Thursday, June 14, 2018

Repairing and modifying a Planet transmitter


At the weekend, I was sailing my model boats and realised there were a couple of jobs I should have done before I came out. 

First, the hinge thing in the aerial had been getting loser for some time and now the stubby end hung on the wire, a situation that wasn't going to last long as the wire would break. And you can't buy Planet transmitters easily these days. 

Drilling through the whole assembly and inserting a 2.5mm diameter plastic rod fixed this. OK, the antenna no longer hinges, but I never needed it to anyway. 


For some reason, not all the boats steer in the same way. Fixing this while sailing is simple - flip the switch under a plastic cover, switch the transmitter off, switch it back on again and the directions will be reversed. 

 Switch flipping isn't easy though as I never have a small screwdriver to lever it over. Invariably, the only aid in my pocket is a house key, and these don't quite dig in deep enough to do the job. 

Now, I've drilled the first 2 channel switches (the only ones I use for boating) and fitted these with short lengths of wire. I can move these with my fingers so hopefully, I'll not have to sail with the steering reversed again. 

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