Air Land Sea Hobbies

For some people, model cars are more than just a hobby. Recently, a 46-year-old RC enthusiast has been tinkering with one of his cars, aiming to race it up to 200 mph one day. A test run conducted last week yielded impressive results – 161 mph, which is considerably faster than the family van.

Predictably, the remote control car was custom made and features a battery pack that’s normally utilized in remote-control planes. The car looks more like a speeding orange bullet than a miniature automobile, and it features an 11 hp motor that allows it to zip along the ground at an astonishing pace.

There are many different Lipo Battery Chargers on the market. Some of these chargers balance and charge threw the balancer lead. When charging below 1.5A (1500mA), it is OK to charge through just the balancer leads. When charging over 1.5A, it is recommended to charge through the main battery leads, and balance through the balance connector. This is because the balancer leads and associated wires are too small to handle higher charge currents and may cause erroneous balancer operation due to potential voltage drop. 

Read all the instructions that are included with your lipo battery charger. If you charger is set up to charge and balance threw the balancer lead both your charger and lipo batteries will perform best if you limit your charge current for large lipos to a maximum of 1.5A.

I’m thoroughly convinced that my son will be a jet pilot one day. His entire bedroom is decked out with aeronautical paraphernalia, and when we took him to the Smithsonian last year he wouldn’t stop talking about the Spirit of St. Louis. He’s also the type of kid who can’t board an airplane without asking the flight attendants a million questions about flight. They usually try to appease him with a pilot wings pin, but you can only collect so many of those.

For his last birthday, I bought my son a remote-control plane. He identified it immediately as a Cessna 182 and took it outside to practice takeoff techniques. I’ve never seen a child being so conscientious about using a new toy properly. In fact, I would classify this rc plane as more than just a toy – it’s practically a training module. Fifteen years from now, don’t be surprised to find my son at the controls of your commercial jet.