RC Tank Warfare community hobby forum

Howdy,

I just obtained my first RC tank, a Panzer III from HL Matos. The main battery is charged & the tank's lights go on when the main button is turned on. The problem is that the RC control transmitter does not turn on. When I hit the "ON" switch the Power light does not go on & the tank does not respond to commands. I have 8 brand new Duracell AA batteries installed & reinstalled a couple of times. The battery lid does not close as tight as I'd like but that does not appear be an issue.
This is a Sender RC unit with crystal. There is a plastic tape/tag on the lower right marked 03 TX which I believe is the frequency. Should I remove that tape; could this be blocking the unit from powering up? Same tape and number 03 is located in the tank's main battery compartment.

Any suggestions for how to get this thing to turn on is appreciated.

Skirmisher

Hi

Some people have trouble with the Duracell batteries and the Heng Long transmitter have you tried another brand....

Jake

The batteries in the controller may be the problem, aa batteries are not all the same size especially the rechargeable type, make sure they are making contact at both ends and also in the cerntre where the seperators are.

regards Jack.

Hi It might seem strange but take out all the battery separators in the controller just grab them with a pair of pliers and break them out . They stop the batteries making contact with the terminals .some of them are thicker than the battery terminal so stop it contacting the bottom of the next battery .

regards pete

Otherwise try some foil between the batteries and the connections. It's crude, but at least it will tell you if it's the batteries - or your controller is kaput...

If you saw the red light glow once you can get it to come on again. It's the batteries, the battery compartment is poorly designed. Just fiddling with the batteries till you see the red light glow often does the trick also removing the partitions. ..A voltmeter is indispensable here since you can have some good batteries and some weak ones and this can make it not work. A new battery will be 1.6v and usually they are good till around 1.5v. Below 1.4v replace them with stronger ones.

Thanks to all. It was the batteries & after more fiddling it lit right up! This is a great model, more detailed & better built & finished than expected. A real back yard monster and terrorizer of the resident cat & dog!

One other question regarding the rechargeable battery in the tank. Does it harm the battery to recharge it before it is totally drained? I recall having VHS & 8mm video cameras some years back that needed the battery pretty much gone or else it would never fully charge again. Any advice on that issue is much appreciated as well.

Skirmisher

Hey Skirmisher....Hope you posted this on your other thread ....as the consensus was for you to do what you ended up doing
not that the solutions on this one aren't similar...but some were just darn unnecessary


ALPHA

Skirmisher, both NICD and NIMH can, indeed should be discharged before being recharged, unlike LI-POs which which will cause you problems if you allow them to drop too low, if your using an IBU2 with a LI-PO the alarm will let you know before that happens. shaun