Tag Archives: London radio sailing

Living in The Southeast? Do You know TJD Models…?

It probably doesn’t matter if you live in the Southeast of UK or not…. but we are all interested in where we can find shops and suppliers useful to radio sailors.

When I borrowed an IOM to start radio sailing, I needed some help to replace batteries with JST connectors and also intelligent chargers. A Chipstead member recommended TJD Models at a little place in North West Kent named Sutton at Hone. Maybe all model shops are like theirs, but to me the range of stock seemed enormous.

They were all about rc cars and planes, but listened patiently to me wittering on about radio sailing. They were really helpful and to meet my requirement, they had to pop out the back and solder up some connectors for me free of charge. Really kind and helpful. Nothing was too much trouble. I promised them straight away that I’d be back.

For one reason and another it was a few months before I thought to contact them. I decided I’d get a spare radio receiver to keep in my toolbox.

I placed the order on their website at 4.58pm on a Saturday. I was thinking delivery maybe the following Wednesday. Honestly,…. at 5.45pm the same afternoon there was a ring on the doorbell and a smart guy hands me a package and says “here’s your receiver”…. I couldn’t believe it. 47 minutes delivery.

Basically I had only just logged off from the computer. I couldn’t figure momentarily what had just happened. It was like I had a “Dr Who Tardis” type moment. Time warp in action. The super kind chap from TJD had dropped the package off on his way home.

Beat that, Amazon Prime…..Or Deliveroo.

https://www.tjdmodels.com

Radio Receiver Chatter – Interesting Short Video….!

I saw in the Club WhatsApp group some exchanges about transmitters and receivers. In particular, Craig and Rohan were very keen on a receiver unit called the AR620 from Spektrum.

This little video came up when I googled it. It’s just a few minutes long. It’s an interview with the Technical Director of Spektrum. It is pretty interesting to hear what the product designers think is important. Of course, it’s 100% about planes and rc cars, but nonetheless I was intrigued to hear his comments about:-

  • No antenna – integrated aerial by Texas Instruments and it actually performs better than dangly wire aerials
  • Binding to the transmitter via a button, and two methods
  • FlyBy telemetry for reading onboard battery capacity, and “flyby” means it only works to a range of 600-800 feet
  • A very intriguing set of remarks about mounting the receiver 2-3 inches away from carbon fibre in the plane fuselage as the carbon blocks the signal. Given the amount of carbon fibre in our Marbleheads, it’s worth reflecting over. Note that Craig and Rohan didn’t make any comments about this being a problem. A small (not thorough) piece of research from me said that Kevlar does let radio signals in. Interesting.
  • Quite a large amount of chat about two failsafe modes, “PreSet” and “SmartSafe” and the “Hold Last Command”. In radio sailing that part of worth listening to a couple of times.

What Colour Floats Your Boat …?!

I sometimes wonder at the sight of a multi-coloured fleet of boats and ponder the choices which each skipper may have made regarding the choice of boat, patch, luff colours.  I imagine for a lot of skippers it’s of little or no importance, but for some it’s obviously all part of the enjoyment.

So as a lighthearted distraction I wonder if skippers and builders would like to share any thoughts they might have on the subject.

Which colours if any are difficult to produce?

Which are the most used colours?

Which colours are most or least visible?

Which colours fade?

I recall seeing at least one boat which was colourless/transparent. Maybe the decision for that skipper was just too much!

Red and Green should not be seen without a colour in between. Imagine if this rule were adopted by IRSA!

The introduction of multi-coloured fittings and mast tube has also taken us to a new level of what’s possible.

What’s your colour?

And why?

PH