AnnMarie,

Is the current stock of the 9C have all the known bugs fixed? I want to get a 9CAF and one of my plane would be a full house (2 ail, 2 Flap, V-tail plus motor on/off) electric glider. I wonder if I have to buy one and send it in for brain transplant??

Thanks for your help.


Brian Chan, An Electric Airplane Junky.

Brian,
Yes, it would need a new processor prior to shipment to you or you would need to send it back to be changed. To purchase it with the processor already changed, simply ask your dealer to special order it with the processor upgraded. It will take about a week in our hands to get it changed over, back to GP sales, and shipped to your dealer.

AnnMarie,

Thanks, I guess I have to send it back to GP when I get it. How do I know I needed the change or all units do not have the latest processor?

I hope the service is free, right?

Brian Chan

Brian,
All units sold in the US have not had this upgrade unless its been done at specific request. If you've not got it yet, just have it changed prior to shipment.

Yes, absolutely the upgrade is free. And all 9Cs in for any type of servie in the future will receive this upgrade for free, even though a huge percentage of 9C users will never utilize the combination of features which causes this problem to appear.

If you want to be sure your radio needs an update, go into a glid2 model, set up butterfly AND elevator compensation in butterfly AND v-tail. now go to the servo screen, and give butterfly inputs. You will see half the volume of travel on the rudder servo than the elevator servo. You can fix this with a simple mix, or you can have the processor upgraded at no charge.

AnnMarie

Thanks.


Brian

Hi AnnMarie,
My 9C and R148DF are in checking on a different problem as we speak (to HobbyServices). Should I email them to request the processor change, or will they automatically do it?

Rob

Dear Ann Marrie ,

This is with reference to ur thread .

I have purchased my radio from Singapore Hobbies earlier in the Month .

Will this problem occur in my radio .

How do i check for this problem .

Appreciate ur reply , ASAP.

Regards.

Arjun Chopra

Co-Z,
Please send an email to double check that they do.


Arjun -- select a GLID2 glider.
turn on vtal
turn on butterfly
set a percent in elevator for butterfly

Activate butterfly with the switch. if one elevator servo moves only half as far as the other, yours has the problem.

Brian,
All radios received in the US after 6/30/02 have the updated processor. So we currently have mixed stock, as some frequencies have sold out and some have not. an easy way to know for sure -- the new batches also have a longer dial on them for VRs A, B, and C.

AnnMarie,

Thanks for all your help, Customer Service can't get better than this!! I have ordered a 9CAF from Tower and I requested to have the processor updated. I shall see today when it shows up( two days Fedex shipping). I am glad that Futaba actually takes in user comments and improve their products. As I was one of the users that complain to you about the short knobs on the 9C, can I get some new knobs from you if my new 9C is not the post 6/30 stock?

Brian Chan, An Electric Airplane Junkie.

Brian

Brian,
Yes, when we have them available here. Let me know.

AnnMarie,

I received the 9CAF this afternoon, I guess I got one of the newer unit, have taller knobs, I think. I have to compared it to my friend's this Sunday.

Anyway, I played with it for a while and noticed the annoying programming method of the 9C. Too many buttons to push. I thought the spin wheel can do all the cursor driving, just spin and click, without lifting the thumb off the wheel. Like the one on the Multiplex and Graupner.
Oh well, I needed the side slider to fly my Electric Super Dimona power glider with spoiler( with VR(D) to control the spoilers. Is there a way to turn off the center beep on the VR(D) and VR(E)? Kinda annoying, I think a detent of the center of the slider will be good enough (to me), my 3 cents!

Hi Brian! I think you'll really like the 9C once you get used to it. There is a mix of buttons to dials to make clear what type of function you're doing.

For most people the detent is not enough and an audible tone was requested adamantly. sorry, no, you can't turn it off.

AnnMarie,

Hey you should be out flying instead of replying messages on weekends! My excuse, it is raining here at the moment.

last point, I wish the 9C came with a box like the 8U. And it is too wide to fit in 8U box 8-(

Thanks again.

Hi Ann Marie, when you say "upgrade", does it mean that the processor is re-programmed or the processor is physically exchanged with a new processor ? If it is a physical exchange, I think you will need to change the whole circuit board that carries the processor chip. This is because most chips are surface mounted i.e. soldered directly to one side of the circuit board. It will not be easy to manually de-solder and re-solder the fine-pitch processor chip to the circuit board. I hope that you can throw some light on this. Thanks for your great support............

Rajul,
The chip is being replaced. I'm not doing the physical labor on them, but i believe we are remounting the chips not replacing the entire board. Again, sorry, but I don't know.

Hi Amcross, with my current 9C, when I use glid2 and compensate for elevator in butterfly and vtail, the elevator servo travels twice as much as the rudder servo. I tried using a mix between channels 2 and 4 to eliminate this imbalance but it didn't work. Did I set the mix wrongly ? Appreciate if you could go into some details as how to program this mix correctly..........

pmix
master ch 2 (elevator)
slave ch 4 (rudder)
trim OFF
link OFF
switch same as airbrake/crow
percent 100%

Hi Amcross, I followed your recommendations and there was no improvement, in fact no change at all to the elevator and rudder servo travel. I also tried various % of mix in pmix but no difference. I found that pmix only effects the servo travel rate when you move the sticks. I have inserted five pics of my tx settings. I think you will find the same results if you were to simulate it on your 9C. Bottomline seems like a processor change is the only solution. Meanwhile, my Omega glider stays in the box until I get my 9C serviced............





pic 1........servo travel when crow switch on. ch 2 travel is more than ch 4 (2x)

pic 2. crow set up page

pic 3. vtail set up page

Raj,
I dont have a unit with a bad processor so i can only work through it mentally.

instead do a mix
MAST = OFST
SLV = ch 4
percent start with 50%, see if you need to increase it
switch = same as butterfly switch

pic 4. program mix page

finally pic 5. no difference in servo travel after implementing program mix

Hi AMCross, using program mix offset can only give you a false impression that the elevator compensation is working. If you were to add a delay in elevator in the butterfly menu, you'll see what I mean. Ch2 servo will move gradually to the endpoint but Ch4 goes haywire !!! Ch4 oscillates to the end point !!! That will spell death to my glider !!

My conclusion : If you are flying glid2 with crow and elevator compensation on a v-tailer, go get the processor changed. Any pmix doesn't fix the problem 100%..................