I was doing a range check the other morning on my Cap and got to about 30 meters away from the plane with the aerial down and start to lose it connection..... I'm a little concurned with the distance

When you do a range check what sort of distance should you get with the aerial down??

30 meters is more than far enough (about 90 feet), I usually only go about 10 meters away, with the antena totally collapsed, when I had range problems, they showed at this distance, the range can also be affected by wire fences, poles, etc.
You should be more than OK.

I can get 100 feet away with the antenna collapsed on all of my planes with no loss of control at all.

Stick Jammer,
I get close to 175 feet.
But I took me gear to my friends home and he took them to work.
I had the Receivers retuned and the transmitters peaked up.
One was only putting out 180 mils.
Now All put out the full 3/4 watt into a 52 ohm resistor.
I have no idea how high I went but I ran the Super Star 40 until it ran out of fuel.
All I could see was a speck.
The engine was an OS 40 with a 10X4 prop.
I sure would like a shot at the alitude record but I need tons of info.
Prop,engine,fuel,wing design,etc but i'm gonna do it

a true range check to check new radio and plane installion should be severall hundred yards with antennae extended fully.usually one person holds the plane other person starts walking till plane barely visible and moves controls in pre arrange sequence.any jittery servos or loss of signal ,do not fly till problem fixed or radio checked out.this method though time consuming also test the antennae which could have a bad connection between the joints from dirt/grit.after this initial test is passed you can do the quick check with antennae down see what the range is and then before every flying session you can check range and if any difference is noted do not fly till problem of reduced range is found.

30 meters is about 98 feet

Futaba manual says 500 yards on the ground and 1,000 yards when flying.
It also says that the RX has a range of no more then 1,000 yards.
The way it's writtin it seems that the RX is detuned to be less sensitive.
This is why I decided to have all my gear going over with lab grade equipment.They told me that one of the adjustmens was vey touchy and power can change just by bumping the TX so they replaced that trim pot.
I have the specs now and as a ham I think i' allowed to work on 72 MHZ gear

That would be with the antenna fully extended.

Here's the procedure for range checking according to Futaba: http://www.futabarc.com/faq/faq-q331.html

No WB You are not allowed and you have been told that by many people (here) but you simply refuse to believe it. :stupid:


Before you use your "re-tuned" gear maybe you might want to explian to the other members at your flying field what you did and see if the still feel comfortable operating their planes when you are using yours.

As a Ham you can work on Ham frequencies. If you want to mess with your radio you have to use 50Mhz.

That's what it's there for... Use it.

Sorry,
I forgot that.Yes thats with the antenna all the way out.
Thanks for that URL.

OK,
But what about 72 MHZ radios?
If I can't thats no problem.
My friend works in a facality where a lot of work is done for NASA.
These Guys can look at a board and not need any paper to go by.
Must be nice to have all those smarts and access to tons of mega buck test gear.
Sending you a PM