Radio Control: Electrics
THIS MONTH'S column offers some special battery, charging, and discharging stories. It seems that every couple of years I manage to run my auto battery down while charging my motor packs. This happened again a few weeks ago, but it was not exactly a surprise this time. My car had warned me a few times with some sluggish starting sounds, which I ignored. This was the original battery in my '96 Voyager minivan, and the fact that the battery lasted more than two years, given the way I use it, is something new. Previous OEM batteries failed after just a few months of deep-cycle use-the kind of use a battery is likely to have with lots of motor-pack charging. I do not know if the car maker has upgraded the battery specification, or as follows below.
Radio Control: Electrics
THIS MONTH'S topics include a meet announcement, a new catalog, observations at the '98 LVRCS meet, servo current drain and related consequences, and my own ESC design progress. The Concord Model Engineers, in conjunction with Sailplane and Electric Modeler, present the Third Annual Devil Mountain All Electric RC Fun Fly, Sunday October 4. The meet will be held on the Bay Area Radio Control Society field in Richmond CA.
Radio Control: Electrics
Amazing and very much appreciated - that's what the slow but steady growth in Ni-Cd battery technology over the last two-plus decades has been. My first floundering E-flights occurred 1972-73 - when just about nothing for E-power was available at any hobby shop, including batteries. This was a time of "do it all yourself" with a struggle! I remember struggling to rewind Radio Shack and other toy motors to make them (somewhat) more suitable for the flight task at hand. And I recall the exasperation of trying to fit unwilling gears and a suitable prop to them. Then there was the small, light, homemade super-regen receiver and Adams actuator. And I still see myself trying to power the whole works with an old receiver pack comprised of four button cells that had to be charged overnight in classic manner. (There was no such thing as high-rate charging then.)
Radio Control: Electrics
THIS MONTH'S column will cover one meet announcement and some neat new products and other technical stuff seen at the 1997 KRC Electric Fly. The San Diego Mid-Winter Electrics is a meet sponsored by the Silent Electric Flyers of San Diego and is scheduled for February 13-15, 1998. Scheduled activities include funfly events, F5B exhibition flying, Speed 400 Pylon, Scale exhibition, and AULD (All Up, Last Down). There will be dealer booths, a Saturday banquet, and a tour of the Aerospace Museum. For more info contact the club Web site at www.sefsd.org or Russ Schuppner at [email protected] or phone (619) 469-2820.
Radio Control: Electrics
THE MID-AMERICA Electric Fun-Flys are really two meets combined on one weekend to look like one big Michigan E-meet. This year's meet(s) were July 12-13, and were sponsored by the Electric Flyers Only, Inc. and Ann Arbor Falcons. CDs were Ken Myers and Keith Shaw. Each is well-known and well-regarded within the Electric community, and each is a club president. This meet has been growing steadily and had 75 pilots with more than 280 aircraft this year. It is structured as a fun-fly with simple events and judging categories. Ken and Keith wrote about the affair, and they boasted of having something new and unique this time: great weather both days! I received a carefully constructed surprise package a few weeks after the meet. It included a videotape that I dutifully watched as instructed. This tape contained highlights of the meet, beginning with a walk along the flightline, with attendees being instructed to say "Hi, Bob," as the camera passed by.
