TOPIC:

Measured some AA's sitting around the house with plastic calipers:
Eneloop 4th gen: 50.2 mm
Fujitsu "White": 50.2 mm (supposedly identical batteries to the eneloops)
Engergizer: 50.2 mm (Alkaline)
Biltema orange: 50.4 mm (Alkaline generics from a cheap auto parts store)
Varta "High energy" 50.1 mm (Alkaline, blue packaging)
Clas Ohlson 2300mAh 50.2 mm (Rechargeable NiMh)

Most of them measure 50.2 mm then. with a caveat on the calipers being cheap and plastic.
I could just squeeze the Vartas in and verify that the transmitter works. But it can't be good for the springs.

Luckily I had my patented battery extractor device ready for removing them after (plastic baby feeding spoon)

Back on topic: the power indicator light on this unit is really soft and mellow that lights and fades slowly. My guess is that there's an actual incandecent bulb in there.

Now made into a sticky topic, should have been a long time ago!

received with a baja champ.
1 techniplus mk V in 27 mhz ( out of my mess) with 1 AR 201 receiver and AS-12 servos







strange combo. Maybe one late model???

Jonny wrote:

...

Update February 2016 - Change(s) of Ownership, the mk.VII "A" .. and the end of Acoms?

Mk.VII (AP-202) - all boxes are marked as Acoms, but only some have an Asahi (Asahi Communisations = Acoms) logo, on later boxes any mention of Asahi is gone, mostly changed to "Think Happy". Looking at the corresponding manuals, both show Acoms, but the back page shows the manufacturer has changed from Asahi Corporation to CCP Co., Ltd (3-1-8, Sakae-cho, Kawaguchi, Saitama, 332-8521, Japan).

Looking at the "Mk.VIII", all boxes (I think) have the "Think Happy" logo & the manuals all show CCP Co., Ltd as the owner/manufacturer.

On the "Mk.IV" 2.4GHz stick sets, all are also "Think Happy" logo'd & show CCP Co., Ltd as the owner/manufacturer.

Note: I looked at both the CCP website (www.ccp-jp.com/) and that of the Bandai/Namco group (www.bandainamco.co.jp/) but both are quite impenetrable, even with Google translate

Given the above, I've revised the chronology to include a note on the "Mark VII-A" and put in end dates of 2015 on that and the "Mk.IX" 2.4ghz offering, during which supplies of both seemed to dry up entirely.

I can only speculate as to the reasons for the apparent end of Acoms, but it does seem a shame to me - the AP-202 27mhz ("mk.VII-A") sets were both cheap and competant, and while the 2.4ghz sets had some flaws (audio only trim adjustment, looks, and to a certain extent, price), nostalgia alone would I think have guaranteed a place for it.

Just edited/appended the 1st post re change(s) of ownership (with hindsight the information was already there, but no-one had put 2 + 2 together ) & apparent end of Acoms as a brand

Some time ago I bought a small job lot of "old" servos & RXs, I fianlly got around to looking at them with a view to cleaning/repairing/testing & using them - & found a previosuly unseen Acoms AS-5S servo. As this falls between the AS-5 and the AS-7, I've attributed it to the mk.III set.

There were also 3x ARB-227 RXs with little to no antenna so that got me looking at the unsolved wire length question - previously I'd found theoretical anwers of 24" or 38", and comparing the illustration in the manual with the bundle of wire each length produces, I'm going with 38" (965mm) so have put that in the first post, along with a caveat.

An NIB mk.ii set came up on eBay with a reasonable buy-it-now price so I snapped it up. Box was obviously toast, even in the listing & on arrival it really is, both sun bleached _and_ water damaged, and the paperwork is wrinkled & stained too. However, genuinely NIB sets are so rare (most sets claimed to be "new" are so obviously used sets put back in a box) I'm pleased to have it - no doubt something will come along that I feel is worthy of using it in

Cool! I don't think I've seen a true NIB of these before

Jonny wrote:

An NIB mk.ii set came up on eBay with a reasonable buy-it-now price so I snapped it up. Box was obviously toast, even in the listing & on arrival it really is, both sun bleached _and_ water damaged, and the paperwork is wrinkled & stained too. However, genuinely NIB sets are so rare (most sets claimed to be "new" are so obviously used sets put back in a box) I'm pleased to have it - no doubt something will come along that I feel is worthy of using it in

larbut wrote:

Cool! I don't think I've seen a true NIB of these before
...

... apart from the last one I bought (no longer NIB as I've fitted _and_ used it)...

Jonny wrote:

I got around to looking at the new Mk.II set ... box is a little dog-eared around the edges but the colour is still very good...

...

...

Spotted this AW-27 steerwheel TX on ebay & although the internal battery holder is missing (2x2x2 AA, I've already ordered a generic one to adapt) I thought it was worth having ...

It was minging when it arrived - I really had to wash my hands after unpacking it - but after a going over with baby wipes, then Novus "Plastic Clean & Shine" on the case, Autosol on the antenna, and wet & dry paper on the foam it's a lot better.

Boxy styling puts this AW-27 at around the time of the mk.III or mk.IV, but servo reverse switches didn't appear on stick radios until the mk.IV. Dual Rate adjustment has never been on Acoms stick radios, maybe it is on later steerwheel TXs, at this point I don't know.

Note the steerwheel on the left side of the case - I've never got on with steerwheel transmitters before, so this appealed, but I did wonder why there were right- and left-handed versions with the same part number ... looking at it, it seems probable the the top can be turned 180 degrees & refitted, I'll investigate if further at some point I guess.

I did consider expanding the 1st post here (and my collection) to cover all the steerwheel variants - but someone has already done it at rc-tamiya.cekuj...i.a22.html







Technipsort 2.4GHz - predates 2.4Ghz stick set by 18months / 2years? (and ceased production same amount of time before the stick set)
Technisport Hayabusa - very similar to Technisport 2.4GHz but 27, 40 or 75MHz

Well would you look at that, A pistol grip control that can change to suit Lefties or Righties