Dear ModelTronics:
The PIPE Here yet again, and it's the "setting-aside" of the 50.800 to 51.000 MHz band by the "Ham community at large" that DOES make it possible for Ham RCers like US to be able to use those "numbered-00-to-09" channels in the FIRST place!
As far as I can determine, it SHOULD be OK for us to use ANY frequency that we Hams are licensed to use, to fly our RC planes with...but where the (non-Ham) German RC modelers
HAVE had those 433 and 434 MHz frequencies set aside for THEM, it IS safe for THEM to use it. We US and Canadian Hams just don't have THOSE thirty-four frequencies the Germans have "set-aside" for RC usage ONLY as yet, that's all!
The ONLY main restrictions on Ham use of the RC frequencies are MOSTLY summed up in
Part 97.215 of the Amateur Radio Service rules, viewable at
http://www.arrl.org/FandES/field/reg...s/news/part97/ (scroll down AT that page to view Part 97.215)...and of course, NOT to forget, there's ALWAYS the
"Ain't I a Stinker" rule the FCC has had on the books since about 1980, about BUDDY BOX usage on the Ham bands,
that does NOT allow the "Primary Control Operator" rule of ham radio to be used for ONE way communications to allow a NON-Ham to use a buddy box with a licensed Ham...
...that's one of the MAIN reasons I've got a number of the 72 MHz FMA made FM RF transmitter frequency modules...the "RFD1FM" unit, now available from Jensen Jet Models at
http://www.jensenjetmodels.com/ (FMA discontinued them early in November 2003), in ANY "knobby" single stick radio I'll have in usage, so I can switch my MicroStar "knobby" radios over to 72 MHz to allow a non-Ham to TRY "knobby box" flying, via a buddy box, if they would like to!
So, IF you use the 433/434 German made RC radios here in the USA "for now", THOSE frequencies MIGHT be best used for GROUND operated models ONLY...as I'm planning to do with my two old Ace RC 53 Mhz AM RF boards and four Silver Seven AM receivers, possibly for use in LAND YACHTS [ice boats with wheels instead of skating blades] when it's too WINDY to fly RC planes! If someday, though, the 50.8-51.0 MHz frequencies get "gobbled up" by six meter Ham repeaters as the 53 MHz segment of the six meter band has been, perhaps the AMA MIGHT help Ham RCers GET the "set-aside" usage of those thirty-four German UHF RC frequencies on 433 and 434 MHz...and where Multiplex (a GERMAN RC firm up until JUST recently) MAY have been making gear for usage on those bands, perhaps a nicely worded letter to Mike Mayberry at Hitec (the firm that DID buy out Multiplex) COULD get you some Multiplex 433/434 MHz UHF RC gear to try out over here! But IF you get your hands on some, JUST try it for GROUND models for now, until that "set-aside" can happen!
Hope this helped, even if only a little bit!
Yours Sincerely,
The PIPE!
