Kevin,

The transmitter was $29.95 and the receiver and add-on board, plus the Rx100-T-v5  which is a servo driver, was $59.78, a total of $89.73.

Can't wait to see your crane go together. Also check the holes where the boom fit's in. That was a bit tight on mine. I drilled a larger hole for the stub ends of the boom to fit in. And removed some material at the end so the boom would swing freer. I'll take a couple of pics and post them to make it clearer.

Will let you know when they get here.

Sorry to here your under the weather.

Bernd

Here's the areas I was talking about and what I did about them.

My boom got stuck in the up position until I did the above clean up.

Bernd

I've got a little more done on the crane. I finally have the board mounted and wired into the power side. Next I need to figure out how to wire up the three motors so the proper stick will activate the proper motor I want. Need to consult with David, the guy that designed these receiver boards, and see how to set it up.

I've cut a piece of copper clad board and drilled two holes for some brass wire. I could have used copper wire but I had this on hand and the proper size. Two holes in the board for the brass wires. The other two are 00-80 tapped holes to hold the whole works down and a insulation gap file in the board to separate the minus from the plus.

The board is fastened to the floor of the crane and is ready to have the positive and negative voltage wires attached.

View at the back of the crane.

I fabricated a couple of .010" thick pieces of shim stock with a slot in them to solder the wires to and using a 00-80 nuts bolted the wires in place.

Top view down. Picture quality isn't the greatest.

So that's it for now until I get the motors hooked up correctly without letting the magic smoke out of the receiver.

Bernd

I finally have the Rx installed and functioning. It still needs some tweaking. The swing base picks apparently loose contact and some of the movements are still a little stiff. But it works.

Still more work to do on it to get it to the finished stage.

Bernd

I like it.  The variable speed and ease of control are impressive, IMO.  Also begin able to operate two motors together is sweet.  The is definitely something to be said for the radio control option.

Excellent!

Thanks for the video.

That was one aspect of why I decided to change to R/C. Being able to control all motors at once. Now all I need is the dexterity to use all three at once.

Another reason was that the crane won't be run in a multiple unit configuration unlike with DCC diesels. I think this would work well for steam engines since you would only see perhaps a double header. You could then run like the prototype with two engineers running each engine.

At first I was not for the R/C control of trains but after having worked on this project I'm liking it.

Bernd

I think this would work well for steam engines since you would only see perhaps a double header. You could then run like the prototype with two engineers running each engine.

You have a point, but the main problem I see with R/C is the need for dedicated Tx/Rx pairs.  If you wan to have 4 locomotives on the layout at a time, you need 4 transmitters (I think?), even though you might only be using one at a time.  That's the one thing that DCC really has going for it at the moment - the ability to select any viable locomotive from the point of control.  Obviously there have to be ways around that, but it's the one thing that has bothered me about R/C in large scale trains.  It's fine if you only have one train, but as soon as you add more, it gets expensive or challenging.

Ken,

That's what I thought too. But this new R/C stuff with the 2.4mHz signal you can use one transmitter to run any Rx you want. It's called "binding". I don't remember now how many people can operate at one time. I don't think you could fit that many operates in to a layout room as this system is capable of handling.

I'm learning more about it as I go. I still have more research to do to understand how this system works. The only thing you can't seem to do is run multiple units from one Tx. The engines would need to be mechanically tuned to run exactly the same at a set voltage.

I need to do more experimenting with this. I have 3 more cranes to do. The next one will be a more improved version of this one. I plan on using 4 motors so I can get all functions on the crane, small hook, large hook, boom, & swing motions. Motors are on there way over from the far left coast as I write this. But before I work on the next cranes I've planned on working on a Walthers HO scale turntable.

I need to finish up with this crane first before anymore projects are started. As I write this I'm thinking of perhaps starting a blog on the 2.4mHz transmitter and their capability in using them for model railroading.

Bernd

I would be interested in reading that blog, and (should it happen) your experiences in using R/C to control a locomotive.  Things such as speed control, switching, steady running, motor noise, and anything else you can think of would all be interesting.

Also, I apologize!  I should have commented first and foremost at how smooth and realistic (barring the mentioned halts) your crane looks.  You have managed to avoid the toy-like nature of so many operating accessories.  I am most impressed.

Ken for the kind words. Like I said it still needs some tweaks to make it smoother. But I think I'm going to skip that since I've got it running. I need to switch some motor leads around so the right stick uses the side ways  motion to swing the base.

I used to fly model airplanes so I know a bit about the transmitters/receivers. There were 3 frequencies, 27Mz, 54Mz and 76Mz. This has now changed to 2.4Ghz. I'm going to go on an information gathering mission and then post a blog on this. That's the plan.

I'm a bit disappointed at the response so far on the subject of using radio control on this model.  I had thought that the proponents of battery power and R/C control would have been all over this by now.

The length of this thread must have bored some people. Oh well.

Bernd