wsmalley

My Feedback: (6)

How do you add an extra battery to the receiver, can you plug into a spare channel- or do you need some special device?

foxx

My Feedback: (2)

You can plug it into any unused receiver channel. The power bus is common to all channels.

perdo

My Feedback: (61)

Be sure to plug the battery into a switch and then into any unused port in the receiver. If you plug in direct it will be on all the time and run down very quickly.

Just my $0.02 worth

Don//

wsmalley

My Feedback: (6)

Thanks for the comments guys-I figured an additional switch was needed. Now, if you don't have an extra channel, what's the next way to add the battery? I saw some gizmo on the net for $70 or so-seems kind of expensive to me.

sfaust

My Feedback: (11)

You can use a Y connector. However, since you are adding another connection between a servo and the receiver, I would pick the channel you would want to loose if you had to loose one. I typically use the non essential channels first such as smoke, choke, flaps, etc. If you aren't using any of those, I would make a choce between the rudder and throttle. While I wouldn't want ot loose either, if I had to they are better than loosing the elevator or ailerons

Just plug the Y into the receiver on that channel. Then plug in the servo in one side, and the battery and switch in the other. Range check it, and verify all controls are full and correct, and you shoudl be all set.

Keep in mind, each and every flight, check each battery separately by turning one one, wiggling the controls, then turning that one off and turning on the other one. Again wiggle the controls. If everything works, the redundancy is being provided.

Treat them as separate batteries when you charge them, and when measuring them with an ESV. Its really simple, and gives a great deal of redundancy for little effort.

If someone at the field thinks your'e insane for using two batteries, tell them this.

Ask them how many times they have seen a battery or switch failure cause a crash. Then tell them, " Lets us each start our engines, go to full throttle, then turn off a battery and hand launch. The winner will be the one still flying"

wsmalley

My Feedback: (6)

Lost 2 planes to battery failure-it's kind of neat to watch them flying away or slow spiral in while your madly moving sticks! I try to measure batteries every other flight and use a field charger to bring them up, but some have said that's hard on the battery. In any case they do fail and when you least want them to!