I have crunched a bunch of numbers on this subject in the past. The bottom line is that you can’t beg, borrow or steal anything electronics related cheaper than you can get from China. Well, this might be a bit of an exageration but really, you can get a brushless motor and speed control for $20 with free shipping. Lipo’s can be found in the $15 range. Assuming your time is worth something (people differ on weather you should “price” your personal time) you simply can’t justify the time it will take to scavange, modify, test and install MacGyver’ed parts. I should mention that this idea sorta kills me inside, just as the fact that nothing made today has stand-alone parts inside that can be replaced individually when they break.
At any rate, I have some good links in my back pocket for cheap Ebay parts if you are interested. And of course, the catch with these ultra-cheap parts is that it takes a month to get them. On the other hand, I when I am getting (3) lipos for $21 incl. shipping… I’ll learn to be patient.
I must be tired this evening, but what are lipo’s?
Do you have any Chinese parts sites that are worth checking out?
I hardly dare to look at the LMR shout box because sometimes I have no idea what people are writing about. It is like there are other parallel communication that doesn’t get through Or continious message from days ago.
Well I guess I have to live with that. Personally I would prefeer if the shout box was wider in my browser.
Lipos = lithium polymer battery used in model airplanes amongst other things. The ones I use are 11.4v and in a hobby shop, they can be as much as 60 bucks a pop, on Ebay from China, I have gotten them for around $16. The $7 ones I mentioned above are little 7v ones for some of my small robot projects. Lipos are great, if you treat them right and charge them correctly. In terms of links, what are you looking for? If I have ordered something similar, I can tell you my experience with the supply house. --I gotta tell you, as you could guess, ordering from China can be a little hit-or-miss.
i am looking for the cheapest options on ebay with
lipo
esc/rc receiver (more than 4 channels)
cheap servos.
as much second hand / found items as possible.
so links to good ebay pals that could arrange good deals on the above would be NICE
i have to keep the price per unit (only electronics) as low as possible. i was thinking about under 50$ per unit electronics. then i could get some fundings from some local organisation and sell the kits to the kids for around 10$ per unit. that would be great!
If you really want to go cheap HobbyKing has a TX/RX pair for about $23 US dollars. While it is definitely of lower quality it should work fine for a park flyer. And for the actual pane you could get this slope soarer for about the same ($23 US). I definitely agree with Chris though; buying a kit is cheaper than building it yourself.
I know this topic is slightly stale, but only a few months, and I am looking for some of the same parts. One place I thought I might mention is R2Hobbies. I have bought a couple of things from them and been pleased with price and service. I am going to tinker with autonomous filght with foamies (cheap home built RC airplanes). I think I am going to start with a scaled down version of MikeysRC FPV Pusher. His site is good general resource for info about making planes on the cheap. The plans are all free (donations encouraged) and the sport trainer sounds like a good choice for kids getting into it.
the reason I ask is that I was on another computer and was pricing something and figured I would check there. When I typed in to Google the, the automatic choce list had “dealextreme scam” as one of the top searched items. I have no personal experience with them and I don’t know on what basis Google brough that to the top. But I found it a little spooky.
I had good experiences with Dealextreme. They deliver what they promise. In my case a well reviewed oscilloscope.In your case that might be cheap Chinese knock offs. Mileage varies, shipping happens…
It is odd how Google does that. I tried a few vendors. What I mean is go to a Google search box and assuming you have a supported browser and settings that allow it to work, when you type something you want to search for it shows a drop down of common searches and changes it as you type. I just went back and tried again to see what it showed me with various vendors. I type the vendor’s name and a space. Nearly all have them, including dealextreme have “coupon” as the top next word with things like “shipping” or “paypal” being really common also. In dealextreme’s case, “scam” is right after “coupon”. So I clicked to see why. Guess what? They have a public forum and someone complained on that forum. Reading his post, he went off half cocked and didn’t even try the proper channels first to resolve his problem (getting a product he wasn’t happy with). A lot of people replied telling him he was an idiot and then it turned into a long running thread with people debating the quality of their service. Apparantly dealextreme pays for their results to be placed high, probably so people will find products there. Lots of people viewd a page at their site titled “dealextreme scam” so I think Google did what they were paid to do and pushed that up higher in the search results…
I have a few of the Hobby King cheap -O- radio’s, and they work decent for the cost.
Plus they are easily hacked. Example V1 and V2 are the same, just remove the back and swap the spring and detent arm side for side. I would suggest buying one of those over this receiver.
Or continious message from days ago.