The crystal determines frequency. I've used the Vex with three different brands of Futaba compatible 72mhz Rx's to date. The Rx needs to be single conversion (which most cheap analog Rx's were).
Well, the Barham wasn't quite done so it wasn't battled. BUT, I can completely understand why. Steve took the time to create a beautiful superstructure that was so realistic you'd think it was a picture of the real thing. What a work of art. I was impressed, to say the least. Good job, Steve!
Thin man didn't pass the super rule of 1 inch, but it was very nice photo of a QE. Now if he added some thickness to it it would have passed but it would still be very funny looking end on. Good job Steve, loved it.
I would like to nominate @SteveT44 for the 2016 Clark Ward Award for Excellence in Superstructure Design.
Decided to up the operating voltage on the Barham to 24v. Testing at the Fall regional at 12v was a bit sluggish. Jumping to 24v turned the RS-555PH's drive motors into beasts. Checked the spec on the motors and they are rated up to 30v so I should be OK there. One issue is the built in voltage regulator on my custom cannon board and the BEC in the pump ESC. The linear regulator on my board is at the top of it's rated input voltage at 24v and the BEC in the pump ESC is rated even less, so some electronic mods are in order to accommodate 24v. First mod was to modify an HK 30A brushed ESC for higher voltage. This basically involved removing the on-board BEC (5v regulator chip). Since I'm not powering the board from main voltage, I also removed the positive power cable and filter cap. The ESC logic side will be powered from the 5v coming over on the servo cable. The FET's on the board are rated to 48v by the manufacturer so running 24v mains isn't a problem. To handle the 5v supply for the model I ordered a 5amp 5v BEC from Pololu. Nice little unit, made in the USA, and is rated to 30v input voltage. This is a switch-mode regulator so it doesn't dump excess voltage off as heat like the cheap linear regulators that hobby electronics come with. Since I was redoing my cannon board, I decided to cut it down to four cannon's (original could fire eight). This freed up space so I could mount the TIP120 transistors directly on the board (these were off-board on the old board). Here I'm halfway through fabbing the new board. This is using a custom micro-controller (chip with the red dot) that reads two R/C channels and switches the four transistors, which in turn switch the cannon solenoids.
Tested my Mk3 firing board this morning. Works great and is firing FAST! Much quicker than the Pololu trigger in the Mogador. Also, pumping 24v into my 12v Kips, they're firing WITH AUTHORITY! Wouldn't be surprised if I was spiking any seismographs in a ten mile radius.
Hmmm..... So would you want your kid pondside while firing those guns? Sometimes I think that we forget SAFETY while getting the most out of our guns...... Not sure I would have stayed in the hobby if I didn't feel save bringing my kids to the pond.
I was only referring to the solenoid switching rate and how hard the solenoids are clicking. The cannons themselves are still limited to 150psi so the hitting power hasn't changed.
You can put your eye out with a rubber band, fast is different than hard. Guns now are generally much harder hitting than they really need to be. My test is simple "would you put your hand 6 inches away and shoot?". If yes then TWEEK , if no then relax.
The most dangerous thing in the hobby is all of us old out of shape guys running around in the heat. Then trying to swim for a ship. I'm surprised we haven't had a heart attack yet.
I interpreted setting off seismographs to the "POP" of the gun firing, not the "click" of the solenoid. I am in agreement that a large part of the fun in this hobby is working to get just a little more out of our ships. We have heard rumors of some pretty spectacular achievements with these toy BB cannons. I am sure that much of it is exaggerated. BB cannons setting off seismographs was just a little bit of a red flag to me. I am very comfortable with Carl's viewpoint.
In the tank world we measure hitting power by how long the 1" diameter scars on your shin take to fade away!
