Radio controlled planes are model planes that are controlled remotely by use of a radio device. The radio device is held by the pilot. The radio device, commonly known as remote control, sends signals to the receiver that is built within the airplane. This receiver controls the servos of the plane depending on the position of the joysticks of the transmitter.
There are many types of RC planes available. These planes are designed to match the experience of the pilot. For those who are just beginning to fly, Park flyers and trainers are ideal for them. Then there are glow plug engines, electric powered and sailplane aircrafts for those who have advanced more and for the expert pilots, there are jets, pylon racers, autogyros, helicopters, 3D aircraft and other planes which can be flown for competitions and pose more challenges while controlling.
The park flyers are so called because they can easily be flown in a large public park and some models are docile enough to be controlled in an enclosed place like a gym. There are also bigger types of park flyers that require bigger open areas to fly too. The trainers too are very user-friendly planes. They are easy to control and fun to learn with. The advanced types like glow plugs and electric powered planes have solid controls, but the more complicated the controls are, the more fun one has. The expert planes are used even for professional competitions. They are also equipped with more complicated controls, but are fun to fly.
RC planes come in three forms, the ready-to-fly, almost ready to fly and the Balsa kits. The ready to fly ones require very little assembling after they are bought. What one can fix are may be the wings, and the ammunition. The almost ready to fly are not fully assembled and so the buyer has to assemble most of the parts. And the kits come as chips and parts which one has to assemble from scratch. Assembling of the kits can take a few hundred hours to thousands of hours, depending on the size and type of the plane you have bought.
RC planes are fitted with ailerons on their wings, which assist in turning them while in flight. Some models of RC planes use the combustion technology and use gas in their engines. The electric models use batteries. The batteries used on these planes are not the ordinary ones we can get in any shop but more powerful types, which can last for many flying hours. There are three main types of batteries one can use on the model planes. These types are Nickel-Metal Hydride (NiMH), Nikel-cadmium (NiCAD), and the latest type in the market, the Lithium Poly cells. |
