RE: 2.4 poll - Requesting pilot experiences
Hmm...
Here's what I observe on the car side of things. I know planes are different, but bear with me here.
2.4ghz radios are fast on track to standard issue in cars. Everything from 1/36 scale indoor cars to 1/5 scale gasoline buggies use it, many of which straight from the factory, and nobody ever reports any sort of shenanigans with their radio gear. Now I can hear a lot of you going "Well your cars draw way less power than our planes do". This is true. Even the biggest MT with the meatiest rubber on it isn't going to draw as much power as an enormous 3D bird running a 50cc gas engine. But our power sources are a whole lot smaller too. Many of us who still run nitro run four AA alkalines(I prefer duracells, myself). Those of us that don't usually get along happily with a ~1700mah NiMH hump pack. We don't have Lipo, Life or A123 RX batts and we sure as hell don't have redudant batteries. Even if we wanted to we just don't have the room for them in our radio boxes.
Electric guys don't run a receiver battery at all, they just tap off the main pack that's also supplying the motor. Receiver power on these vehicles comes through the speed controller via signal lead, and the switch is usually on the speed controller itself. We're also running a whole lot closer to possible interference. Power lines, cell phones, wireless routers, these things are far closer to our receivers than your planes are likely to get. They're also down in the mud and snow, getting smacked around with hits so hard you wonder how the truck itself doesn't snap clean in half, and are exposed to engine vibrations plane receivers are spared from(Main reason for this is we don't have room in our RX boxes for foam padding).
Yet we don't have problems. We should. We beat on our receivers far harder than you guys ever will and feed them way less power. But nobody ever complains of their 2.4 causing their monster truck to get closely acquainted with the nearest tree.
I, personally, don't run 2.4(I'm still on 27am fer cryin' out loud!), but I will be on 2.4 sooner or later.
I'm actually rather curious why quite a few plane guys are constantly bashing and ragging on 2.4 while us car guys never have a problem.
Oh, and when I get my first plane, I'm going straight to 2.4. As I said nobody in the car world has problems with 2.4, and it seems the majority of plane guys don't, and I can land a nice Futaba 4ch 2.4 for 99.99, so why not?