Original Date posted: April 3, 2011

Mixing, Delta Wing Style.

It’s not exactly a mixing 101 introduction, we’ll hit that topic some other day, but we do introduce the topic of mixing and how it pertains to a combat or delta wing style flyer. That is, a plane that does not have a separate aileron or elevator. They’re combined into one synchronized pair of control surfaces called ‘elevons’.

Elevon = Elevator + Aileron

When a mommy elevator and a daddy aileron reaaaaaaally like each other… No, we’re not going there. Oh, the letters I would receive.

Why do we need mixing at all? If you plug your aileron servo and elevator servo into your receiver and start banging on the stick, you’d quickly notice that only one control surface moves with elevator input and the other only moves with aileron input. Since we don’t have separate elevator and aileron control surfaces, this poses a problem.

We need to mix these transmitter inputs to multiple receiver channel outputs. That’s the quickest way to describe mixing, but not necessarily the most simplistic. Basically, we want moving the transmitter stick in one direction to actually make more than just one servo move. By default, your transmitter only moves one servo at a time if you only move a transmitter stick in one horizontal or vertical direction. Rudders move left and right, elevators move up and down, and so do ailerons.

But we need the ‘ELEVONS’ here, and we need them pronto. STAT. ASAP. There are typically three ways to perform mixing of any style, and we’ll cover two of them here. The first isn’t widely used anymore, but still fun to consider.

Mechanical Mixing

This is the one we won’t be covering in detail. But think of an aileron servo, sitting on rails, and the aileron servo connects to our two control surfaces. Now, picture an elevator servo attached to the aileron servo itself. When you give elevator movement, the control surfaces move because you’re actually MOVING the aileron servo ITSELF. When the aileron input is given, the normal servo arms move the control surfaces as you’d expect.

That’s the kind of rig you’d have to create for mechanical elevon mixing. It’s neat, and I’ve seen it done on small little combat flyers when the pilot didn’t have a programmable transmitter and the servos were embedded on a circuit board. So, not a huge amount of the population would need it. I may try and build one myself someday just to say I did. It’s how I roll here in my RC man cave.

V-Tail Adapter Mixing

So, let’s say you DO NOT have a transmitter that’s capable of mixing built in. Say the park flyer transmitters that come with popular Spektrum bind and fly kits – you know, the game controller looking transmitters. Those don’t have mixing built in for delta wing style, because they’re often attached to planes with fully separate elevators and ailerons.

So what can you do then? Pick yourself up a v-tail mixer device. They’re cheap and online and here are two examples. One here and one here

The wiring for these is really quite simple. The hardware mixer sits between your receiver and servos. You plug your mixer into your aileron and elevator receiver channels, and the servos plug into the mixer. Voila! Instant elevon/delta wing mixing.

Programmable Transmitters

This is by far the preferred method. Most of our transmitters these days are programmable in some way, either by a PC or on the transmitter itself via switches and buttons and big old LCD screen to confuse you. However, this really is the best way to program mixing, as mechanical requires much more building setup and the v-tail mixers aren’t often as customizable as you might like.

As far as your transmitter goes, you want to look in your setup menus for options such as ‘Elevon Mixing’, ‘Delta Wing Mixing’ and the like. They’re typically under setup / adjustment / wing mix menu options. If only I had every single transmitter out there, but I don’t… so it’s hard to describe it in exact menu locations.

What is our goal with this mixing of which you speak?

The goal here is to have aileron/elevator stick movement translate into moving our elevons together in harmony. They shouldn’t be separate. We want Brad and Angelina, not Brad and Jennifer. If that reference is still applicable when you read this, I’m thankful. I would have used Burt and Loni or Ike and Tina but then I’d really be dating myself.

Quite simply though, here’s the final output checklist for your stick movements and what your control surfaces should be doing. If you’re looking at the back of the plane and the nose of the craft is facing away from you:

• Moving your elevator stick DOWN (toward you)
  Both control surfaces should move UP
• Moving your elevator stick UP (away from you)
  Both control surfaces should move DOWN
• Moving your aileron stick RIGHT
  the RIGHT control surface moves up, the LEFT control surface moves down
• Moving your aileron stick LEFT
  the LEFT control surface moves up, the RIGHT control surface moves down

No matter what mixing method you choose, if things aren’t looking like the above, you may need to reverse some servo directions on your transmitter or swap aileron/elevator servo receiver channels on your craft.

Manually mixing with your transmitter

A lot of transmitters offer ‘Programmable’ or ‘User’ mix options. These are for when the built in mixes on transmitters don’t give you what you’re looking for. Elevon mixing is SO common that I’d be surprised to see a programmable transmitter made today that doesn’t have it built in.

However, if you watch the video, we go through creating a manual mix, two of them to be exact. Why? We want the elevator stick input to also move the aileron servo (mix 1). We ALSO want the aileron stick input to move the elevator servo (mix 2). So they’re actually mixing against each other in a way.

So, a brief intro to mixing, targeted towards delta wing style flyers, like our combat flyer. Enjoy!

Note: HoverAndSmile.com is no more.  The content has been migrated into krystof.io.

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Original Date posted: March 10, 2010

Dual Rates

This was actually the first transmitter video/article I wanted to create, but I figured we should walk before we run, as even though it’s one of the more exciting transmitter topics to cover, without knowing about creating model memory slots or binding, you can’t effectively work with dual rates and expo.

So, let’s break out the definitions. Let’s define Dual Rate and Exponential as the two primary methods for regulating servo arm throw during flight for purposes of altering the aerodynamic handling of your aircraft. A bit of a mouthful, so let’s ‘break it down’ (hopefully a little better than Michael Keaton in Night Shift). With any of your airplanes or helicopters, from big to small, servos are used for such things as changing the angle of your swash-plate, which in turn alters the the angle your helicopter blades spin at, causing it to change direction, as well as moving your ailerons, rudder, and elevators on your plane to change angle, causing your airplane to change direction.

The movements of your transmitter sticks are relayed to your receiver which in turn controls your servos. In general, moving a stick on your transmitter all the way from one end to another, be it left/right or up/down, also moves your servo from one end point of rotation all the way to it’s opposite end point of rotation. The movement of your servo arm from one end to the other is often called servo throw or servo travel.

Looking at this graph here, we have a simple linear graph of transmitter stick movement and servo arm travel. The actual distance of the servo throw doesn’t matter, it’s your baseline, and that’s what counts. Moving the stick from one point to another moves the servo accordingly, from one end point to another. We’ll use this graph as a reference for the remainder of the article to explain how dual rates and exponential change this graph.

Now, with that said, let’s explain dual rates. They’re called dual rates because transmitters often have ‘hi/lo’ switches to move from one set of rates to another set of rates. Dual rate means you can switch between two settings of servo travel with just a simple flip of a transmitter switch. If your high-rate is set at 100%, that means your servos move 100% of the total allowed arm travel or throw. If your low-rate is at 50%, then when you flip the transmitter switch, the servos now only move 50% of the total allowed throw. So looking at the graph, this red line represents high-rate. We would represent low rate by reducing the angle of the line, which means even though it extends all the way across the line of transmitter stick movement, the amount of servo travel decreases.

Think of your car’s steering wheel. If you could only turn the wheel half as far as you could, you wouldn’t be able to make turns as tightly as you could if you turned your wheel all the way. Same idea applies here.

That’s the general idea. There is no magic dual rate amount from one plane to the next because it ALL comes down to how YOU fly the plane. However, it’s often recommended that beginners use low rates, and if you’re not sure what rates you need, start conservatively. Start off at 65-75% and change by 10% intervals until you’re comfortable. Whittle down accordingly.

Exponential

Exponential and Dual Rates work well together, but without confusing you too much let’s look at Exponential alone with a regular 100% rate. Exponential is the term used for when you apply an exponential curve to our servo throw/transmitter stick graph. What does this give you, in essence? Stick numbing.

Numbing the stick around the center point is a great way to learn helicopter hovering, as you won’t be so apt to fling the helicopter from one direction to another as you learn not only to react to the helicopter’s movements, but predict how the helicopter is going to move next.

So let’s take a look at what exponential looks like on a graph alone:

Follow along the lines. Notice how if you transmitter stick is just barely moved away from center, there is less servo throw on this graph as compared to the far ends. This is what gives you that ‘numb’ feel around the center point, but at the end points it’s just like exponential was never even set – where the curve ‘catches up’ to the end points.

Go back to the steering example we used before. This time, think of loose vs tight steering. Loose steering is similar to having exponential on your steering wheel, you need to really turn it more to start moving, while the opposite is true of tight steering. That’s why it all comes down to a matter of feel. For experienced pilots, too much exponential may make a craft feel ‘sluggish’, whereas a beginner pilot may have their hands full.

Look now at the combination of exponential and dual rates. Building upon all the ideas discussed here, it’s not a huge step, but a fundamental one nonetheless:

All the dual rate changes is the end point travel, the exponential curve stays the same.

The easiest way to feel this before you fly is to just change your craft’s dual rates and expo on your workbench and play with the controls, you can easily see how different the ailerons and elevators work by just watching how far/smooth they move when in one rate or another. A little harder to see with a helicopter, so just be careful with the hovering. 

Why?

Why? What does switching rates give us? There are numerous reasons to change the amount of servo throw, two reasons to consider are training and speed. An experienced pilot may fly a plane at a higher rate of servo throw, as they’re comfortable with the plane and how it flies. Handing that plane to an inexperienced pilot with the same rates could be a disaster, because when we first learn to fly we’re awfully jerky with the sticks… at least most of us are. This makes it awfully difficult to get control because beginners feel the need to correct themselves by moving sticks dramatically from end to end. So, a beginner pilot using the low-rate setting will enjoy a more docile craft for the sake of learning and getting a feel of how the craft flies.

Speed is another reason. For example, the faster an airplane moves, your control surfaces have a more dramatic effect on your flight. Take a plane flying slowly with elevators moving at just 20 degrees from center. Now, double or triple the speed of the plane, but keep the 20 degrees the same. The change is dramatic due to the amount of air now moving over your control surfaces. For this case, then a pilot may have a lower rate setting while they’re really pushing the speed to the limit, so they can still retain control, and use the higher rate (i.e. more control surface deflection because the servo arms move farther) when flying more slowly.

How?

Well, here we come down to the parts that are best represented by video. We have four movies ready for you here, two on the theory of dual rates and exponential, followed by how to set dual rate and expo with both the Spektrum DX6i and Spektrum DX7 transmitters.

Enjoy!

Note: HoverAndSmile.com is no more.  The content has been migrated into krystof.io.

The post Dual Rates and Exponential appeared first on Krystof.IO.

Original Date posted: January 13, 2010

Let’s look at what binding does, what model memory is used for, and examples with an mSR, foam flyer, Spektrum DX-6 and DX-7 transmitters.

Here’s the video, and the article follows:

What’s Binding?

Binding is the process of linking your receiver and transmitter together. Each transmitter and receiver have their own unique identifier, like a social security number, except without the identity theft issues. We call this a GUID code – Global Unique Identification. The receiver will remember which transmitter it has been bound to, so that the next time you turn both on, the transmitter and receiver automatically set up the channels to communicate with each other. Rebinding the receiver to a different transmitter negates the previous binding.

So, take a look at this stock transmitter that comes with an mSR or Park Zone Micro Mustang. It binds just like a Spektrum DX-6i, but it only has one memory slot to hold one receiver’s unique ID. This means if you wanted to use this transmitter on a different aircraft, you would have to rebind each time you swapped out your airplane or helicopter. It’s very possible however, to take this transmitter and say, bind it to your mCX, like I have here. This is the stock transmitter that came with a P-51D Micro Mustang, and by following the instructions on the back of the transmitter, I’ve bound it to my mCX.

This won’t work for an advanced 6 channel helicopter, but it does work for any of the craft that use the tiny 5-in-1 and similar receiver units that the Park Zone Vapor, mCX, mSR, and Micro Mustang share. So, in theory, you could buy one of those with a stock transmitter, and then purchase the rest without, and rebind each time, reset your trims, and then fly the craft of your choosing. Since you have to re-trim and rebind, however, the stock transmitters really aren’t that great, and sooner or later you’ll want the control and flexibility of a true programmable transmitter.

Model Memory

This is where model memory slots come into play. The more advanced programmable transmitters like this DX-6i generally have ten or more memory slots to bind with (in this case) ten different receivers, one per model memory slot. Each slot has its own unique settings as well. One slot can be set up for a helicopter, while another slot can be used for an airplane. That’s why model memory is so convenient.

How exactly do you bind a transmitter with a receiver? Well, there are some differences between vendors, from Spektrum, Futaba, JR, and so on, but the idea is very similar. First, you’ll need an empty model memory slot on your transmitter to store your receiver’s unique ID, so let’s set that up now. We’ll create a memory slot for our Blade mSR on a DX-6i and a foam flyer on our DX-7.

DX-6i Model Memory Creation:

• We’re creating a memory slot on our DX-6i to hold our mSR.

• Use model select to find an open model slot. We have an open slot number 8 here, and it’s defaulted to an airplane model.

• Now click the thumb-wheel again, scroll all the way down and select setup list.

• Select model type, and choose helicopter.

• Give your model a name. Scroll down to model name, press your button. Scroll through the letters, assign the characters, and then select Ok!

• Scroll down to Swash Type and make sure you have 1 Servo 90 Degrees selected. This is a requirement when binding the mSR in Helicopter mode.

• Scroll back up to main, and you’ll see we now have the mSR slot configured. Turn your transmitter off with that model slot selected.

DX-7 Model Memory Slot Creation

• We’re creating a memory slot on our DX-7 to hold our foam flyer, an example of binding to a larger transmitter you’ll find on a Blade 400, CX3, etc.

• Hold down your select and scroll down buttons at the same time. This lets you select which model you want to fly. We have a open helicopter slot on 15, so we’ll need to change this.

• Select and Up buttons take you back to the menu, scroll to ‘Type Select’ and select Acro for Airplane. You’ll have to confirm this with your clear key, as it will wipe out any helicopter related settings you may have had in this slot.

• Select and Up again, this time scroll to Model Name and give a name to this slot. We’re using ‘FF’ for foamie flyer.

• Select and Up for the menu again, select model select and you can confirm you’ve now changed your slot to an airplane type with your given slot name.
• Then hit Select and DOWN to actually select this slot for the transmitter to use. Shut off your transmitter with this slot active, as when you enter bind mode, your transmitter will use this slot to bind with your receiver.

DX6i mSR Binding

Now that you have that completed, you must put your craft into binding mode. Spektrum transmitters usually have two different ways of setting a receiver to binding, and it depends on the size of the receiver. For the small receivers used in the Vapor, Micro Mustang, mCX or mSR, you place your aircraft in bind mode by simply having your transmitter off, then plugging the battery into your aircraft. Since the receiver isn’t detecting it’s currently bound transmitter, it will automatically enter bind mode, with a blinking light which basically means it’s waiting for you to down your drink, walk up to the bar, and ask for its phone number.

Let’s bind our mSR. We have a model memory slot created for it on our DX-6i, and the transmitter was last shut off with that model selected, which is the slot the transmitter will use when binding, so make sure it turns on with our new mSR slot selected. With the mSR in binding mode, hold the ‘training switch’ forward while turning on your transmitter. You’ll see the word BIND flashing in your transmitters display and hear a constant string of beeps. Let go of the training switch, and your transmitter is now in bind mode, just like your receiver. Let a few seconds go by, and you’ll see that the blinking LED on your mSR has turned solid, and your transmitter is now controlling your aircraft.

Remember that when you fly your craft again, you don’t want to enter bind mode every time. Therefore, turn your transmitter on FIRST, make sure you have the right memory slot selected, then turn on your mSR. The same goes for your larger receivers as well. Unless you’re binding, your transmitter is the first item to turn on, and it’s always, regardless of binding, the last thing you turn off.

DX7 Foam Flyer Binding (Larger Receiver)

Larger receivers often require a bind plug to put the receiver into bind mode. Bind plugs are usually shipped with a receiver, and for Spektrum models we place the bind plug in the channel marked ‘BATTERY’, or ‘BATT’ for short. Make sure your transmitter is off, then supply power to your transmitter and you’ll see it’s ready to be bound, and in our case the small LED is blinking rapidly.

Inserting the bind plug into the BATT channel.

Now that our receiver is in bind mode, we need to turn on our transmitter in bind mode to talk to the receiver. To do this on the DX-7, push the BIND/RANGE TEST button on the back of your transmitter, then turn your transmitter on. Let go of the bind button (it will flash green), and within a few seconds you should have control of your craft with your transmitter. You can test that generally by moving the aileron and elevator control and see that servos are responding. Remove the bind plug, and power off your unit. You’re now bound… and hopefully not gagging.

Besides binding different receivers to the same transmitter, you can also bind the same receiver into different model memory slots of your transmitter. In case you’re wondering why we would want to do this, consider the case of these foamie flyers. I may have two different foam flyers I use, and I may only have one receiver available at the time. If I setup two different model memory slots for each craft, I can simply remove it from one craft and put it in another, and all I have to change is which model memory slot my transmitter is using and rebind, so keep those bind plugs handy.

Use multiple memory slots if you move a receiver from one craft to another. You still need to rebind though!

Note: HoverAndSmile.com is no more.  The content has been migrated into krystof.io.

The post Transmitter Binding and Model Memory appeared first on Krystof.IO.

Original Date posted: December 31, 2009

The Transmitter. Keeping you from swinging a rope from your hand to the plane to make it fly. Communicating with the receiver component of your craft, the transmitter relays your commands in order to maneuver your plane or helicopter. Easily the most potentially expensive part of your R/C collection, transmitters may look alike from one to the other, but under the hood they can be completely different beasts.

Here’s the video if you’d rather jump straight to that:

Although we’ll look at various transmitter types in this segment, throughout the series we’ll be diving into more detail with the Spektrum DX6i and DX7 transmitters. 99% of the topics and ideas will apply to other popular transmitters, however, so don’t worry too much about the brand specifics. In the end, it all comes down to translating the ideas to the specific transmitter model you’re using.

You may be intimidated the first time you see one of the more expensive or capable transmitters. When I first saw a DX-6i, I knew forever gone were the days of a coat hanger thick wire hand held transmitter controlling a Dukes of Hazard R/C Car that could only move forward in a straight direction, and it could only turn in… you guessed it… reverse.

Transmitter Parts and Modes

Let’s take a quick look at what a typical transmitter has on it. The most important parts are of course your sticks – they control all the actions of your craft. One of the more interesting differences in transmitters that you may never have to worry about or even hear of is ‘Mode’. Mode 2 Transmitters are the de facto standard in the Americas, while the rest of the planet and solar system generally use Mode 1. We’re really not sure what Antarctica uses, to be honest. The difference in modes relates to which stick performs which function. Mode 2 transmitters have throttle/rudder on the left, and aileron/elevator on the right. In total, there are actually four modes, but modes 1 and 2 are the most popular.

It’s not a deal breaker, but I wouldn’t want to have to switch back and forth, so I look for Mode 2 transmitters myself, as it’s what I’m used to. It’s that simple… if you’re a PC person, you’re more comfortable on a PC. If you’re a Mac person, you’re more comfortable on a Mac. If you’re running Linux you can use whatever mode Antarctica uses for terms of this discussion.

Back to the transmitter. We have our basic controls – throttle for speed and lift,rudder for yaw, which means the rotation of your craft along the Z axis, elevator for controlling pitch, that is whether your craft points up and down, and the final control,aileron, which dictates the rolling of your craft.

Trim switches on your transmitter are for building in fine tune control gestures. For example, if your plane has a tendency to roll to the left when trying to fly it straight, or your helicopter has a tendency to slightly turn on it’s own, you can use the trim to ‘nudge’ your craft without having to constantly hold a stick in a specific direction.

The Trainer switch is used when a training capable transmitter is linking to another transmitter with a special trainer cable. Used primarily when learning to fly at your local R/C club, it allows a newcomer to control a craft under an experienced pilot’s supervision, and if need be, just like a new student driver, the more adept pilot can take control of the craft with their own transmitter.

Rates/Flaps/Gear Switches – They’re more than just for looking cool while you flick switches around in flight. These switches can help control flaps or retractable landing gear on planes, as well as change the whole sensitivity of your craft while in flight. For example, the faster your airplane moves, the more responsive your stick movements will be, so pilots often use these switches to ‘numb’ the controls when doing high speed maneuvers, as stick movements in a more ‘normal’ setting would cause a fast moving craft to be almost too responsive and risky to fly.

In other parts of our series, we’ll be looking at these controls in more detail, and the topic of dual rates is a most interesting one, as it completely changes the dynamic of your craft mid-flight.

Transmitter Communication Methods

Now that we’ve covered the most common switches, dials, and sticks on your transmitter, let’s look at how transmitters typically communicate to your helicopter or airplane. Most of your R/C transmitters will use the four following methods for the wireless communication to your receiver:

Infra-Red – Often used for cheaper helicopter toy models, you’ll need to stay in line of sight at all times to make sure the signal works through. Just like flipping channels on your TV.

AM Radio – One of the early forms of radio transmission, AM radio is very susceptible to interference compared to FM and 2.4 GHz systems.

FM Radio – The former standard for R/C transmitter radio modulation. FM Radios divide the government mandated hobby FM band into specific channels. Your FM transmitter and receiver must have the same crystals for the frequencies to sync up, and it’s these crystals that designate upon which channel you’re operating. This is often the reason that flying fields have boards to post your name and channel number, so no other pilot will use the same channel as you. You’ll often see FM transmitters with large number tags on the tip of the antenna, used to identify which channel you’re on so other pilots can see which channels not to use.

2.4 GHz Spread Spectrum – The new kid on the block, relatively speaking. 2.4 GHz systems generally solve the FM Radio channel issues by using unique digital identification of receiver and transmitter, basically eliminating the need to wait for an open channel or having to endure signal conflicts. 2.4 GHz systems themselves use complex channel switching and overlay techniques, constantly searching for open channels and paths to use.

These systems are not interchangeable, meaning you can’t use a 72 MHz FM transmitter to control a 2.4 GHz receiver. So, what do these different transmitter radio technologies mean? Typically, whichever route you choose (and most choose 2.4 GHz, followed by FM), there are still choices to make. Different vendors have different communication protocols used for the actual data transmission, regardless of FM, AM or 2.4 GHz. This means a Futaba 2.4 GHz transmitter won’t talk to a Spektrum 2.4 GHz receiver. An E-Sky 72 MHz FM transmitter and an E-Flight 72MHz receiver on the same channel still won’t be able to communicate.

Now, there are companies that do offer some compatibility, with either modules that snap in to a transmitter or by subscribing to a specific frequency and protocol. An example of this is Spektrum’s DSM2 protocol, which is supported by Spektrum transmitters as well as select models of JR Transmitters.

The bottom line is that as you get more into the hobby, you may end up getting a collection of transmitters, one for each craft you purchase. This is clearly not ideal, for reasons of storage, ease of use, transport, etc. This is why most enthusiasts end up choosing a radio frequency and vendor for most of their craft.

Transmitter Channels

Common RC Channels

You will definitely come across the term channels when describing transmitters. A channel is simply a single form of control a transmitter can communicate to a receiver. Moving any stick on your transmitter along a single axis uses one channel. So, for typical transmitters, if you have two sticks, and each stick can move up/down and left/right, you’d be using at least four channels.

The more complex the radio or craft you’re flying, the more channels you’ll need. If you have a plane that uses flaps, or bomb bay doors, you’ll need another channel for each of those controls. Helicopters are often categorized in 3, 4 or 6 channel configurations. You may wonder why the need for two extra channels on some helicopters. Well, as you get more complex heli systems, the fifth channel is often used to remotely control your gyro, and the sixth channel is used for controlling the pitch of your helicopter blades. There are 5 channel helicopters as well, usually leaving out remote gyro control and using the fifth channel for pitch.

Keep in mind that not every three channel aircraft is the same as the next. Some three channels may only use throttle, elevator and aileron control, while a different three channel aircraft may use throttle, elevator, and rudder control. These aircraft don’t have all the capabilities of a four channel airplane, but can still be flown – you’d either roll your plane to turn it with ailerons or use the rudder to rotate it.

So what does a channel physically translate to? Well, your elevator and aileron controls (right stick) would use two channels to communicate with two servos. Your left stick (throttle/rudder) would use one channel for a rudder servo (or tail rotor), and another channel to control the speed of your primary motor.

The bottom line on channels is that the more you have, the more you can do. The typical programmable radios that people will plunk down a bit of cash for are at least six channels or more. With a six channel transmitter, it’s a good guarantee you’ll be able to fly any basic helicopter or airplane setup.

Programmable vs. Non Programmable

Most of your RTF (Ready to Fly) kits that come with transmitters in the box include non-programmable transmitters. These transmitters are generally cheaper and with reduced functionality, sometimes only able to fly the craft they came with. If you buy enough ready to fly kits you’ll start building a collection. Sooner or later you’ll be tired of having that many transmitters around, so if you’re just starting and planning on staying with the hobby, do yourself a favor and pick up a programmable transmitter, like the Spektrum DX6i, DX7, Futaba 6EX, or JR X9303.

Programmable transmitters offer two great benefits. The first is that you can fine tune any of the rates or mixing of your controls. If you want to tone down your aircraft’s elevator with a non programmable transmitter, you’ll have to literally shave the elevator on your plane. With a programmable transmitter, the transmitter can tell the receiver to only let a servo go to a certain point and stop, which lets you dictate how responsive your craft is. The other is model memory. Programmable transmitters let you store memory slots for each craft you have. This means – one transmitter can fly many different craft without having to put your transmitter down and pick up a different one. For example, Pops has his DX-6i transmitter with memory slots for his Blade CX2, his Park-Zone Vapor, his P-51D Mustang Micro Flyer, his mSR, his mCX, and his combat flyer ALL tied to one transmitter. Beats carrying around and having to learn different transmitter types for each craft you fly.

Which one do I buy?

As far as which company’s transmitter to buy, well… it’s a Chevy vs. Ford dilemma all over again. I’m not going to promote one over the other, looking at the popular RC forums you’ll see parties supporting each one. I use Spektrum because it’s what I started out with, and it’s what I’m comfortable with. I like it, but you may not. Talk with your local club, ask your fellow fliers what they use. The six channel transmitters aren’t the most expensive things in the world, but you’d want to make sure exactly what transmitter you’ll want if you plunk down over a thousand dollars for a ten or twelve channel transmitter.

The thing to keep in mind is that since different companies make different transmitters and receivers, you won’t be able to easily switch from Spektrum to Futaba without having to swap out all your receivers as well. Sure, the transmitter may not be a bad price, but if you have five craft flying Spektrum receivers, you’ll need to also buy five Futaba receivers to replace them with. It’s just fair warning. It’s not something you’ll have to worry about right away, but once you are onto your third airplane or helicopter it’s something you really should start figuring into your future purchases.

Of course, ARF – Almost Ready To Fly kits don’t typically come with transmitters or receivers, so you’ll have to purchase the receiver that matches whichever transmitter you’re using and go fly.

Another important note is you’ll often see transmitters reference ‘HELI or AIR’ transmitters. More often than not, especially with programmable transmitters, both will fly helicopters and airplanes. The differences are in which default mode the transmitter will have in it’s model memory (you can change that easily), and how the sticks feel. Air mode transmitters have a ratched throttle stick, while helicopter transmitters do not. It’s not a deal breaker, you can use either or, it’s best to have one in your hand to feel it as far as the ratcheted throttle stick goes before you choose.

In the end, we hope this introduction to transmitters and the different kinds available will help you understand a bit better when someone throws the term 2.4 GHz around, or talks about things like four or six channel aircraft.

In the next installment of our series we’ll be looking at binding your transmitter to models as well as model memory!

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