Hi Jay! Gene from Tyler, Texas here! You fixed up my Ace Pulse system. Works great! So here is a story for you.
My dad was stationed in Izmir, Turkey in 1972-1974, the country was under Martial Law at the time. There were armed soldiers on most street corners and all privately owned transmitters including radio control transmitters, were illegal.
I was about 17 at the time and had been flying control line for years when we moved to Turkey. I was determined to fly RC no matter what! Importing a radio from the states was impossible as it would probably be confiscated. Radios were REAL expensive at that time, I couldn't risk a year or two of meager wages delivering newspapers, plus it probably wouldn't have done my Dad's career any good to have a package seized at the customs office! There must be another way!
About that time, one of the magazines ran a series on a homebrew 2 channel radio that was also available as a kit, The Ace Digital Commander. I ordered the kit and waited about 4 weeks, and received a box with a mess of components and building instructions which duplicated the magazine instructions.
I grabbed my Dad's soldering iron and set about building my new radio. Some weeks later I finished soldering and fired her up for the first time. The bad news, nothing worked. The good news, no smoke!
Fortunately, I had met a fellow modeler, a Turkish man who owned a stereo shop. In those days Turkey had an import duty of over 100%, so anyone that wanted an IMPORTED stereo had to pay more that twice the retail price. My Turkish shop owner built stereos from scratch WITHOUT circuit boards. Just one component soldered to another and another and another. The stereo cases were handmade from wood and sometimes sheet aluminum and often covered with vinyl. All dials, switch labeling etc were hand made from scratch.
My Turkish friend worked on my radio for a week or so and was able to get it working and tuned but unfortunately I had ruined one of the servos. I was restricted to single channel flying which I attempted with a Sterling Minnie Mambo.
If anyone is still following along with my saga let me know and I will relate the outlaw flight of the Mambo in Izmir, Turkey!
Last edited by 049flyer; 10-23-2015 at 09:08 PM.