My club, Hamilton Hawks, is considering some informal combat next spring. I have a couple of old air frames left over from the good ol' days of the Havoc Over Hamilton, which some of you may remember. These two planes are set up for SSC. One is a Panther and the other is called a Bandit. Both have been sitting around for several years and are in need of batteries. I know I can replace the existing batteries with similar Nmh, but my question is, can I use small 2S 370 mah lipo? I have several of these used in small electric planes. They are 7.2V.

Greg

Probably too much - they come off the charger at 8.4v, so may be too "hot" for the older electronics. If you don't care, they probably won't let the smoke out of anything right away, but you may see a shorter life out of the receiver or servos (and therefore likely the plane). I'd either put a voltage regulator in line, or switch up to LiFe batteries.

Plenty of NiCds still around. Or AAA NiMHs. Or 5V UBECs are cheap and very light weight.

I wouldn't use a Lipo on a combat model, IMO too much of a fire risk. As far as voltage goes, some older servos have issues with anything over 6 volts. I almost lost a helicopter a couple months ago running 6.6V LiFe on older Futaba digital servos. I also had to throw a regulator into a sailplane to use 6.6V on some older JR wing servos. Your best bet is 5 cell MiHM.

Greg,
I assume you are running glow & looking for a receiver battery. Most RCCA pilots have gone to flying 700 mAh LiFe 2 cell packs (Zippy packs) from Hobby King. They are currently showing as back order, but I would expect them to be back eventually. You can run them all day for combat without needing to charge between rounds (I've flown 10 rounds of combat on a pack a day). Make sure your charger does LiFe packs!
Watch your 6,
Andy
-TEAM KAMAKAZE-
RCCA #876
AMA #273119

I use since lipo exist packs of lipo 3s around 450/600mAh and good regulators without any problems, fast to check when refuel what is the remaining capacity, at least 2h flight time.

And never get any fire, a 3s500 weight nothing, well packed in the foam I have never seen damage.