon Hobbies), Futaba (old reliable, very large diverse corporation, slow with innovations), Frsky (honorable mention). You can purchase glow fuel online now days. Talk to your bank about how to safely make online purchases. I have full size boats I will not use old fuel in them. Might want to do an evaluation on your stored fuel before it wastes your time

And, while Lee makes some valid points, there is nothing wrong with using your 7C. Before you use it, send it and your receivers in for a once over and new batteries. The odds are if it worked fine before, it still will. I personally have a 9C that I'll use for pretty much anything that I'll ever fly. Granted, it's 10 years or so old but it still works fine so there's no reason to change to the latest and greatest just because everyone else is.
As far as your fuel, if it has had the seal broken, either use it with extreme caution or don't use it at all. Tried to run an R/C boat with old fuel a while back. While it ran, it wasn't running like it should, can only assume due to the can being previously opened. Opened up another can, just as old, that had never been opened previously and the boat ran like a scared rabbit. Just to be clear, this was boat fuel with 50% nitro and not the 5-10% used in most planes.