Fall 2005 Issue

An Introduction to Using Amateur Radio to Control Model Aircraft

 By Del Schier, K1UHF

Amateur radio has many facets, possibly too many to explore in a lifetime. This column will discuss one aspect—radio control, or RC. This new “Airborne Radio” column will give a general overview of radio control, for which hams are licensed to operate on 6 meters. I will be sharing with you this interesting and enjoyable segment of amateur radio, and I hope that this new CQ VHF column will be of interest to all radio hobbyists.
Many amateur radio operators have similar interests within and outside our hobby. I have met many hams on the air who are “full-scale” or RC pilots. I also meet a good number of hams at RC model events. RC modeling by itself has perhaps as many facets as amateur radio and shares many similar aspects.

RC modelers who are licensed hams use 50 MHz to control their model airplanes. Amateur television and telemetry experimenting takes place on the 432-MHz amateur band. The two hobbies are not only similar, they are also intertwined.

Identical twin brothers, Walt Good, W3NPS, and Bill Good, W81FD (later W2CVI), made the first RC flights in 1936. Historians credit them with being the first hobbyists and radio amateurs to fly RC in the United States, and perhaps the entire world.

The Winter 2004 issue of CQ VHF had an article on the historic RC model flight (“A 6-meter Rig Flies the Atlantic,” by Maynard Hill, W3FQF), where on August 11, 2003 an RC model flew non-stop, unrefueled, across the Atlantic Ocean! It was controlled on 6 meters with a 432-MHz beacon and was built by a team of volunteers led by W3FQF.

Analogies may be made between both hobbies. Airfoil design and antenna design, both with highly evolved engineering disciplines, both require almost a sixth sense and a great deal of experience to come up with effective designs. Piloting an RC glider that is dependent on Mother Nature’s thermal updrafts is as fascinating as observing the variations in radio propagation.

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