ganged servos and 14 mz
 

I like the 14 mz, and have one on order; however, I find the servo ganging function tedious for giant scale airplanes, for example: my plane has 3 servos per aileron, total 6 servos to plug in. Using a match box, I only need to plug in two connectors to extensions on receiver; one is tagged so the order is maintained. It seems that if I used the radio as intended for multiple ganged servos, I would have to plug in 6 separate servo lines each time I put the aircraft together, each one would have to have a matching number, and a left or right designation. It seems a smart guy (maybe Futaba) might market a servo ganging plug, where you have multiple pigtail connectors that go into the radio and merges into a single multiple conductor plug, which then mated to another plug that you could connect your multiple servos into. Simple one plug connect/disconnect for ganged servos. You might say, just another failure point, maybe so, but what are the chances that you get the order of servo wires out of wack? Maybe this item is out there.

RE: ganged servos and 14 mz
 

Great idea! Now design it, build it, and bring it to market! perhaps a cottage industry?

RE: ganged servos and 14 mz
 

There is something like you are describing only better available. A local fellow builds custom wiring harnesses for our planes, and he includes Plug 'N Play connectors. When you plug the wings onto the fuselage, the aileron servos are automatically connected for you. It's really nice, and you never take off without having the ailerons plugged in. You can contact him at [email protected] and he can give you a quote on a system. He uses only top quality components, and I don't know how I ever had multiple aileron servos without his system.

HTH
Jim

RE: ganged servos and 14 mz
 

Icebird,

How about some pictures of this setup.

Martin,

The only relevant issue I see with say a 3 legged Y type harness is that you would now be sharing 3 servo's off that one receiver lead. Probably not the best thing to do with a Giant Scale plane that draws a lot of current. I have never had to use a !QUOT!Match box!QUOT! but I am guessing that one of the many functions of that box is to help with current draw of many like ganged servos. Not sure there is much of any other way to get by with only 1 wire per wing half. If Icebird's contacts solution is solid and he has the ability for 3 separate servo leads that would definitely be the ticket but that system would have to be extremely solid before I would even consider using it. For now I would be labeling my wires carefully and paying close attention when plugging them in.

RE: ganged servos and 14 mz
 

One of the guys in our club built a custom harness using DB-25 connectors (the same type that's used on a PC parallel printer port). He has a plane with four servos in the wing which (if kept grouped in sets of three) uses 12 connections of the available 25.
Six servos would use 18 pins. However, if you bussed the power and ground connections you could use a smaller connector (8 pins for six servos).

Mark

RE: ganged servos and 14 mz
 

This is a common issue in the glider world. The above mentioned harness is one solution. It is NOT multiple "Y"s. It is a plug with 6 or 9 wires on it. It is essentially three plugs fused together. For me, I see this as a non-issue. It takes mere seconds to plug in the servos so that is what I do. If it gets too cumbersome then I will install a plug harness. Simple.

RE: ganged servos and 14 mz
 

Tekati, you have a point about 3 into one with the match box, but I haven’t had any perceivable problems. The fact that I use 18 gauge wire may help. I think the match box allows you to use a separate power source. On the matter of having multiple servos on one line, unless you have an extra battery plugged into an extra channel in the 14mz, all the current is going from the battery through one line to the transmitter. I’m a little weak in my electrical engineering, so I’m not sure what the total current is in flight, on a 10+ servo, 40 % plane. My plane has 14 JR 8611 servos, so multiple batteries or a power management system is a good choice, having only 3 servos on a single 18 gauge wire is probably not an issue. You could probably start a new thread call "How do you have your 40+% plane set up on the 14 mz?"


Another question I have rolling around in my head is, dose the 14mz have better resolution in the servo matching function, than a match box? I know when using the G3 receiver you get better control resolution on the servos. When trying to minimize current draw with a four bank of high torque servos, this could be a great selling point.

I put too much time in this hobby, so says the wife, so I’m always looking for buy versus make, but I may look into making my own harness, some of the automobile locking harnesses show promise, the only thing that is a worry is corrosion, most auto connectors are not gold plated like the RC connectors.

Thanks, I appreciate the input on this thread

RE: ganged servos and 14 mz
 

I don't have any of them out of the plane, but here's on with the one socket mounted in the wing of my Cap 232




I hope this works, and also that it helps.

Jim

One other thing I forgot to mention is that these are mounted in such a way that one can move a little bit, so if the wing shifts slightly, the connection will remain solid.

RE: ganged servos and 14 mz
 

Icebird, can you show a pic of the male side of the connection ? Thx

RE: ganged servos and 14 mz
 

I'll give it a shot, it looks pretty similar to this one.

Jim