[NSRCA-discussion] Futaba 2.4 FASST

[Michael Wickizer]

Jason:

Great news about the 2.4 systems, but much more entertaining to hear about 
your testing methodolgy.

Mike


>From: "JShulman" <jshulman at cfl.rr.com>
>Reply-To: NSRCA Mailing List <nsrca-discussion at lists.nsrca.org>
>To: "JShulman" <jshulman at cfl.rr.com>
>Subject: Re: [NSRCA-discussion] Futaba 2.4 FASST
>Date: Mon, 12 Mar 2007 15:06:12 -0500
>
>
>Well, I got out the 2.4 and put it in my beater trainer... and "beat it 
>up".
>Of course, it was anti-climatic as it didn't give me anything even close to
>a problem.  I didn't get to do antenna position testing (too much fun
>flying), but on this
>day, the RX was stuck in the foam with the antenna side facing up. One
>antenna was kind of vertical (had to curve it forward) and the other was
>moved horizontal, towards the back, next to my throttle servo and on-off
>switch.
>
>The first flight was short. I arrived to the field about noon and took out
>my fuselage so I could install the Rx. Having been flying my 14 in my
>trainer (and always getting weird looks cause of it) I had to remember 
>which
>plugs where to what. 5 minutes later, the trainer was programmed and ready
>to go on the 2.4. I did a quick range test on the ground, about 100 paces
>and it was solid so I fueled, started it and took-off... no issues. But
>after 2 minutes the motor died. Hmmmmm... then I remembered, I forgot to
>replace the carb with the new one I just bought, oops. 5 minutes later 
>again
>and it was purring like a kitten. So take-off again, and point the nose up
>(about 20 degrees, its under-powered) and start climbing for the clouds.
>Well the clouds were really up there, so after 10 minutes of climbing to
>them, and seeing that my 54" plane was now a speck in the sky, I flew 
>around
>for a little bit. Went from one end of the field to the other, all the way
>up there. Now at our field, we have a big cell phone tower right in front 
>of
>us about a mile away. Having flown on both the left and right of it didn't
>produce any interference at that altitude. My friend Ryan, who was watching
>all this, said I was somewhere between 1500-2000 ft. I'll take his word for
>it as he
>flies some full-scale and looking down from that altitude gives him a
>different perspective. After my neck couldn't stand it anymore, I dove the
>plane down (I did throttle back) and about 4 minutes later I had it back on
>the ground.
>
>Now this plane is one that I bought literally to go and beat up with the
>understanding that at any given moment it will crash. Usually 
>intentionally,
>but as it's also my test plane for radio equipment, other things can 
>happen.
>So Ryan fueled it up and preceded to have some fun with it. Full power
>touch-n-goes, wing-tip skids and the occasional "oops" prop balancing
>touch-n-go.
>
>So the third flight was my turn to abuse it, after a new prop was put on 
>it.
>High power touch-n-goes (some hit-n-goes to shorten and rebalance the 
>prop),
>wing-tip hits and full power,
>full pull loops and turns. Others wanted to see the range of the
>system. I rocketed up to that
>speck again. I landed, fueled
>and went back up. This time there was a Spektrum flying at the same time, 
>no
>problem. Someone else said "I've got 5 other Spektrums mind if I turn them
>on"... I said go get them.
>
>So he runs back to his trailer, grabs all his radios and starts turning
>them on while he's walking up to me. He gets to me and says, that's 6 total
>Spektrums on (and I'm a speck again) and he's really impressed. Of course
>I'm getting bored up in the clouds so I bring it back down. On the way down
>he has another idea... line the radio's on the edge of the runway and let
>me do my high speed demolition flying. He puts his Spektrums along the edge
>of the run way and I come screaming by and do one of my multiple
>bounce-n-goes and it's rock solid. I come back the other way and same
>result, shorter prop but solid link. By this time, we are
>all impressed with the system.
>
>So that's 2 spread spectrum systems working at the same time, with no
>issues. The future is bright.
>
>Regards,
>Jason
>www.jasonshulman.com
>www.shulmanaviation.com
>www.composite-arf.com
>
>
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