This hack’s old as dirt to be sure, but new to us and a great accomplishment. The plane above, which is meant to fly without an operator, has been given RC control thanks to parts from that little car. The transmitter and receiver pair are the obvious transplant, but how do you add steering to a $7 plane that wasn’t manufactured to have that feature? The tail was cut and reconnected with mylar hinges to turn it into a rudder. A rare earth magnet and a coil are also thrown into the mix to provide movement. Basically this is a simple solenoid where the coil pushes against the magnet when energized, actuating the rudder. This in combination with an upgraded motor allows for both speed control and yaw. It doesn’t look like you can control roll and pitch but what more can you really expect?
This would be a nice first step on that path to building an epic flying camera rig.
[Thanks Rob]
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nice, i wonder if it can be done easier though, maybe just with weights attached to the servo somehow
wish there was video
Heads up folks – at least in Canada there are *specific and different* freq’s assigned for air vs land RC vehicles.
So transplanting from one to the other is potentially very, very improper.
Awesome hack. Those little cars are pretty sweet too.
Great hack!
There’s so much you can do with those little $5 charge-a-car controller things.
Seconding Required’s issue, the aircraft frequency is kept separate to prevent ground vehicles from bringing down a possibly sizable nitro-powered onto a spectator.
-Debbie Downer
ok whos making a heli next .
Lol, this article was posted before almost 5 years ago:
http://hackaday.com/2005/01/22/radio-controlled-airplane-from-a-micro-rc-car/
That makes two dupes from ages ago this week. We’re slipping.
The site and its links mention that you should use only freqs legal in your country. For the US that would be 27 MHz and 49 MHz, which may be used for any R/C vehicle including planes or cars. They also mention removing the “crippling caps” (added to allow multiple races in the same room) to extend range so you can fly the plane in a small park.
im a total rookie,so im goin to try “air hog wing flier” with just the steering survo and controler from rc car for tail rudder.so i bought the plane $15 Can. “rc car free.” i’ll let u know if this basic than the bare bones works.let me know on here if anyone has done this?