Episode 8: RC Airplane Receivers

Announcer: For anyone interested in RC airplanes, we’ll share tips and tricks on building models and talk about successful flights, epic crashes, and everything in between. Visit RCPlaneLab.com to join our email list and ask questions. You can also text us or leave a voicemail at 818-351-9846. Please rate and review us in your favorite podcast app. Thanks for spending time with us today. Now, here are your hosts, Ron and Tom.

Ron: Welcome to the RC Plane Lab podcast. This is Ron, and I’m Tom. Today we’re talking about receivers. Since our last episode covered transmitters, it makes sense to work our way down the radio system. Transmitters send the commands; receivers sit inside the airplane and listen for them. What should we cover first, Tom?

Tom: Getting the two to communicate wouldn’t you think sure so. Yeah it’s a it’s a process called binding, unless you’re not using Spektrum and you’re still using old school radios with crystals. Then, there’s really not much to it you just make sure the crystals match the same frequencies which I don’t think, too many people use that technology anymore no. But I’m sure there are some.

Ron: People out there that do, and I’m guessing if they do they probably already kind of know what’s going on with the crystals and all that stuff since you really kind of have to buy everything as a set to make it talk to each other. Yep, you know with the newer receivers that you bind together. They you know there’s no set that goes together you can make them talk to any receiver or you can make any receiver talk to any transmitter as long as it’s the same brand, or as long as they’re on the same, technology I guess. Yep, without actually having to change things physically on them like you used to with the old FM days yes. Yep which by the way I did look up there there used to be 60 channels 60 FM band. Yeah so that’s what I I found out and it looks like they. Skipped, 0.2 megahertz every time to go for the different channel yes that was known as narrow band.

Tom: That was, what they changed in I believe it was 90 or 91,. But because before that we were on I don’t think we had 60 channels before that. Because there was a lot of bleed over you know the technology didn’t exist to really really hone in that signal and keep it within that bandwidth. So yeah 91 I think we we all had to put gold labels on our transmitters we had to send them off to the manufacturers. So they could yeah adapt them to, to the new standards and all new radios had to be gold label certified. So that they would operate on the narrow band you know one of those 60 frequencies I think I actually. Have an old my old x347 back here with a gold label on the back with a date even? That’s funny yeah that kind of dates you yeah yeah. But anyway yeah so yeah you got to get them talking to each other and the way to do that is through binding. Okay so walk us through it what do.

Ron: You what do you do to bind your, your receiver to your your transmitter. Okay well I’ll I’ll stick to.

Tom: What I’m familiar with which is Spektrum, many of the other brands are are similar in the process you know check the instructions that come with their unit or or google it,? But, basically on Spektrum you, you fire up the receiver with a bind plug which is a a plug that, that basically shorts the first and third pins, on the receiver and tells the receiver to start looking for a signal from your transmitter, and usually you get an indication of that by a flashing light.

Ron: On the receiver so you power it up yeah so. So so what it does is it pulls the the signal wire to ground. Okay there you go yeah it’s not really shorting it out shorting out it’s kind of a when I hear shorting it I think of something bad. Okay, all you’re doing is pulling that to ground looking for a ground reference that way it knows to go into a different mode when it boots up.

Tom: Okay so once you’ve got the receiver in bind mode. Then on the Spektrum transmitter you hold down the bind button while you’re turning the switch on and. Then the transmitter then goes into bind mode and looks for a receiver that’s looking for a signal, and. Then it pairs with that receiver they communicate back and forth and agree on a protocol and a frequency if you will to communicate on and. Then they agree that they will only accept signals, or transmit signals on that frequency and this. All happens really really fast and you only have to do it once, I say have to do it once something that, you know we could talk about later something that, can be done more than once and should be done more than once under some conditions,. We’ll talk about that later but, yeah that’s, that in a nutshell that’s, once they’re bound together you turn everything off, pull the bind plug out of the receiver and. Then you’re you’re you’re ready to rock and roll so when you’re binding though,.

Ron: I don’t know if they still recommend it or not. But they they say you’re supposed to be several feet away, yes you know the receiver and transmitter should be several feet away. Yeah that way I guess it doesn’t get overloaded with too much signal. Yeah and you’ll get you’ll get an indication of that.

Tom: Because, I know on my on my DX8 if I’m sometimes if I’m too close to the receiver if I’m physically holding the transmitter too close to the receiver it just simply won’t bind,. So then I have to shut everything down start the process over and get a get the transmitter at least a few feet away from the receiver and. Then it usually it binds just fine but if it it it either binds or it doesn’t, there’s no half binding or partial binding or anything like that it either binds or it doesn’t.

Ron: Yep okay say I didn’t know if there was or if it had anything to do with like the amount of signal that was there no,. Because I remember I had one, it was a Spektrum receiver it was a little park flyer. Okay that I lost signal on and I that was before I knew how to bind and I I was really close to binding or really close together when I was binding it together,. But and I I don’t know if this is true or not. But I remember after I or after that happened or I lost the airplane. Because I lost signal I was looking somewhere online, and it said something about that it’s very important. Especially for park flyers to be bound binded bound I don’t know bound bound from a farther distance. Like I said I don’t know if that’s true or not. But I I did have a problem that’s the only one I’ve ever lost from losing signal it’s not like it was far away actually you were flying it when it happened you remember that one I I’ve that little the pizza box or the little flat guy little. Yep.

Tom: Yeah I do I love that airplane that was a good airplane. Yeah yeah I miss it I’m sorry.

Ron: Yeah but anyway no so that that was the only one that I ever lost. Because of that and like I said after after that happened I did look it up and it said that when you bind those it’s supposed to be done and at a farther distance there’s something special according to that one thing about park flyers and I don’t know if that’s true or not. But just something to keep in mind okay always keep you know a good 10 feet, just to be SAFE when you’re binding I think. Okay that’s kind of the rule I’ve.

Tom: Gone with now that’s buying new things that’s interesting because. Because the bind process. Shouldn’t have anything to do with range, so and it could very. Well be that it didn’t but you know?

Ron: Like I said that was just something I came up with after that when I when I looked it up and it could be complete bunk that’s not true,. But you know best practice go ahead and when you bind things.

Tom: Just have a few feet between between the two yeah and. Then you can you can also perform a range test with, Spektrum transmitters, by pressing the range test button which reduces the output of the transmitter and. Then you walk I forget how far it is I think 30 feet I think is what they recommend and operate all the channels and if everything is working. Then you know you’ve got a good, you know a good, pairing if you will. Okay yeah that’s a good idea too I guess yep I do that on on every. New installation, not necessarily a new model if I pull a receiver out of one airplane and put it in another one and rebind it, anytime I rebind or bind a receiver I I perform that, range function test before I fly it it’s just you know one more thing kind of like a good pre-flight you know one one more.

Ron: Little piece of insurance yeah good idea good tip, I’ll be honest I don’t do that. So I probably ought to start with some of these things and maybe that would have caught that, that one problem I had maybe you know you never know and. Yeah and it could have been a brown out could have been you know anything right weird going on with it and I I just don’t know actually I still have that receiver in a box, and it was a Spektrum receiver maybe I ought to send it back into them and let them look.

Tom: At it and see if there’s anything wrong with it. Yeah my my guess though is if it’s a park flyer receiver they probably don’t support those anymore or at least not that one,. But you never know I mean you could certainly wouldn’t hurt to hurt to you know get an answer at least. Yeah because I I.

Ron: Don’t plan on using it in anything else so it’s just kind of sitting there taking up room. So right right yeah might not be a good idea. So yeah you could do that until you taught me that to send them back in when see when something goes wrong with it. So see if anything has come out of this.

Tom: Episode you’ve learned something so there we go there you go. Yeah so yeah once you’ve got them, once you’ve got them talking to each other the transmitter and the receiver. Then you have to start you know, telling the receiver what to do right assigning channels. Well actually hold on before we.

Ron: Go too far I I want to mention when you bind,. So there’s a a battery slash bind port on most of these receivers at least the ones that I’ve dealt with. So when you bind you can actually put your battery in any port that’s correct? So yeah you don’t have to worry about yeah on Spektrum. Because so the way those work is they have their power bus to where all of the the negative and positives are bussed together. So every one of those pins is run off of the same, same connection. So when you. Power up, you know if you if you put the battery in the aileron port they’re all going to be hot they’re all going to have, have the the negative on them too. So you’re going to have ground and positive so signal is the only thing that really changes all throughout them. So when you’re going ahead and binding it you can put that in any port, as long as the the bind plug is in the bind port that’s correct? So I just want to make that make that distinction too. Yep yep yeah that’s a that’s that’s a.

Tom: Call because, I’m actually looking at one of my old, AR7000 receivers and it doesn’t have a bind port it has a battery port and all my all my channels. But no bind port so in this case you plug the the bind plug into the battery port and. Then plug your power source into any of the available channels to do the binding. Yeah and your receiver you know when you buy a receiver new it’ll of course come with instructions and tell you how to do it. But in general, if there’s not a bind port. Specifically on your receiver, the battery port will be the function you use to to set the you know to plug the bind plug in and set the binding process in motion and. Then like you said you can power up a receiver in any of the available channel slots. Because they’ll pick up power I got you now from.

Ron: Any of those feeds yep cool got it yep, so what’s next. So yeah like I said once you, once.

Tom: You’ve got them communicating with each other you have to you have to start the process of, of plugging everything in and using up all those channels that are on there did you want to talk.

Ron: About channels yeah so a normal, I don’t want to say normal the basic really, amount of channels you want to fly with I would say is four you can get away with. Yeah you can get away with the three channel receiver three channel receivers, will control throttle rudder and elevator, going up to the four channel is when you get the ailerons. So well technically you know you they don’t have to.

Tom: Be those channels like a three channel which I’m not even sure you can buy a three channel radio or receiver anymore. But, it doesn’t necessarily mean throttle aileron elevator it could be throttle rudder elevator it could be elevon throttle and I mean who knows. But, just because the I did want to touch on that just. Because the channel is labeled, for instance on my ar 7000 here the very first throttle our first channel the bottom is throttle. Well just because it says throttle it’s still a. Proportional channel it can do whatever I want it to do,. But it is set aside and the programming and the transmitter will match throttle when you go looking through the menus if that makes sense.

Ron: Yeah I just wanted okay so thanks thanks for the correction that’s fine and and you’re right I guess what I’m talking about is basic airplanes like if you’re just out looking at an airplane. Yep a normal three channel, airplane slash receiver yes will normally control your throttle your rudder and your elevator. Exactly, yep so when you when you go to the ailerons that’s when you get your fourth channel. But you’re right you don’t necessarily have to have those for those channels right, you know like we talked about before dihedral if you have a big enough, amount of. Dihedral built into your wing you really don’t need elevator or, you really don’t need ailerons. Because it will kind of self-correct on it’s own, but it’s once again I just want to want to say that it’s good to get used to four channels, absolutely and just kind of stick with four channel and don’t go anything under. Yep I could not agree more yep yeah and so when you go up to like a fifth channel most of the time that’s going to be like a gear, landing gear that are retractable or flaps or flaps and. Then yeah your six channel is kind of going to be flaps or gear too is usually. What stuff is used for now you can if you don’t have landing gear that retracts or if you don’t have flaps on your plane you can use it for a lot of different things? Exactly yeah I was just going to say that right and sometimes too if you just have six channel you might need more than six channels to do six things you know your your gear, or not your gear. But your your flaps you might want to have separate flaps, to be able to control your flaps separately, and. Then maybe you can mix that with ailerons so you have you know your flaps would also go up and down with your ailerons. But then. When you flip the flap switch then they go down? So I mean there’s a lot of different things you can.

Tom: Do right and I think I think it would help I mean? So channels I mean that that used to be how how we thought of functions on an airplane you know an aileron is a channel, an elevator servo is as a channel anymore at least at least on on modern you know radios that could do the mixing and stuff like that we use channels a little bit differently like you kind of touched on you know flaps and operating. Them separately like lots of airplanes use use multiple servos to drive ailerons. So I mean I’ve got several airplanes myself that I have a servo in each wing panel to operate each aileron independently and that takes an extra channel on the receiver, if I want to operate them independently, yes you can drive them you can drive them with a y harness on one channel. But you’re you’re not truly operating them independently so that’s how you’re going to get right your your. Flap around function to work for example is you’ll have to use up another channel or slot on the receiver. Because you’re then going to plug that second servo in the in the case of Spektrum the I think it’s the right hand, aileron servo will plug into that sixth if you will channel or slot on the receiver. So it’s yes they’re channels but but really they’re really more just plugs and independent functions. So I mean it can be kind of misleading when you say. Yeah I I fly a four channel airplane but I’m. Using eight channels you know what I’m saying yeah yeah I understand. So you know that that kind of helps the discussion sometimes you know especially if you’re going you know searching for a receiver to buy let’s say, I always say buy as much receiver as you can afford not necessarily what you need. Because, I can’t tell you how many times I’ve run out of slots or plug you know except receptacles. On the receiver, because I’m using so many different servos to do this or do that or you know mix you know flapper on or elevon or or ailer vaders or whatever you want to call it,. So I.

Ron: Always yeah but most of the time when most of the time when you’re building a plane though you kind of know what you’re going to be, doing. Yeah so I mean I don’t I don’t have like a bunch of extra receivers sitting around waiting for airplanes. So you know I I will buy a receiver for an airplane as I’m building it or putting it together or whatnot and. Then when you when you kind of look ahead and know what you want it to have. Then you know how big of a, a receiver to get most of the stuff I get is going to be six channel, even if it is just regular four channel airplane or you know one that. Controls your,, your ailerons elevator rudder throttle so here’s here’s a great example right here on my building board this hold on. Okay hold on that’s fine let me let me finish this my thought what I was going to say though is you know even though most of them are four channel I have used the fifth channel even if I don’t have flaps or, or retractable gear for like onboard glow heaters. Okay you can use that or if you have a gas engine you might want to use that for,. For your choke if you don’t want to have a manual choke or a kill switch and you can oh I was going to say that too or a kill switch and that’s not a bad idea if you’re working on a gas airplane to be able to turn it off sure remotely. So like the opto kill switches are a good idea, you know most of the time when you’re when you’re working on,, like a nitro plane you can just shut that throat all the way down and that will kill the motor, I I’ve never set up a gas plane to do the same thing I don’t even know if you can or not you can oh you can. Yeah okay well then maybe next. Time when I set up a gas plane that’s how I’ll do it. But I usually put the kill switches on it I don’t recommend setting it up that way. But you can oh and what’s the so not to get off topic too much. But.

Tom: What’s the what’s the issue with doing that, well I mean if you’re if your linkage gets bound up in the airplane? Then you have no way to shut it off for for one thing unless you have an opto kill switch and that could be dangerous, you know if the if, you you’re on the on the ground let’s say and you’re you’re going through your startup process and you don’t have an opto kill switch and you’re not. Exactly sure where the throttle is set and you go to fire the thing up and runs at half throttle and takes your arm off that’s another good reason to have an opto kill I mean there’s lots of reasons. Not to set up an airplane that way but anyway. Okay all right I I’m just curious so go on. Yeah so what I was going to say was you know the example that’s on my on my bench right? Now this horton kit I mean it’s it’s a fairly simple airplane it’s a flying wing with two electric motors. But, even with the Spektrum DX8 and an eight channel receiver I’m I’m out of, I’ve used up all the slots and technically I I have the flap servos on on a y harness. Because I don’t have any more slots that I. Could use, so even simple airplanes, depending on on how you’re driving the control surfaces and and what other function if I wanted to put lights on this airplane I that I could control from the transmitter I simply couldn’t? Because I’m out of I’ve got all my all my, servos and and the two speed controllers they’re all all the slots in the receiver occupied. So, I I always I mean I will always tell people you know if they’re shopping for a a receiver just to just to have or for their. Next project buy as much as you can afford because, you know I I hang on to airplanes for a long time. But I also you know trade and whatever you know somebody likes an airplane I have I’ll pull my radio gear out of it. Well now I have this radio gear and if if it’s a six channel receiver. Well now I’m limited to putting this in a in an you know in an airplane with six servos or or five servos in an electronic speed controller or whatever I’m limited I’m limiting myself and I have an eight channel transmitter. So why not at least have an eight channel receiver. So I can you know so I can use all. Those functions if necessary just just something I can see that. Yeah just something I I try to I try to do whenever I can if I’m you know if I’m picking up a receiver I’ll I’ll try to pick up whichever whatever is in the budget, and and maybe. Then some if I can yeah oh well and I get that I usually.

Ron: Like I said just buy what I need for the airplane I’m working on right, and I I don’t really think ahead that way, and it really hasn’t bitten me too much. Because most of the stuff I’ll buy is going to be like a six channel I don’t necessarily buy four channels very often right, I guess that does give me a little bit of extra leeway in case I need to add something to it. But yeah most of my stuff is six channel I have some seven channel eight channel. But most of the stuff I have is just six.

Tom: Yeah and and honestly most probably 90 of the airplanes I fly would be just fine with a six in fact I mean I I don’t I’m looking around the shop here,. Well I’ve got the kristen eagle I think I have it set up with eight channels. But, yeah I mean six channels will fly 90 of the airplanes I own. But it’s just nice to have that those extra channels you know when the should the need arise. Yeah buy buy what you can afford for sure but if you can afford a little bit more, I always say you know go for it if you can. Yeah and and I understand that so like one of the.

Ron: Other considerations too though is like for my my big yak, I actually fly that on an eight channel receiver, even though I have a lot of servos in it right and that’s. Because I use one of those smart fly boards, would you want to go ahead and explain kind of how those work. Yeah so a smart.

Tom: Tray is, is basically nothing more than a power distribution center if you will, your receiver is still doing the receiving function you know receiving the signal from the transmitter and. Then sending it you know in this case to to a power distribution center which allows you to plug in multiple servos, on there there’s lots of different ways and and lots of different boards out there. But essentially lets you you know if you if you want to think of it as ganging servos up on. One channel without using all the wiring and the y harnesses and all that it’s a nice cool little board with all these plugs that you can plug into and. Then you run a a lead from your receiver to that particular channel on the board and. Then the board divvies that up to the servos, usually you know they they also provide provisions for, optical kill switches that are built into the boards which are pretty sweet, they also offer, multiple, power sources to be plugged in. So you have. Redundancy built into the especially like on your yak you know you can use I think it’s two, receiver batteries,. So you have that sort of redundancy and that extra capacity to drive those high volt or, high volume power hungry servos,. So that’s kind of what a what a power board or a smart tray or a power distribution block or or whatever you want to call it is it is it allows you to to really really gang up those servos on those big control surfaces without using up a lot of slots in your receiver.

Ron: And so what I like about that too though so you’re you’re correct I’m not powering anything through the receiver the only thing, the only power the receiver sees is from the batteries that go into the smart board and. Then right that handles all the the the higher amperage right? Yeah I draws I.

Tom: Should have said that but yeah exactly exactly what you said that the the power is not going through the receiver to drive all those those heavy duty servos the power is actually going through that board which is built very robustly to handle that current? Yep exactly yeah it’s made to do that yep and the.

Ron: Nice thing I like about them too depending on what kind you get, they will actually have separate endpoint adjustments and. Yeah for each servo so on my yak there’s there’s two servos per aileron. Okay, and I used to use matchboxes on those so it’s a what a matchbox was it’s a little I think jr made it and you can you have one input going into it and. Then it, it matches the servos so a servo even when they’re close they really don’t put out the exact same, position and that could. Be just how you have it set up you know if you have your clevis just a little tighter on one than another you know that the the actual position will not be exact and you don’t want those servos to fight each other you want them to work perfectly in unison with each other. So they’re not, so they’re not trying to change the other one’s position right, you don’t want you don’t want any torque you don’t want any, twist in that aileron as as you’re as you’re flying. So what they do is you set your endpoints,, you know your your full throws on them. So that they’re not. Fighting each other and and you can do that in the matchbox which is, like I said it’s just a little box that, it’s really not much bigger than a receiver. Okay, and then usually those sit I don’t remember if I had those in the wing or if I had them in the in the fuselage. Yeah it doesn’t matter yeah yeah so the the smart board though gets rid of those and the thing I like about the smart board though is it also does the you know the the matching the end point adjustment and all that. So they’re not fighting each other, but it just makes the whole inside the plane. Looks so much nicer it does, yep so you have single wires that go into the receiver and it just it makes the whole thing look a lot cleaner it does the installation looks nicer and it really works better in my opinion,. So you know we talked before about the the power bus that’s in the receiver those are only made to to handle. So many amps exactly you don’t want to pull a whole bunch of power through them if you do right you can, overheat them you can burn them up you can have a lot of issues, with even with smaller airplanes. Because some of these newer servos are actually. Pulling quite a bit of power through them sure so make sure you’re not overloading, overloading your your receiver with it and and what happened you know that’s what happened to my plane when I almost lost it that one time to that big yak is that you know I think it was pulling too much power, through that receiver and. Then it just shut itself off and and reset itself. Because it was just pulling too much through and it just kind of you know freaked out. Yeah saw a low voltage and browned out yep right which I’m I’m. Okay with that I’d rather have it do that than actually you know catch on fire or. Mess something up inside of it true, so you know with with the running the smart boards in there you’re able to control the power where it’s going you’re able to control the signals much better,. Because like I said on not only do I have two two, servos per aileron there’s two servos on the rudder there’s two servos for the the elevator. So there’s there’s a lot going on in there right and a lot of electronics going together working to make those those actually work in unison and not fight each other. So smart boards if you have a big airplane are a good thing to have I think. Yeah I I agree.

Tom: Especially if you’re using like you said you know you’re using those high voltage, or I’m sorry those high amp draw, servos and multiple power sources they really do clean up the installation.

Ron: Yeah and it’s nice to be able to power it off of two batteries too completely separate. Yep you know if you have a problem with one battery you still have that other one in there to kind of.

Tom: Help right so I I wanted to mention, I hate to go backwards. But, binding, yeah because I wanted.

Ron: To say something about that too but you you might be on the same page as I AM. Well yeah what position.

Tom: The sticks should be in when you bind yes yeah pretty much. Yeah so usually, during the construction of an airplane or or an arv or anything that you’re gonna you know install your own radio in, you know you’ll have to you know bind your radio system together. So you can start using it and then you’ll you know you’ll install your servos and. Then you’ll set up your linkages and all that stuff and on that first bind, your your goal is to get the transmitter and receiver working. Together and that that’s fine, but once you have your airplane, especially the control surfaces set up, you’ll want to bind it again and Spektrum I think Futaba offers something similar. But Spektrum offers a, or they don’t offer they build it into their system, oh gosh I just the name of it escapes me. But it’s a it’s a kind of a a safety device that’s built in such kind of like a fail SAFE fail SAFE thank you that’s it,. Yeah that is sort of built in that will drive the servos to a. Predetermined position, in the case of a like we were talking about your yak with the brown out, and and that those positions are set during the bind process. So you know you you’ve bound your radio and you’re setting up your control linkages and this is especially true for throttle, and especially on electric airplanes,. Yep you want to when you get everything set up and and you you’ve right you got your airplane built and all the linkages are the way you want them and everything. Is standard you really ought to rebind everything with those sticks on the transmitter in a position that you want those servos driven to in the case of a a signal loss or a brown out or or or something you know wrong during the flight and usually those positions you know low throttle and if you want you know maybe a little bit of up elevator and maybe some right I don’t know whatever set the plane up in a shallow you know glide turning glide or whatever, and those positions are set during? The buying process so like I said when you’re all done and and the airplane’s good to go you’re all finished you’re proud of your work go back there and rebind it, with the sticks in those positions. Because that’s very important and that’s often, a step that gets overlooked and I know I’ve overlooked it many times you know and I go to the field and I turn the transmitter on and I turn the switch to the, to the airplane on and the servos go you know crazy in one direction I’m like oh I forgot to I forgot to bind it in my fail SAFE position. So just something to think about so.

Ron: And what it’s also very reminded me of that sorry. Yeah that’s right and it’s also very important to remember if you ever reverse the direction of a servo to rebind especially if it’s throttle,. Yeah I think we both yep we both know the same person that had an issue with that, he had an issue to where you know he got it all set up and got it running great. But the throttle was reversed right well.

Tom: I laugh I’ve done it too I I can’t laugh at that image I’ve done it myself. So yeah well but yeah and.

Ron: Then and then what happened was he lost signal and instead of going to you know going all the way down to an idle it was a nitro plane and it went to full throttle and it just flew away. Yeah so very important to remember to do that, and and the other thing you know when you’re when you’re going to the fail SAFE like what I always do to check it and I don’t know if this is the right way to do it or not, electric gas doesn’t matter what kind. So I will act like I’m doing my run-up you know when. You’re you’re standing oops you know when you’re standing over the airplane right, with your with your feet, holding it to make sure it doesn’t go anywhere right, I will just turn my transmitter.

Tom: Off yeah that’s one way one way to test it, I prefer to do that with the engine not running. But.

Ron: Yeah that’s that’s a way to test it yeah I mean right? So I mean if it’s an electric one you obviously can’t turn the engine on or off I arm it and I do all that kind of stuff. But when I’m when I’m just checking to make sure everything is set up right, before I and this isn’t done every time I’m just talking about when I when I set one up,. So it’s not every pre-flight I don’t do that but it’s after I get it all bound together and get it and get it set up the way I want it I’ll just you know sit there and turn it off and make sure it works right? Yep yep yeah that’s that’s it that’s very important because you know if you’re working on a little electric one and you don’t have that. Set up and you know it’s in your basement or something like that and you have it plugged in and. Then you don’t think about it you turn your transmitter off first and you have it not bound correctly with fail SAFE. Then you’re going to go full throttle and you can really get hurt, you know especially like I said if it’s an electric one. So it just makes a lot more sense to do it the first time make sure it’s done right and. Then always rebind it you know with the fail.

Tom: SAFE the way you want them yeah no I I agree. Yep so do you want to do you want to I mean we talked about AS3X and and SAFE in our on our you know our other episode did you do you want to hit on that.

Ron: Again a little bit yeah I think that’s a good idea,. Because that technology you know lives in the receiver absolutely you you know not only do you get that when you buy an airplane that has that built in,. But you can buy AS3X receivers, and then you know those are very important to read the directions. Yeah because they have to be put in correctly yeah anytime you have a gyro in there or something like that you know that it has to be there’s usually one way that can sit. In an airplane and work if you do it wrong you’re going to crash right and and like we mentioned in the.

Tom: Other episode they you know they after a little bit of research don’t don’t mount your AS3X receiver.

Ron: With velcro right yeah it was a little bit too much. So that’s that’s good too yeah it needs to be a good.

Tom: Solid mounting and like you said it there’s absolutely a direction, or or several usually I think, the last AS3X I saw you there was like three or five, acceptable mounting positions and.

Ron: Nothing else so yeah read the directions yeah I’ve never actually, used one of those and I I don’t.

Tom: Necessarily think I plan on it either yeah it’s not it’s not something that, that I’m terribly interested in in in purchasing if it comes with a with a foamy. Then you know so be it but, it’s it’s not a it’s not a technology that I’m I’m going to seek out. Because like we like we said before it’s it’s really a designed to be a a tool to to assist new pilots you know to you know to become proficient flyers and I feel like I’m a fairly proficient flyer. So I don’t need the the stabilization.

Ron: But it does have a you’ve only been flying for about like 90 years. Now so yeah it’s not quite that.

Tom: Long but, I mean you know on the on the small foam airplanes. Yeah I guess you know I had that little, that umx, e-flight beast that had that technology and it was pretty cool it would you know on a windy day I could fly that thing and it looked like there was no wind out there. But, I’m pretty confident that, I didn’t need that to at least fly the airplane. But anyway, yeah and my only I guess.

Ron: My only other problem with those is I you know I don’t want it to give somebody a false sense of security that,. Well this is how a plane flies so I’m okay oh it’s 15 mile an hour wind. But that’s right I’ve done this before yeah exactly yep you know I you have to watch what you’re doing and know your skill level right and don’t rely on the airplane to do it for you. Exactly you know that’s my two cents take it for what it’s worth. But I agree I prefer to be the one yeah I prefer to be the one in control completely. Yeah so that’s that’s just me yep and then you know for flying for the. Hobby I mean I really think they’re cool when you can program and take off and and land on their own and do all that with drones and all that too I think is is neat setting the waypoints and watching it fly go to different heights and all that. But that’s that’s not that’s not the hobby that I enjoy.

Tom: And and really that’s really not the scope of of this podcast. Anyway no correct so that’s yeah.

Ron: Sorry we shouldn’t talk about that my bad no that’s. Okay, and then you know and then thanks.

Tom: For scolding me the, the SAFE technology is is kind of kind of the same. But different it’s it’s a tool designed to you know to get people you know flying, with with little or no experience and, same kind of deal you can buy SAFE technology I think, off the shelf and you can also get it in.

Ron: In arfs and things like that, oh see I didn’t know you could get it on and a receiver off the.

Tom: Shelf I think that’s that’s good to know yeah I think,. Well I I can’t say that to any certainty because I haven’t I haven’t sought it out to I had a an arf that had it in there and I didn’t particularly care for the airplane. So I sold it or traded it or whatever but, I believe you could buy that receiver off the shelf, and what airplane was that by the way I believe it was a hanger 9 p51 I believe oh you got rid of that one I did. Yeah yeah I think I did not know that I.

Ron: Think that was one that was the one I thought about getting off of you that’s been a few years ago.

Tom: Yeah it had the little 10 cc gasser on it ran really really good. Yeah yeah it was a yeah, I remember.

Ron: You flew that at the the warbird flying and stuff that was a good one. Yeah yeah, it didn’t fly.

Tom: Bad it just not it didn’t fly in my opinion like a p51 should and it wasn’t designed to it was designed more or less as a as a second airplane kind of a low-wing trainer to get people away from trainers and into airplanes that look like airplanes. But, yeah that was kind of what that was kind of what.

Ron: Took me away from that one is it it was a good looking airplane. But it didn’t have that actual, p51 shape to it you know they they they fudged a little bit here and there to kind of make it fly better which is you know that’s cool I understand that was the point of it. Now if you want to scale p51 that’s not what you’re going to get and that’s kind of what I didn’t like about it right,. But it.

Tom: You know it did it did fly good and it did look good in the air and the engine ran good and all that. But the SAFE technology wasn’t really, for me and it was, in my opinion, on that particular airplane on it’s highest setting I I don’t believe if it was flying away from me I could get it to turn and come back to me it was limited that much, oh wow. Yeah I mean it I don’t know how it does it I’m sure it does it with gyros and you know built into the receiver and all that. But I think on it’s. On it’s most severe setting or most corrective setting for lack of a better word it wouldn’t let it bank more than 10 or 15 degrees. So if yeah if it was flying away from me and I needed to turn the thing around especially if I needed to turn around quickly, you know to avoid say a tree or you know flying over you know you know populated area or whatever physically with the stick buried to the right or the left it physically would not turn enough. So I for that reason but you you could turn.

Ron: That off though correct you could I mean like completely off. Yeah you could, but the airplane.

Tom: Just wasn’t set up to be aerobatic but anyway you know that’s not what we’re talking about,. Okay?

Ron: The,, only other thing I think I want to talk about them before we, before we get off here. Okay, remotes for the receivers okay like satellite receivers yeah like satellite remote receivers whatever you want to call them satellites sure modes. Yeah I’ve heard it both ways yeah Spektrum.

Tom: And Futaba both use them and so what’s the point of those. Okay so on the on the receivers let’s say we’re talking about a regular rolled four channel receiver no satellite, receivers, plugged into it or anything like that it has the antenna you know coming right out of the receiver and our Spektrum our DSM specifically receivers have really really really short antennas. Because the signal is so good right it doesn’t need these long antennas like we used to trail out the back of our airplanes.

Ron: Or make them you remember yeah, I’ve seen pictures yeah. Yeah never owned one like that right?

Tom: Right my my poor contender here has got he’s got a still got a scar on the side of the fuselage where the antenna used to come out. But anyway, so they’re even though they’re really really really good, they’re they’re kind of limited, I don’t want to say limited that’s not not the correct, word. But they they can only they only gets a clear picture. Because the receiver is usually buried in the airframe right we don’t stick our receivers on the outside of the airframes. So therefore the. Receiver antenna is also inside the airplane so at some angles, that that the receiver you know when you’re flying around you know obviously we don’t just fly straight and level all the time we like to do loops and rolls and spins and all these other things occasionally during some of those maneuvers we may not present the best target for our transmitter to send a signal to and what I mean by that is the antenna may not be in a prime position to receive the signal from the transmitter, and. Yeah so.

Ron: They when they should be parallel to each other you know when you’re flying. So to get the best transmission and the best signal to your receiver, you know you don’t if you’re looking right at it you don’t want that wire to be pointing right at you. Exactly you want that wire to be 90 degrees from you. Yeah, and same by the way we didn’t cover this. But same with the transmitter when you’re flying it you don’t want you know they they bend those the the antenna bend. So that is because you.

Tom: Want to be able to they do on ours the new new transmitters they don’t bend at all. Well I guess.

Ron: That’s true they have they have such a better right and and smaller antennas in there even that work. But exactly for those of us that have some of the older ones you know when when you do have that bend and make sure, and this goes for any antenna even like if you’re trying to set up your home internet when you’re working with your routers and and and such you want those antennas to be broadcasting, you know it’s I don’t know how to describe it very. Well but it’s you know they they when it when that antenna is sticking up that is when it broadcasts around it. So it doesn’t. Broadcast out the end of it it broadcasts around yes what the, like the how the antenna is pointed right? So always make sure you kind of bend that antenna that way you get better coverage got it.

Tom: Okay so, Spektrum what they did, to help alleviate that problem of of you know end to end transmission let’s just call it which would be the weakest link between the two right as you can plug a another additional small receiver essentially, into your main receiver that has antennas attached to it that you can. Then position in a different plane if you will and not by airplane I don’t mean. Airplane I mean a different plane of reference right so for instance if I’ve got my ar-7000 here mounted flat in the bottom of my fuselage with the with the antennas pointing out you know towards the left and the right I can. Then plug in a satellite receiver run it to a different part of the airplane depending on how long my lead is and. Then orient those antennas 90 degrees ideally to the antennas that are on the main receiver and what that does is it prevents, a more robust if you will, target. To receive the signals from the transmitter, so that’s the purpose of satellite and a lot of these newer receivers you can plug I think three there’s some of them you can plug three satellite receivers. So if you’ve got a really big airplane or sailplanes especially, really high performance sailplanes, the fuselages sometimes are made of carbon fiber and carbon fiber is not a very good it’s it’s it I mean it blocks it’ll block signal. Yeah yeah so it’s important especially on airplanes like that to use. These satellites, strategically to you know to try to get a good signal to your main receiver and and that’s the function of my yak my yak has two of them. Yeah my, my old, hanger nine yak here I’ve got two satellites in that as. Well in addition to the main receiver, more right and and more is.

Ron: Better yeah and the nice nice thing about those two is you know you can you can put a nice long lead on them right and get them far away. Yep, you know if you have a bigger airplane especially get that as far away as you can you know don’t just put it right next to that other receiver six inches away. Exactly you know I I think I have one on a, a five foot, extension and get that like back in the tail section get that as far back as you can. Yep yeah I’ve got it I’ve got it mounted in the turtle deck of my yak. Yeah right and and the nice thing about that too is that kind of helps prevent some. Noise especially if you have a gas engine you know right those, those ignitions create a lot of electronic interference and a lot of noise,. So by getting that as far away as you can that helps.

Tom: Too right yep yep so that’s the that’s the function of a satellite, receiver is just it’s just to augment the the sight picture if you will of your main receiver to get a better signal, from the transmitter just to help guarantee that you don’t get those brownouts or signal. Well yeah I was gonna.

Ron: Say it doesn’t necessarily have anything with brownouts because they don’t they don’t. Yeah they don’t handle any, any electronic, I shouldn’t say they don’t handle any, servos or anything like that you know there’s nothing else plugged into them they are simply simply antennas. Yep, that that yeah they just give you a better signal, into the airplane. So you can see it better, not see it see it. But you know so your your receiver can talk to it. Exactly your transmitter better yep so yeah.

Tom: That’s right, anything else you want to cover on this one, I don’t know I I kind of I kind of think I’d like to talk just briefly, about the the serial or the or the S.Bus type receivers,.

Ron: I mean yeah that’s fine I I don’t know anything about those. So yeah and I and I don’t know very much.

Tom: About them, aside from you know the the,, FPV and drone guys use them,. Because especially on these small racing drones they don’t have a lot of area. Now you yelled at me for talking about drones before. So now you’re going to go ahead and do it. Well I’m just that’s where the application really lies with with these receivers,. Okay and the only reason I mentioned is because, if if buying a receiver is in your future, this might be one you can sort of take off of your radar. Because. For for standard model airplane use we don’t generally use those S.Bus or ppl type receivers. Because they’re really designed not for airplanes they’re designed for drones and things like that. So, like I said if you’re in the market for a receiver that’s one option you can sort of take off your list and try to help clear up the clear up the choices, just. Because they, they’re really not designed for for standard rc plane type use with the servos and all that.

Ron: That’s really all I wanted to say about that okay? Well that’s good to know so yeah I guess if I see those out I’ll just walk by them and. Then ignore them and not do anything right I mean they they do.

Tom: They do have their they do have their use and and they’re pretty neat and slick what they can do. But unfortunately they they’re not quite what we are, are using with the RC airplanes and besides that I mean we have other means we can use that they really clean up installations,. Because you’re only using one wire from the receiver to drive all these different motors in the case of,, drones. But, you know we talked about the smart trays and that’s kind of the same idea sort of and that’s. What we use to clean up the the mess in the big airplanes? So anyway stay away from those receivers you don’t need them good advice leave them leave them alone and they’re expensive. Anyway so there.

Ron: Oh yeah save some money then buy a higher channel receiver there you go see. Buy more than always comes back to that yeah there you go. Yeah, okay well then I think for me I’m done if you’re finished. Then, we’ll sign off until next time I’m Ron I’m Tom see you later bye.

Announcer: We hope you enjoyed this episode of the RC Plane Lab podcast for topic suggestions to ask questions or to give anything back connect with us at RC Plane Lab.com or email us direct at either Ron at RC Plane Lab.com or Tom at RC Plane Lab.com you can also text us or leave us a voicemail at 818-351-9846. Please subscribe rate and review us on your favorite podcast app until next time may your landings be gentle.