ZZ controller breakthrough!

[GryphicRacing]

Last evening, while racing ZZ's against Latency at work, I had the best "duh, moron!" type brainstorm I have had in a while.

We were both having consistent controller range / car control issues. The cars weren't steering when they were supposed to, the range of the controllers seemed especially short, etc. We were blaming it on some unknown interference; cell-phones, computer monitors, the presence of other cars / controllers on the same frequency, etc.

Then it hit me...

Without even realizing it, we had both been letting our index fingers curl over the top of the controllers and....TOUCH THE ANTENNA! :eek:

This effectively grounds the antenna to you and KILLS the range, signal strength, and effectiveness of the controller. Now some of you are probably saying, "Of course you don't touch the antenna, dumba$$!" but it feels totally unnatural to hold the controller any other way, and is very difficult NOT to do. I'd be willing to bet that more than a few others out there are doing the same thing. We both kept unconciously slipping back into that grip and would only notice when the car didn't behave properly.

As soon I figured out a way to consistantly grip the controller without being tempted to put my fingers on top, the car was consistantly much more controllable and the range of the controller was significantly better.

Kinda dumb, huh? But it works!

[lowerdfool]

get a pencil gripper and slide it over the antenna when it's up. It'll make it more comfortable to hold the controller and you won't have a bad signal.

[ericb49]

On a related issue...I have noticed short range with the ZZ, even with a car antenna upgrade. The same car with a bit controller runs easily TWICE as far. I've opened the ZZ controller and the ant is properly affixed, but I wonder if the controller puts out less signal (similar to ZZ circuit board = less amp)? I'm going to replace the AAAs with better models (cheap ones here at the office, why not AA like all my bits ;)) but wondered if anyone has this problem or I have a bad controller.

[Axel]

I haven't tried a different controller, but I'm willing to bet that you're right about less juice going through to the antenna . I'm thinking if we hook up some higher voltage batteries it might help out.

I'mnot complaining with mine though. Out of the box it was 10 feet max (outside) and now I've changed the antenna and been working on it and I'm getting over 50 feet inside and over 100 feet outside for my range!!! It's amazing. Is that a new record?

[ericb49]

Axel, what did you use for a new controller ant?

^-- Nice avatar, man!

[Axel]

Actually, I just changed the car antenna. I desoldered the stock antenna and got rid of all that extra solder there. Then I looked around my house and found a piece of really thick speaker wire (like 10 guage). I stripped that and yanked out one of the single little wires from the twisted thick wire. This thing is skinny, it's only like 1/3 mm thick. Then I soldered that in, making sure not to get a big glop of solder there like it came with, and used that for my antenna. It was originally a little over a foot long, but after it gets out of the car I coiled it (it was too flimsy uncoiled and would flop over) and it only sticks up about 3 - 4 inches. Works wonders. I think one of the big things with this is that it isn't coated with plastic? I dunno, but it works great. You can't even see the car any more when it gets out of range :-)

Thanks on the avatar comments :-) That's a pic of me pretending to be austin powers at a party :-)

[lowerdfool]

Originally posted by Axel
That's a pic of me pretending to be austin powers at a party :-)

On a side note, are you old enough to drink? ;) j/k