Futaba is coming out with a state of the art 2.4 GHz radio. Go to http://towerhobbies.com/rcnews/070210-futk6900.html to read the initial announcement. I'm told this radio won't have the SmartWinch and transmitter battery problems found in the Spektrum units. The first radios are scheduled to be available in late March from Tower Hobbies. The cost will be slightly higher, but should be worth the difference.

Correction to the Futaba 2.4 GHz site. It should read
http://www.towerhobbies.com/rcnews/070210-futk6900.html

Another correction. Hang in there - I'll get right yet.
http://www.towerhobby.com/rcwnews/070210-futk6900.html

Spectrum has also announced retrofit 2.4ghz modules and receivers for Futaba radios. There is information available on RC Universe.

Mike Denest
EC12 #899

I just ordered my new Futaba 2.4 GHz radio from Tower Hobbies. It will be here next week. If any of you have already gotten one, please let me know I made the right purchase. If none of you have purchased one yet, I will let you know my thoughts in a few weeks.

Joe Walter #24

OUT

Skip, what is the meaning of your post? "OUT"

I hope that is not some code for I bought a piece of crap.[:D]

Joe Walter #24

The funny thing to me is that Futaba seems to have taken the 6EX - their latest 6 channel aircraft radio - and made it into the 2.4ghz radio. That would have been a great thing since the 6EX has a knob that we cuold use for jib trim. But, in their infinite wisdom Futaba replaced the knob with a switch.

Scott

I have one and generally like it, but losing that knob to a switch was a severe disappointment.

Michael Edwards - The Future 69 !

I don't think I will be bothered by not having the knob, as I use the left stick's sideways movement for my jib trim.

Can't wait to get it now.

Joe Walter #24

I would like to have a report of on the operations and installation of the Futaba and the DX Spectrum units for the Building Site to be posted in the the bullentin section. Lets share this information in a place for all, expecially for the beginner with the needed learned precautions.

Email me if you are interested and I will direct the commission that will be in MS Word format.

I do not have one yet and will not till fall. Thanks.

...94

Got the new radio last Thursday and installed it in the boat the same day. Installation was no different from any other radio except that you need to (should) make a single line switch so that you can program the Smart winch at the RX rather than at the TX. Rob Guyatt explains how to do it on his site. http://www.users.bigpond.com/rmgsw/Spek ... LineSwitch

Sailed the boat on Sunday with only one minor glitch that fixed itself after a few minutes. After putting the boat in the water and sailing it away from shore, the response from the servos seemed to be really slow. I would put the rudder hard over, for example, and I could count to 3 before the boat began to turn. Not a good feeling. I managed to not hit any other boats and sailed back towards me where the problem stopped.

After that, it never happened again and I was able to sail the boat a long way from shore with out any loss of control.

I have no idea what might have been the reason for this glitch and the manual did not offer any ideas except that there is a fail safe in the "Throttle" stick that cuts the engine to ideal if the signal is lost or the RX battery drops below 3.8v. Since the slow response was in the rudder servo, this did not make much sense to me.

The radio may have just been searching for a channel when this happened and we do sail near a TV tower, which might have been giving a little interference.

Anyway, like I said, it only lasted a couple of minutes and after that there were no problems.

The radio is easy to program and setting End Points on the servos is a great feature. You can fine tune the travel in the rudder and the jib trim. Not having the knob is a non issue for me as I use the #4 stick to control the jib trim. However, it might have been nice for you guys who still use a twitcher.

Two other members of my club have already rushed out and got one and they too have already installed them in their boats.

So far I am sold on it. Will let you know more after the next regatta and more boats in the way.

There are now over a third of the boats in the Florida EC-12 Association using 2.4GHz radios. Finding open frequencies is quickly becoming a thing of the past. And there are far fewer of us getting poked by antennas.[:D]

Joe Walter #24

Joe:

You're correct, the transmitter was looking for a frequency. I found that when you initially turn on the transmitter, you need to let it "pick up a frequency" for a few seconds before you turn on the boat. Otherwise, you run into the problem you encountered. If you follow this procedure, you won't have any problems at all.
I also designed a relatively simple modification to the transmitter for jib trim control. It entails installing another identical pot to the lower left digital trim pot and attaching a 9C lever arm wherever you want it (I put mine on the upper left side of the transmitter). This alters the trim pot from digital to analog. You will need to install "stops" for the lever (the lever has a channel for this purpose) so it doesn't overrun the servo limits. This mod allows you to adjust the servo to whatever position you desire.

Mike

Mike, that might be a good thing to take some pictures of and post for all to see. I have gotten used to the jib trim on the stick, but it is spring loaded to return to center. I know a lot of guys would like for it to be able to stay where you put it.

Joe Walter #24

Joe, I used my new Futaba 2.4 at Elon this past week-end with 15 other boats. I placed a knob right in the middle of the Futaba label on the front for jib trim and it worked flawlessly. You can easily remove the spring on your left stick if that is what you are used to. Overall, much better results for <b>me</b> than the Spektrum. Skip