Will someone explain why with some helis if you plug in the battery before the tx the thing goes mental.
I read on the instructions for a Jabo (It's a Dragonfly under an assumed name!) that this was so that if you lost the signal from the tx when airbourne the heli would carry on flying instead of crashing?????
I dunno 'bout you but the thought of my beloved heli leaving home and running away doesn't make much sense to me.
Let it crash. I can rebuild it. I have the technology!

I have wondered the same thing. Why they didn't make it more "failsafe".

I think it has to do with efficient control. Defaulting the setting to full throttle when the signal is lost ensures more smooth operation than the other way around. Just imagine how signal glitches would affect your flight.

Personally I would much prefer the heli to crash than carve a perfect circle on my living room ceiling!!!!

dont worry, if you loose signal from radio, it will crash.
just try to fly your heli hands off you will see how far it will go.

This is how it's been with all radio control equipment since the beginning. It's nothing new and it's the logical way to switch things on. Why would you want to switch the heli on when it has nothing controlling it but radio noise?

Maybe I should've rephrased the question.
If I for some reason lost the signal from the tx, what possible reason is there for letting a possessed renegade heli fly where it wants to??

The issue you are asking us to address has nothing to do with the order the Aircraft and the TX are turned on other than with no signal from the TX first, the heli runs the risk of "going mental" from outside radio signal interferance. If you loose the signal at anytime, the heli is more than likely going to crash rather than fly off into the sunset. How would you keep the heli from flying away if the TX signal is lost anyway? You no longer have control. Your question is confusing.

The issue with turning the TX on first is that you are transmitting a signal which is hopefully neutral on the fly bar and zero throttle.

If you were to plug the battery in first, you run the risk of having an outside signal causing the heli blades to spin and effectively whacking your hand and doing some damage (as you call it, "goes mental" ). You should always turn on the TX to broadcast a good safe signal and then plug in the bird.

I think you are asking 2 different questions.

1. Reason for the order of operations.

2. Why is there no failsafe in the event of TX signal loss.

Answer to 1 is above.

Answer to 2 is that with PCM equiptment and failsafes set, a loss of TX signal could be compinsated for, but more than likely, the failsafe settings on a heli would result in a crash anyway. That, and PCM in micro form is hard to come by.

Hope this helps.


Jason

Copy from manual:
" Make sure your transmitter is turned on 1st to prevent random (other) radio signals from being processed by the receiver, which could result in damage to the servos. "

This happened to me once because I've forgot to switch on Tx 1st. Lucky there wasnt any damage.

Regards.

I'll rephrase the question.
While flying (indoors or out) some catastrophy strikes the transmitter and the heli loses the signal. What on earth is the point in continuing to supply power to the heli through some software in the electronics??
Surely it is far better to crash rather than fly under these conditions?
Is this only a problem with Jabo electronics?

OK, where are you getting the idea that the heli will continue to fly rather than crash. Where does it say in the manual that in the event the TX signal stops the heli will continue to fly. All helis will continue to have power if the TX signal is dropped. The receiver is not a switch. When a signal is lost the receiver does not know this. It continues to listen to whatever is out there for instructions. With a TX signal loss, there are no instructions being sent. More than likely, it will remain in the last instruction before the loss until a different instruction is sent by another TX or interfering signal. I have a hard time believing that without instructions, that any heli will fly on it's own.

I understand what you are asking now. And no, all electric helis do this as far as I know.

Jason

i just made the test. with my setup while in fligt condition (throtle applied) when i turn off tx, all the motors stop. they can be intermitently full speed, but normally, they are off. if you were flying a glow powered airplane and tx signal is lost you will face a serious problem cause airplanes correctly trimmed fly by themself and throttle controlled by a servo will stay open but no problem with electric heli

Hi all

If let say your TX dies while flying or lost TX signal, your chopper will go into steep dive right side and crash. When u power up your chopper without TX, u will notice the servo will move randomly also and most of the time goes extreme up.

Super-Hornet

Because I may have forgotten to switch on the TX first. I just want to feel safe in case I became careless. I don't want my car run full gear if I forget to engage the gear box.

With so much said and discussed, the original question remained unanswered. Why they didn't make the system shut down in the event of signal loss?

There is no doubt the heli will crash if your tx blow up, but the crash will be far more benign and result in far less damage both to the heli and the surroundings if power is cut off than the motors still run full speed and servos push their hardest.

Power off whenever there is a signal glitch is unnecessary. But I would like a system that cuts power after say 5 sec of signal loss or insignificant signal.

The reason I can think of that such a system not being implemented is the cost involved is too high to justify the failsafe mode that is normally maintained by the good RC habit.

Hi

I think if you going to design a receiver with auto turn off when there is no signal, u will need microcontroller or microprocessor build into it. With all this bells and whistle, your RX is going to be big.

Super-Hornet