Hello Everyone,

Our company develops low cost consumer products and we are considering developing a combat system for use in all RC planes. The idea was suggested to us on an Rcgroups.com aerial photography forum, but we thought it was more suited to this forum. The system we envision allows several individual planes or teams to compete against each other using an ultrasonic hit detection system that will work in all outside conditions. The system would record the total number of hits to each plane and possibly even a total for each of their opponents. We wanted to get your opinion as to which features are most important and any other ideas you might have to make the product better. We have several product feature questions along with general product questions. We greatly appreciate any time you can spend helping us make the best RC combat system.


Product Description:

The product will be small module that could be mounted on the inside or outside of any RC plane.

Should the combat system be mounted inside the plane or outside?
What is the best method to mount it to the plane?

The system would allow for 8 different teams or individual combatants. The system would prevent you from scoring hits on yourself or on another member of your team. The system will display the total number of hits for the plane on a small two digit LED display. The display could also cycle through the other 7 teams, giving a hit total for each team.

Is 8 a good number of team channels?
Is a maximum of 99 hits sufficient for a single combat round?
Is it important to know how many hits came from each opponent or is good enough to simply track the total number of hits?

When a plane gets hit, it would indicate it by its motor speed being reduced or some other method so that pilots and spectators on the ground can follow all the action.

What is the best indication(s) for a hit to a plane?
- A loud tone? (Could it be heard from the ground?)
- The throttle being reduced for a few seconds and then restored?
- The throttle slowly being reduced more with each hit the plane takes?
- A combination of the above or another idea?

The combat system should be easy to fire to allow the pilot to concentrate on flying.

What is the best way to fire the combat system?
- Using the throttle control? (Setting the throttle to full fires the gun and then the throttle must be reduced for a few seconds before it can be fired again.)
- Using a separate channel (Do most people have free channels on their radios)?
- Continuously fire (for instance, once a second)?

What should be the maximum range for the system? A range of 50 ft has been suggested by other users. Is this long enough or too far?


Considering the description above and the features you would want, we have some general product questions:

1. Is this product something you would be interested in purchasing?

2. If you saw this product in your local hobby store, how much would you expect for it to cost?

3. How much would you be willing to pay for this product?

4. What features are most important? How would you rank them?

5. On a scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being the highest, how would rate your overall opinion of the product?


Thank you for your time and interest. Feel free to post your replies or if you would like to correspond to me directly you can email me at: [email protected]

Sincerely,

Phil Mass
Element Products, Inc.
Broomfield, CO