Ratby Aeroplanes has taken the 'lead' in R/C flight simms by developing the right connections to use a well known FMS freeware r/c flight simm with any transmitter. Here's what Mark Stringer has to say about it.

Whilst browsing the Internet I have found a Freeware R/C Model flight simulator from Germany, which has an English language setting. It's great! There are hundreds of models available out there on the Internet for it.

I have researched how to make a radio Transmitter work with it.

My background in computing helped here and I am now confident that I can produce a lead for almost any transmitter that has a buddy lead. Nothing the odd transistor, resistors and some shielded cable could not sort out. My leads plug into the trainer 5 or 6 pin DIN socket on the TX and the other end plugs into the parallel (printer) port on the PC. A few pre-requisites on the PC setting and off you go.

Come wind or rain you can still get your transmitter out and fly to your hearts content. I have successfully made this for Futaba, Sanwa, JR and Fleet PPM radios so far.

This has taken a lot of research into how to get the transmitters to work with it, so I decided to make life easier for people and now I am offering the TX lead for what ever your PPM TX is, along with the support to get it working properly.

This costs just £34 + P&P (£1.50)!!!

Now that should keep you happy during those winter months. Great to keep your hand in or to learn the basics before flying for real. I have sent the ED my screen shots, the ones he doesn't use are on my web site. Please note that I have tested this on all Windows platforms and it works on W95/98/ME/XP and 2000. However XP and 2000 can only use the latest version 7 of the software if you want to use your transmitter.

I have been given full permission by the creators of FMS to supply it with my leads (thanks very much to them) and also to supply many models (thanks to the authors of those). I will be resuming the supply of a CD containing all of the software and about 300 models once all permissions are double checked. This will add £1 to the cost of the lead purely to cover its production cost - as soon as this is again available I will update the ED.

For more details contact
Ratby Aeroplanes at:
www.bizonline.co.uk/ratbyaeroplanes
Or e-mail at:
ratby@bizonline.co.uk
Or telephone: 01584 891554