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[class37]

hi all,

afraid this may seem a stupid question, but following a digital interface malfuction [yes, pushed it the wrong way] my C-130 herky bird sustained cat 5 damage when it was softer than the ground.

is it worth while to salvage the rc & motors, or would they not be suitable for a boat, as obviously there is no reverse.

the rc is four channel, but with only three controls, a fore & aft stick which was for elevators, and side to side stick which was the rudder.

the third control is a rocker switch on the top of the tx case, which was the engine on / off, although to actually start the motors you had to switch this rocker on then press a start button, presumably a safety feature.

on the rx there is one spare socket [ch4] and the batt socket is also empty, so I presume it is powered via the 'esc'. the other two sockets are the servos.

any reasonable suggestions accepted, and have already decided to give up flying, and concentrate on sailing my tug.

cheers

alan

[DickyD]

Presumably your radio gear is 35MHz for flying which is no good for boats which have to be on 40MHz.

[class37]

hi DickyD

transmitter has C&F digital proportional on it, with a sticker on the back saying 26.995 MHz, although the receiver has 27 Mhz on it.

does this still mean it's no good for boats ?

cheers

alan

[Martin (Admin)]

Yes, that's 27MHz radio and ideal for boat.

 ....... usually, water is softer that ground!

[das boot]

Yes, that's 27MHz radio and ideal for boat.

 ....... usually, water is softer that ground!

"usually...."




Rich

[class37]

many thanks for that, Martin, only problem is I haven't yet mastered walking on water, mind you after over lubrication I have problems walking on ground 

seriously I can presumeably replace one servo with an esc to give me proportional engine control, and use the other servo for the rudder, and then use the on / off channel for something else, knowing me an emergency bilge pump !

cheers

alan

[class37]

hi Rich,

so for the novice what probs with 27 ??

I have an awfull lot to learn on this.

[HS93 (RIP)]

what motor is it ? got a picture or any numbers? should be able to use it what type of boat would you like to put it in ?speed boat /tug/etc

[class37]

Hi Rich,

sorry the penny has dropped... the usually was re the water, not the 27 MHz.

must engage brain before typing !

cheers

alan

[andrewh]

Class37
(I generated this reply at lunchtime, but the companies nanny-software prevented it being sent)

I see that the frequency issue has been answered, but not what the motors etc are

Sorry you have rekitted your Herky bird

The answer to your question is a sort-of yes, certainly.

BUT - the radio for surface use must be 27, 40 Mhz or 2.4 giggles  - if you were flying on 35mhz you cannot use the radio at all.

But motors, ESCs etc 9and prolly the flight batteries are perfectly usable. 

Am I right in assuming a GWS C130?  in which case its GWS direct drive motors?  or is it brushless?
Either are fine and fun for boats.  Since you have 4 of them and a good capacity flight pack perhaps something fast with multi-motors MTG, MGB, E-boat, PT boat?  Would be a nice contrast to your tug

Or you could make a BOSS airboat  (praps use some of the Herky) and have 3 or 4 motors with airscrews?
OR you could carve a swift Sunderland of about the same size as the Herk and combine your skills and interests

What kind of thing, er, floats your boat?
andrew

[class37]

Hi HS93,

motors are about 25mm l x 20mm w x 15mm d.

number on them reads FK130PH-2475/42

the 4 motors appear to be wired in parallel, and the battery was 12v.

am thinking of a 1/72 platform support vessel for my first build, the tug was bought second hand, so I am not sure if the motors would be strong enough, mind you I won't be looking for high speeds, an presumably I can use a 12v gel battery rather than the nicads used for the C-130.

see, I have already learned something from this site .... batteries = ballast !


any help ?

cheers

alan

[dodgy geezer]

Class37
(I generated this reply at lunchtime, but the companies nanny-software prevented it being sent)

I see that the frequency issue has been answered.....

andrew

He probably needs to know that 26.995 is BROWN frequency, which means that he should tie a little brown pennant on his aerial, and check at the pond that no one else around has a brown pennant before turning on...

[class37]

Hi AndrewH,

sorry not sure what you mean by GWS ? is that a make ?

C-130 was I think by a firm called LEE, a sort of polystyrene with strengthening bits of plastic and what looked like gaffer tape.

motors have what I presume are suppressors wired between both the pos & neg posts and the casing, ie 2 per motor.

Herky was about 1000mm span, 745mm length [now much more compact] and a charge gave about 10 mins. then you recharged the battery with an adaptor from the car cigarette lighter socket.

one thing I am not sure of is if I can simply bridge out the push switch you had to use to start the motors, or if this would cause a problem in the esc. on the Herky once you turned the motors off, that was that ! if I can't then it will have to be a new esc.

it was quite good fun till the pilot cocked up ! still quite spectacular, and it fits in a much smaller bag now !

I don't seem too have the co-ordination for flying, as I managed to 'rekit' [what a lovely term] a helicopter last year, let it get too far from me, and it all shut down, then demonstrated it's ability not to glide ! SWMBO says I'm too dangerouse with whirly things, so I suggested the tug, and amazingly she agreed. said I couldn't crash that ........ but with my luck I'll hit an iceberg !

at the moment I'm looking at building a platform support vessel in 1/72, so I may try the motors when I get the hull completed, though I'm not sure if they'll have the grunt needed.

still it's all a learning curve, and I may recycle sme of the herky to fill some of the compartments in the new build instead of buying bean bag filling !

cheers

alan

[class37]

Hi dodgey geezer,

many thanks for that. can you also show your freq by a coloured ball on the end of your aerial, or is that just a saftey thing, and only a pennant can show your freq ?

cheers

alan

[DickyD]

This will explain what colour ribbon you need on your antenna.

http://www.ukrcc.org/27mhz.html

[amdaylight]

Hi dodgey geezer,

many thanks for that. can you also show your freq by a coloured ball on the end of your aerial, or is that just a saftey thing, and only a pennant can show your freq ?

cheers

alan

Yes the custom is to use a colored ribbon, but a ball with the right color and frequency number on it will work. The whole point of this is so someone can look and see what frequency you are using and not turn the same frequency on.

Andre
over yonder in Portland Oregon

[Peterm]

The rubber ball is also to prevent you poking someone`s eye out.   Pete M

[andrewh]

ClaSS 37

Tent-peg landings=rekitting

Ok, now I know the model, know the motors
(GWS is Grand Wing Servo, who do lots of large plastic planes including a C-130)

Your plane was steered, I believe, by differential speed control of the left and right motors, and it clearly has an elevator control as well
.  
From what you say I think there is a receiver with servo sockets (and a frequency!)  Is the elevator servo a conventional servo (little box with three wires and a plug?)
Do the motors have 2 seperate speed controls?

Photos, we need photos of the transmitter, receiver and all the bits that you extracted from the ground

The answer is still yes - it will work in a boat.  You MAY have to steer and control speed by using the motor differentials, or you may be able to flick a switch (usually called Mix, or Ail Mix or elevon mix) and seperate the two channels

The FK130 is a really high speed little spinner of a motor.  You could replace the two little motors on each side with one motor suitable for a boat - something like a 385

So then you would have two 385s with forward (only) control and steering

You COULD use your third channel to switch reverse

Post us a couple of Pics of the radio components, please
andrew

[class37]

Hi AndrewH

sorry to be so slow replying.

plane had a 4 channel tx, but only three controls.

left stick working a servo for elevators
right stick working a servo for the rudder.

rocker switch at top left hand of tx case which switched on engines, but you then had to momentarially press a push button on the aircraft to start the engines.

switching the rocker switch again turned off the engines.

only flight controls were rudder & elevator, no engine speed control, just all or nothing.

on the rx five slots, one marked batt which was empty, two with the servos, one with the esc and one [ch4] again empty.

will dig the wreckage, sorry, donor vehicle, out tomorrow and take some pics and try to upload.

much appreciate all the time & effort you are all putting into this.

cheers

alan

[class37]

Hi AndrewH,

think I have finally sorted out how to post pics, so here goes

[class37]

it worked !

as you can see the lead from the esc to the engines is only two wires, so I assume there is no control of engines other then the ON / OFF from the rocker switch on top of the tx case.

the two servos are only connected to the flying surfaces.

wonder if I put the esc into ch2 slot, if that would give me speed control, or if the esc is not designed for that.

cheers

alan

[class37]

Hi all,

haven't done much with this radio setup yet, until the other day when I was looking at my Azteca class patrol boat [ see seperate thread - http://www.modelboatmayhem.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=20478.0]

I decided to have a quick play, and started off with the rudder servo in ch1.

it worked.

then plugged the ESC [from the boat, not the exC-130] into ch2, and found I had full control forward and astern.

this is looking good .

then got clever and decided to see what happened if I plugged a servo into ch3
this is the rocker switch on the top left hand side of the tx.

this turned out to give full deflection of the servo in both directions, so I then tried the esc in this channel and found that with it switched 'off' I had full astern, and with it switched 'on' I had full ahead. errrrrrr

quickly replaced the esc into ch2 and after checking all was ok, switched it all off.

now I am wondering if the esc that came with the a/c has some sort of diode or something so that the motors only run ahead [wouldn't want to reverse into a mountain, would we ?]

I have noticed that the Azteca hull seems to have originally had three props and rudders, with the outer props & shafts removed and filled, and the tops of the outer rudder casings sealed with plastic pipes.

now the old brain creaked into motion, and came up with the following, so what thoughts do you have ?
[this assumes that the C-130 esc will work as suggested above - as I'm back on nights haven't had a chance yet to check]

1. refit the two outer motors / props, and connect to the C-130 esc, which should give only full ahead.
2. refit outer rudders linked to centre one.
3. use the centre motor for normal sailing and manouvering, but if a little get up and go required, hit ch3 and get the outer motors wound up to full thrutch !

I presume outers would counter rotate, but would the use of three rudders / one prop at normal speed cause any problems ?

still trying to find out how I can get the 4th channel to work !

afraid that if I open the tx box I might let all the smoke out !!!


suppose I'd better get some work done, but will check back to see what sort of anguish I've caused with this latest idea !

cheers

alan

[class37]

well, certainly didn't seem to get any response there.

anyway, have now tried the exC-130 esc and it did not work as hoped, so it's back to the drawing board again.

I have now gutted the hull, and have recut the slots for the outer propshafts, and redrilled the holes for the outer rudders.

after looking at the Action site, I see that I could run two motors off the esc, and still use the tx / rx that I've got in her at the moment, just forgetting the 3rd channel as far as motors are concerned.

as the idea of adding the other props was not so much to produce a speed boat, but simply give me enough get-up-and-go to keep out of the way of the swans, what would be your thoughts on just running the two outer shafts, maybe changing the props to three bladed and slightly larger [there is space].

the present prop is a 35mm diameter two bladed, but I could fit 40mm diameter triple bladed props without getting too close to the hull.

the present motor is a Model Motors Direct 777 running on 6v.

any advise ?

cheers

alan