Steve,
Thanks for the info the rest of the world as far as shift direction goes. Very strange stuff there. I do wonder why Futaba did what they did for the US market. (If I had to guess, I'd say that Hitec followed Futaba's lead there. Could be wrong though.) Of course, it's also possible that Futaba chose to use that shift to be compatible with the domestic companies like Ace and Kraft that used to be dominant in the states. I have no idea if either Ace or Kraft ever produced an FM set though. Before my time.

You are absolutely right about the whole label thing for PPM vs PCM, FM vs AM kind of thing. It's just common useage, probibly due to the order the various tech has evolved. First there was AM/PPM, and no one bothered saying anything, it was just a radio .

Then there was FM/PPM, but it was only differnt in that it was FM, so all the ads had "IT's FM!!!" in big letters, and the transmitters all had "FM" stamped on the front pannel. So, now we had AM and FM transmitters.

Then along comes PCM. And all the ads say "PCM! It's better!". You get the idea.

So, now we have 3 types of transmitters, all of which are referred to by somewhat incorrect short hand terms . But we know what we mean, and the stuff works (most of the time)