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General control line discussion => Open Forum => Topic started by: Ken Culbertson on May 28, 2025, 11:36:25 AM
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Has anybody tried one of these Horizon/Tower Chinese clone Tac's? I lost my Hangar 9 in a move, and I am finding out with a twin you REALLY need one. It has more features than the Hangar 9 at roughly the same price and delivery.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/286567407035?_skw=RC+Tachometer&itmmeta=01JWBYNVATQN60VT2T5F0J1W4T&hash=item42b8bf9dbb:g:sI0AAOSwh1loJEmX&itmprp=enc%3AAQAKAAAA8FkggFvd1GGDu0w3yXCmi1e51w8VGD7eWmzfr223o9wDmz1Eu7D%2BNiZ34BlXw4qCuVvlnOQ3a1CM%2Fao0bBLuJNnQvNrS%2Fv5tT%2Fzdj09fgsyPsYubUTbSzuupXgBM1JQvCviOkdGYPOlYMWumc0SN8hUjjDRQu%2FaGzD3aqNKbloBz5%2FTWj6VVM0RDrXqVrpRc9dlEnSDYWd64qmun5ldR9CFcr7S9JeYHNDWvl4YcNDUNx0hDXrf26O45%2BU2dHCii%2Bj2UewUJe1Pz4SxopzX198M2xrU4%2Fx1sF2hdVWLSlCUjMgHya%2FXmrQjElYZJhLt6hg%3D%3D%7Ctkp%3ABk9SR8i11_7iZQ
Ken
Interesting side note: I asked the Bing AI if the Hangar 9 Tac was made in China. In bold letters it said "NOT MADE IN CHINA". Reference 1. So I pulled up Reference 1:
( Brand: Hangar 9 ), ( Manufacturer Part Number: HAN156 ), ( Country Of Manufacture: China, Peoples Republic Of ), ( Harmonized System Code: 8205.51.00.00 ), ( UPC: 605482501566 )
So AI is our future?
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Nothing can go wrong…go wrong…go wrong……
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I have a couple of them. They are OK but not what my old Hobbico/Tower unit is. I have only one of those left working. There aren't too many choices these days .......
Dave
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Ken, I have one of these, but not totally happy with it. Sometimes it reads fine, other times not. Maybe something I'm doing wrong. Maybe something with the optics, distance to prop?, proper backlight?, etc.
A friend of mine suggested using a short length of tubing over the lens. I'm going to try that.
But I also have a GloBee that I can use and works fine.
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Ken, I have one of these, but not totally happy with it. Sometimes it reads fine, other times not. Maybe something I'm doing wrong. Maybe something with the optics, distance to prop?, proper backlight?, etc.
A friend of mine suggested using a short length of tubing over the lens. I'm going to try that.
That was the sort of "fix" we made to the Fromeco "TNC", which had great electronics, but poor sensor layout. the sensor was behind a supposedly "transparent to IR" window to protect it. David got one and had some problems with it. I took one look and suggested he cut a hole in the window and put in a short length of tubing (his was about 1/2 ID, maybe a BT-5/ST-5 size rocket tube, maybe 1/2"-3/4" long) with the inside painted flat black. Instantly worked. We went back to the Fromeco people and they changed the design, but now the sensor was in the bottom of about q 3/16" ID metal tube that was shiny like a mirror inside. They though the problem was "collimation", that is, off-axis sensing. I think the problem was glint and reflections, and the evidence was that the "shiny tube" version worked better than the original, it wasn't nearly as good as the flat black rocket tube version.
Putting a collimator tube on the different tach might or might not improve it. But it's cheap and easy and easily reversible, so worth a try.
Brett
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Thanks a bunch for the quick response. I found a Hangar 9 on Amazon Prime that will be here Friday. Probably the same MFG as the one in the link but at least I have the assurances from the best AI can offer that it is not Made in China. LL~. I don't want to repeat the panic attack that followed hitting my wake with the outboard running faster than the inboard. Interesting however is that it seems to fly better in level flight and simple rounds that way but anything unusual or a tight corner and it bites you. ???
Ken
You know the one thing that I love about electric is that most of the time you can hear what they are saying about you since everyone is used to talking over the IC noise! VD~
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Thanks a bunch for the quick response. I found a Hangar 9 on Amazon Prime that will be here Friday.
As I mentioned I have a G.T Power RC tach that is of similar design to the Hanger 9. It was reading erratically now and then so I tried a short length of 1/4" black shrink wrap tube on the lens. It is now reading fine, so problem solved (for me).
The shrink wrap is not heated to shrink. The 1/4" size fit nicely and snug as is. The color is also flat black which is good.
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I have been using this since 2008. Couldn't find a TNC so I went with this and it's still working well. I keep it in the original box. Works great. I would call and make sure they have it before you order.
https://www.greathobbies.com/productinfo/?prod_id=GPMP2500&hf_type=S&srsltid=AfmBOoqMaqDQON9kodbS7Viv_HdCJr9hNm5AJNWgjKRcapF1XaUtmJqi
Dont balk at the price. By the time you fart around with all the others out there and still don't get what you want you will have spent more and wasted more time.
I have gone through several of those little hanger 9 things along the way thinking it would be easier to deal with being smaller etc. The ones I got were junk and would either not work, go through batteries every week, or be extremely inconsistent.
Made in china, good luck finding cheap electronics that aren't made in china.
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I have been using this since 2008. Couldn't find a TNC so I went with this and it's still working well. I keep it in the original box. Works great. I would call and make sure they have it before you order.
https://www.greathobbies.com/productinfo/?prod_id=GPMP2500&hf_type=S&srsltid=AfmBOoqMaqDQON9kodbS7Viv_HdCJr9hNm5AJNWgjKRcapF1XaUtmJqi
Dont balk at the price. By the time you fart around with all the others out there and still don't get what you want you will have spent more and wasted more time.
I have gone through several of those little hanger 9 things along the way thinking it would be easier to deal with being smaller etc. The ones I got were junk and would either not work, go through batteries every week, or be extremely inconsistent.
Made in china, good luck finding cheap electronics that aren't made in china.
If you click on the little black circle in the "Stock" column it says "Discontinued, not available".
Great hobbies web site is good in this regard: it shows stock status for both on-line and in-store for all its locations.
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If you have an Apple Phone, there is an audio tach app called "engine rpm" that works well. A neat feature is that it has a logging function that is useful for doing engine work. Also nice is that it doesn't depend on light and does not need to be so close to the prop to work.
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If you have an Apple Phone, there is an audio tach app called "engine rpm" that works well. A neat feature is that it has a logging function that is useful for doing engine work. Also nice is that it doesn't depend on light and does not need to be so close to the prop to work.
In fact, it works perfectly good from the center of the circle, so you can get in-flight RPM pretty easily, center because you don't have to deal with Doppler shift. It also works for youtube videos.
We have done it a few times and found nothing that surprised us. It might surprise others - because, for example, when your 4-2 engine breaks into a 2-stroke, it is down something like 200-500 RPM *slower* that level flight where it was 4-stroking, and in some cases it is blubbery rich and running 500 rpm *more* than level flight speed.
Brett
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In fact, it works perfectly good from the center of the circle, so you can get in-flight RPM pretty easily, center because you don't have to deal with Doppler shift. It also works for youtube videos.
We have done it a few times and found nothing that surprised us. It might surprise others - because, for example, when your 4-2 engine breaks into a 2-stroke, it is down something like 200-500 RPM *slower* that level flight where it was 4-stroking, and in some cases it is blubbery rich and running 500 rpm *more* than level flight speed.
Brett
yes! I have felt the loss of rpm and speed in a particular model/engine running 4-2-4 and it ran much better in 2-2-2. But later the engine head was replaced with a higher compression one and it seems it worked fine in 4-2-4.
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yes! I have felt the loss of rpm and speed in a particular model/engine running 4-2-4 and it ran much better in 2-2-2. But later the engine head was replaced with a higher compression one and it seems it worked fine in 4-2-4.
My point was not quite that - it's not faster because it went into a 2-stroke, it is in a 2-stroke because it's slower (and the converse, it goes into 4-stroke because its faster). The cause and effect is backwards from what "common knowledge" would have you believe.
Brett