I have a Futaba 2PHKA-AM 75mhz radio. I was range testing (antenna down)and could only get about 30 ft range. The antenna in the boat is under the deck in a plastic tube. I was standing behind the boat so the rec antenna was facing away from me. The boat is fiber glass. The radio is new. The strange thing is my brother in law has exactly the same system and it does the same thing. I called Futaba and they had no explanation. They say I should get about 100 ft. I finally carried the boat to the far side of the pond and with the antenna up there was no problems so we went sailing anyway.My concern is that if I go to a bigger pond I might have problems. Any ideas?
don
as far as i am concerned. and this is my view and should not be considerd as an expert. if you control your boat 100 feet away with no trouble. then that should be fine for the local ponds. if you are real concern about it. you might want to try and see if running the antenna up the mast. and see if that make a differnece. is your battery pack near the reciever? that might be causing a problem? it did on one of my old radios. i just moved the battery pack way from the reciever, and the problem went away. i use a tower radio in most of my boats. and I have never had a radio problem. the fm will be a better radio . that is for sure. but sail. and have fun. if your pond is only 100 feet wide. why worry if you cannot control you boat 400 feet away. what you cant see ,you cant drive, and from my piont a view , i dont want to sail in that condition
good luck
try running the attenna up the mast or shrouds
long live the cup, and cris dickson
After I posted this I went out in my driveway and tried this again and it worked fine. Driveway-fine.Pond-no good. Our pond is at a hydro-electric site and this must have something to do with it. There is a 138 kilo-volt line about 100 yards from where I was range testing. I would have expected the interference from the hydro lines to be glitching but when I got 30 ft from the boat it just stopped responding. No twitching, no false moves -it just quit working. If I moved in to 25 ft it would work nice and clean. At 30 ft it was like I turned the transmitter off. Strange stuff,electricity. Thanks for any help but I think it’s O.K.
lol
hey don. did you turn on the boat too.
i have done that also. we had a pond right next to a power station. you should see the range there
we all would have been happy with 100 feet
good luck with your radio
cougar
long live the cup, and cris dickson