Radio Technique
Interference. Not that we have the new RC channels, everyone is worried about interference from commercial transmitters. You might (for example) ask your District Frequency Coordinator about such transmitters near your flying site and he might point out (from data supplied by AMA HQ) a Common Carrier transmitter rated at 25 Watts and looking at you through a 140 degree beam antenna mounted on a 300-ft.-high tower. Is it time to panic? That antenna is 10 miles from your flying site.
Myers at the '83 WRAM Show
The Nick Zirolis (Jr., left; Sr., right) showed the well-known and muchloved Eindecker ($34.95) and Saulnier ($37.95) models which have been a mainstay at the Rhinebeck WW I Classics over the past 10 years. They are now available in a new incarnation-featuring vacu-formed cowls and cockpit areas. They also showed the 1/5-scale AT-6 Texan and F4U-1 Corsair, having fiberglass fuselage and cowl, with balsa wing and tall. Nick Sr. does all the design work. His prowess was recognized by his being presented with the Howard McEntee award at the 1983 WRAM Show for years of model design excellence. Ziroli models are available by direct mail. Old friends meet at the WRAM Show. In this case it was our author and Radio Technique columnist, George M. Myers, left, acting as MA reporter, meeting with Tom Runge, president of Ace RC and exhibitor at the show. These men will be working together in your behalf this year. George has accepted the chairmanship of the AMA Frequency Committee, and Tom has accepted the presidency of the RC Manufacturers Association, the latter vacated by the untimely death of Lee Renaud.
Radio Technique
RIGHT NOW, we're in a use it, or lose it situation. We've been given our new RC channels on an exclusive, secondary-user basis. Nobody has been designated as a primary user, so nobody shares them with us! The AMA has designated certain channels for immediate use, on the basis that the selected channels will be most compatible with converted existing equipment. If we are slow to occupy these channels, that action will be taken as evidence that we really don't need them, with the result that other users will start appearing on our channels. Who out there wants to bet I'm wrong? Among other things, I serve as District Frequency Coordinator for District II, and in that capacity I have received another printout of known Common Carrier transmitters that might effect our flying. This listing (which is known to be incomplete) lists 85 transmitters (nationwide) that are located directly on last year's 72 MHz frequencies, and another 342 located ± 10 KHz from the new channels. In my district, the count is four on-channel and 36 adjacent-channel transmitters to be checked.
Radio Technique
BUILDING THINGS. Ace RC, Inc. has a new experience at the Nats planned for those of you who attend the 1983 Nats. For the first time, Ace will sponsor an electronics workshop. The idea is that you would like to build an electronic kit, but are shy about the possibility that you might do it wrong. So, you attend the workshop at some time when you are not involved in the competition. You are met by Ace people who will show you their kits, explain what they do for you, and (if you wish to buy one) take you into a completely-equipped workshop where you can use Ace tools to build it! If you get stuck, the Ace technicians will be standing by to help. In a few hours you can be walking out with a new tool that you've built by yourself.
Radio Technique
TUNING YOUR RECEIVER. Every so often, I receive another pound of newsletters from AMA HQ. Based on what I read there, some folks are overreacting to possible RC interference. While it is good to be aware of what may happen, I think it is wrong to tell ourselves that it will always happen and, thereby, start limiting ourselves unnecessarily. In point of fact, I have been flying on the new RC channels for the past six months, and I have deliberately invited every kind of potential interference that I've seen discussed. So far, using radios built in 1970, 1976, 1978, 1980 and 1982, and setting up for adjacent-channel (40 KHz) interference, second-order and third-order intermodulation and image, the main thing I've discovered is that there isn't any problem!
