Category Archives: Backup Equipment and Tools

Futaba Users : Do You Have a Transmitter Carry-box ??…

Do you get anxious with carrying your delicate transmitter around in the boot of the car… kind of sliding and rolling around?? It has been worrying me. Delicate joysticks and all that.

My Radiomaster Pocket feels like you could throw it across the room and it would come up smiling. Blinking tough, they are. The rest of my transmitters, less so.

Do you have Futaba? Half of our club do. Very popular 🙂 I’ve been looking online for bags or cases for the transmitters simply to protect them from bashes. I found some cheap ones made of black felt which didn’t inspire. I also found some smart steel cases (very sexy in a way) with foam inserts (allegedly for Futaba) but they only take one transmitter at a time and are unreasonably expensive I felt. If you are a two transmitter person, that means lugging two suitcase things into the car each weekend and that’s just before you load the boats and rigs. I felt… not good.

Then by complete accident, I discovered this from Black and Decker. Their standard 19inch toolbox – available everywhere globally I’d guess for about £20 if you’re lucky. I bought mine in UK Homebase DIY Store – in the start of year sales.

Before I show you the inside, those two little red flap compartments on top are good for spare receivers, batteries etc. Very quick access….

But Futaba lovers – look at this!!

It’s like the toolbox was made for our transmitters. Amazing ! One transmitter, no problem! You could get one or even two in there – and the size even protects your transmitter switches just perfectly. Can you see in the photo that the switches are held securely in free space?

To stop them bouncing around, I simply popped some sticky back neoprene in there. The end corners are deliberately not lined as that’s where the switches will sit. It’s really snug and the neoprene holds them like a gloved female hand. You can see I have one piece of loose neoprene to separate two radios.

On top fits a loose tray – great for batteries, voltage testers, or whatever you want.

I tipped the tray over and did this…

I put four neoprene pads to sit over where the joysticks are situated. I reckon that if the transmitter wriggles out (unlikely) of the gloved female grip, they can only move upward 10mm before they touch this neoprene. I might put an extra layer of neoprene in the bottom of the box to lift them up and close that gap completely.

What do you think?? Good for £20 ??

I even like it that it looks anonymous and doesn’t shout “please steal me”!!!

By the way, I have tried it on my Spektrum and it’s too wide for this. So Futaba people, this idea is just for you !!

Beginners Guide to Diagnosing Under-Deck Problems – Electrical/Radio/Winch/Servo….!!

I had a little outage last Marblehead Sunday. The boat slipped into Failsafe mode and drifted quietly off toward the Royal Castle of Windsor!!

The Commodore leapt into RIB duty mode and helped me get it back, no problem! Useful to take a lifter with you! As soon as racing finished, in classic Datchet manner… everyone gathered around, tool boxes came out, to get my fault diagnosed.

It was pretty educational and a great learning to see them go about it. We quite quickly figured all the electrics and radio were OK and identified the winch as a possible failure point. It was great to see them checking out the transmitter, receiver, battery, cabling etc.

All this learning was a delight. So as not to lose it, I have documented the diagnostic and repair process here. If you find yourself in a similar position, it may be helpful. Click below to download.

Can You Cut Dyneema Line with Kevlar Scissors??

Just recently we published a couple of items on both dyneema line sizes and cutting them with dyneema scissors.

In my experimenting here, I happily got my dyneema lines out to find if there is any need for fuss about cutting it… there is!! My Stanley knife and scissor collection was useless.

I immediately googled “dyneema scissors” on Amazon and got the fright of my life … £40-£60 for a pair of scissors!! Tut tut NO!!! I noticed that kevlar scissors were about half the price, and so googled “can you cut dyneema with kevlar scissors?” and this interesting little video came up:-

You can never tell if these videos are genuine or not, can you? Anyway, I found on Amazon the exact Kevlar shears they use in this video – £20 !! Ordered a pair and they are great!! £20 sounds a lot, but at local coffee prices that’s only about 6 flat whites, and they’ll probably last a lifetime. I’m happy!!

It seems that a reason there may be so many kevlar shears out there to choose from is that this is the method of choice for cutting fibre optic cable. Who’d have known the big need for that ten years ago!

I’m less happy about sealing the rope-ends though. I’m using a keelboat rope burner from my toolbox at the minute – very quick, but leaves a bit of a blob. Might be OK. Sailboat RC recommend a quick swipe of THIN superglue along the line, cut it with your wife’s favourite ceramic kitchen knife, and then you can thread it through holes. I have a battery sealing knife in my toolbox – I must have dropped int once too often as it refuses to deal with dyneema or anything else at the moment. SailboatRC list a natty little USB plasma cutter – only 15 euros… but postage is 49 euros!! More research to do!