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I used to build and fly 2 meter gliders anywhere I could launch them, only FCC concerns I ever had was the frequency I was controlling them with.
Getting damn risky now.

FWIW my fav was the Gently Lady http://www.towerhobbies.com/pr...

This is my current set up:

Robot Controller:
http://www.pololu.com/catalog/product/1327

Servo Controller (if you need more than the 8 provided with that particular robot controller):
http://www.pololu.com/catalog/product/1356 - these can be hooked up to the robot controller's serial interface and daisy-chained for a maximum of ~255 servos

Servos:
http://www3.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin/wti0001p?&I=LXGLN4&P=7 - this one happens to be a giant scale servo for more torque

Documentation:
http://www.pololu.com/docs/0J20

>>> you can already get RC flying vehicles it's just cost prohibitive at the moment

http://www3.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin/wti0001p?&I=LXCXF4**&P=7
$330 RTF (ready-to-fly)
I actually worked in the same company that initially developed drones in the late 90s. This is where they started.

many years ago.

Before finding BBS's I built 2 meter gliders (Balsa wood), my favorite was the
Gentle lady" http://www.towerhobbies.com/products/greatplanes/gpma0960.html

That TEMPEST would of been a dream come true for me at the time.

Looks similar to a Great Planes 65cc 80-85-160 Brushless Outrunner Electric Motor. This particular motor is rated for 7500 W continuous, 8400 W surge. No, I didn't accidentally add a zero. Yes, approximately 10hp out of a motor that fits in a 3.5" cube. Outrunners are pretty damned amazing.

Note - to achieve this power level, you'll need to feed said motor with 125 amps at 30-50V. No small task there.

How about here:
http://www.towerhobbies.com/products/hobbico/hcaa23_n.html

Oh, and I may not make autonomous planes, but I do make autonomous boats, so this is more than talking out my ass; I've actually built this kind of kit.

Its not like you have an ulterior motive in trying to justify the cost the products your company makes huh. At 25K per plane I would like a bit of that action.

When I was a kid (which was a long time ago, stop laughing) these were the companies I dealt with, at least these are still in business.

Edmund Scientifics:
http://scientificsonline.com/category.asp_Q_c_E_421187

Sciencekit:
http://sciencekit.com/plastic-gears/p/IG0030524/

Also check Radio Control models which uses these gears for their motors:

Tower Hobbies:
http://www3.towerhobbies.com/listings/rcpsmfgs.html

OK, I did a quick search and yeah, the cheapest chargers are fixed current with a timer to prevent overcharging.

But for a few bucks more you get a charger with basic peak detection.

Back when I was in to RC cars 15+ years ago, my first charger had a basic timer. 15 minutes from a dead pack (standard charge) resulted in a slightly warm NiCd pack. Any longer and it heated up quick.

My limited experience with NiMH SubC packs more recently had them fairly warm after full charge on a peak-detection charger charging at about 1C. Didn't charge any longer than that to see how hot'd they get.

Why anyone would spend $50-$100 on multiple good quality NiMH battery packs and then not spend about the same on a decent peak detection charger defies logic. A good charger maximizes performance of the pack and battery life. Heck, I even went and looked at Tower Hobbies - a basic timer charger costs $25 - a basic peak charger costs $35. I suspect only the uninformed buy the timer chargers these days.

Most of my experience with rechargables these days lie with AA and AAA size cells. I've got a handful of old Eveready NiCd cells (out of a dozen or so) that have been used and abused for about 15 years or so.

Capacity has dropped about 10% from their rated capacity for the ones that still work. The dead ones stopped holding charges for more than a couple days and developed internal shorts (common death scenario for NiCds after being stored dead or forced into reverse voltage when used as part of an imbalanced pack).

The NiMH cells I've used have proven to be much less durable and seem to be much less tolerant of abuse. They have had a much higher rate of capacity loss. I've had probably half my older batch of cells stop holding charges. The other half have lost between 20-30% of their original capacity. Not sure if it's the cheap cells (Powerex, primarily) or NiMH technology (batteryuniversity.com and wikipedia both seem to indicate that NiMH cells are less durable than NiCd cells).

Now I only buy low-discharge NiMH cells. Because your typical cell will basically self-discharge between 20-30% a month, this leaves them useless after only a couple months of storage and dead after 6 months or so. And remember that storing a dead cell also leads to early cell death.

The low-discharge cells will retain about 85% charge after a year and 70% after two years meaning that there is little danger of cells fully discharging and the cells will be ready to use without having to wonder how long ago you recharged the cell. They are also much better for low current applications like clocks and remote controls where battery life won't be determined by how well the cell retains it's charge, but it's actual capacity.

I also use a good digital charger (Powerex MH-C9000) which I can use to monitor the cell's capacity and adjust the charge rate according to the type of cell being charged, as well as easily determine when a cell has reached the end of it's useful life and put it aside for recycling.

    I have been Flying R/C airplanes and Heli's for over a decade and we have been using technology like this before I was around as others have posted but here is a link to a Ready To Fly (RTF) Trainer plane with AutoPilot Stabilizes in all three axis. Color video transmitters are readily available for cheap, even real time telemetry and GPS modules, depending on how much you want to spend you increase the quality and reduce the physical size and stealth capability (eg. electric vs. combution powered).

http://www2.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin/wti0001p?&I=L XEXK2**&P=ML
RTF Flight stabilise system (autopilot) >$350

http://www.planetalk.com/videoacc.html
Video Systems

http://www.jcsportfliers.org/
NJ based model club w/ links and photos of hobby

http://www.rcuniverse.com/forum/tt.asp?forumid=81
Hobby - Aerial video forum w/ video links

http://www.rcgroups.com/uav-unmanned-aerial-vehicl es-238/
Link to Hobby related "modeler-built" UAV forum

you mean like one of these ?

Have him switch over to glow fuel powered R/C vehicles. Charge up the batteries for the receivers and he can get a good 45 minutes+ out of them. Right now electric power in R/C is expensive for the high end stuff - batteries are anywhere from $30 to $300+.

And LiPos really aren't used much in R/C cars, at least not yet -- most of the high end electric R/C cars still use the basic 6 cell subC pack, which can be had for as little as $9 each. (Yes, you can spend a lot more for better batteries, but these are fine for toodling around.)

It's a dream that's been pursued for years by governments, energy companies and automakers so far without success: Mass-producing affordable electric-powered cars that spew nothing from their tailpipes. So Jada Toys decided to start small. Really small....yada yada yada....

http://www2.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin/wti0001p?&I=L XKGY5&P=7

The article quoted:
"Public awareness and education are the first steps toward commercialization," said Horizon founder Taras Wankewycz, 32. "We want to make sure this technology gets adapted globally."

what bull. This is just a ploy to delay the use of existing, disruptive, technologies while the oil industry cranks out as much profits as it can.

Go see "Who Killed the Electric Car" and read this on how the oil industry won't let battery makers build NiMH batteries large enough for EVs:

http://www.evworld.com/blogs/index.cfm?page=blogen try&authorid=51&blogid=104

LoB

Looks like it's largely made up of ordinary radio control servos - they're less than $20 each and pretty easy to interface with - a pulse from .5 to 1.5 mSec long moves the output shaft almost 180 degrees. This is a nice construction job and the simple face really adds a lot to the humanoid cuteness factor. Everything else is a (snicker) simple matter of programming.

link from tower hobbies...

Back when I flew Radio-Controlled Gliders ( Gentle Lady in particular), I used a third channel servo to click the button on a Kodak 110 Instamatic. This was waaaaay before small digital cameras.

The contraption was very simple: I duct-taped the servo on top of the camera and rubber-banded the camera to the plane. I made sure the center of balance remained exactly the same.

Although the plane was relatively MUCH heavier, it was flyable. Certainly, I was not able to catch thermals or stay up long, but I was still able to take some cool shots of the surrounding area. Since the picture taking was servo activated, I could point the plane at an area I wanted to photograph and snap the picture.

In the R/C jet community the Alpha 4 is considered the end-all charger.

Most importantly the packs *never* get hot, even on its fastest charge rates.

One more disadvantage -- it can't do LiPoly cells. But I don't know how many jet people use them -- probably not too many. I don't understand why it doesn't do LiPoly cells yet -- a simple firmware upgrade should be all that's required, and since it's all custom made by them, you'd think that would be trivial for them to do. I guess they just don't want to make money -- they won't increase production to match demand, and they won't add simple to add features that would increase demand.

It will also do a peak charge at C/10 rate, to really baby your packs.

In any event, the Alpha 4 is a fine (but pricey and hard to get!) charger for keeping a fleet (it's overkill if you only have one or two planes) of glow or glider planes ready to fly, but it's totally inadequate for the needs of an electric flyer. It also can't even charge 2000 mAh AA cells at a 1 C rate, meaning that it probably wouldn't do the `Ask /.' guy much good.

Actually, the Triton is way more than the guy needs too. He could probably do very well with any peak charger that can charge 1-8 cells, and can probably find one for around $40. Something like this would probably be just fine for $50. And it has two charge ports too, which is a nice feature.

My current favorite is the Great Planes Triton charger -- I like it so much that I've got two of them. It'll charge anything. If you need it to run off of 110v AC current, this page will probably help set you up cheaply. You'll need to make a battery holder to hold the cells, but you could easily charge 10 at once, or possibly even charge them inside whatever you're using them in.

(And this tells how to find the best price on it right now.)

I would like to find an inexpensive Intelligent charger that can charge 4 or more high capacity cells (in pairs or individually) in an hour or less.

Of course, chargers like the Triton are probably overkill for what you need, especially at $130, but I certainly love mine ...

I find it mildly amusing that while Radio Shack is virtually claiming to have "discovered" micro r/c cars and brought them to North America, reputable hobby stores such as this one have had them in stock for a while now.

Just goes to show you what a large-budget marketing department can do for your image!

Try some thin CA, that particular evil substance has held the rubber pads on my Inspiron 2100 for almosta year now. Along with anything else that breaks in my house or on my RC toys.

I used a model airplane prop (about a 4 inch, two bladed prop), and attached it to a small "hobby" motor (ie, one of those 3V mabuchi cheapo motors that are in toys everywhere). I then mounted it to a styrofoam plate, using cardboard braces extending from the edges of the air intake hole.

I then hooked the motor up to a 9V battery, and was able to get more than enough "lift" - without a skirt. Strangely enough, I didn't take the experiment further - it was just one of those "one off" deals.

Model airplane propellers can be picked up at most good hobby shops - or online at Tower Hobbies...

Sorry, part numbers on that supplier page don't seem to work. Go here http://www2.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin/WTI0097p.pgm and search for "mini-z" with "kyosho" as the manufacturer... Lists some hop-ups and the cars themselves.

Manufacturer page: http://www.kyosho.com/cars/kyod37x1.html
My preferred supplier: http://www.towerhobbies.com/promos/00so/kyod49sm.h tml

Real mini R/C cars. That little tank thing looks like some low-quality stuff. These things are fairly fast and have a real suspension, but they do cost a shade more than the crap tank and are a whopping 5" (instead of the tank's 4")... They've got 7 frequencies, though.

There is a company in the Radio Control Car industry called Litespeed products. I can't find a web site for them, but any hobby dealer, and possibly Tower Hobbies could get the stuff for you. Aside from making a cool set of low loss battery connectors, they had a product called Dylon. It was made in a number of colors, and produced good results with white nylon parts, such as those used in Associated Electrics' products, at least untill the mid 90's. Dylon was used on styrene parts, but the colors tended to be much more faint. Red dye produced light pink styrene parts.

Some RC cars are powered by gasoline. Go take a look at http://www.towerhobbies.com/.

I'm in high school and I think robotics are cool, I'm actually trying to build one on my own at home. I went out and bought an OOPIC for $50. It's really a neat little thing. Allows you to interface things to it like lights, servos, motors, etc. And then you can write a little program for it in Basic, C, or Java. Just get the kids some of those throw them in teams or two or three, toss them a handful of $10 servos, see who can build the best walking robot, whatever.

I find that a lot more exciting than making stupid "Hello World" programs. :)

Oopic http://www.oopic.com
Servos http://www.towerhobbies.com
also http://www.robotstore.com has nice kits (including mindstorms).