RC wireless communication (up to 1000m)

Projects Networking, Protocols, and Devices
1

Hello,

i am looking forward in building a controller (TX) and a receiver (RX) for an RC CAR i am building.

i need to transfer data from (gyro, potentiometers, buttons and joystick - yes - will be a complex controller!)

the buttons will not be the big problem, as buttons do not get pushed on a high rate (they are just for ON/OFF for lights and simliar)

the critical stuff is the potetiometer / gyro and joysticks as values for steering throttle and so on needs to be updated often.

so my questions are:

whats the best module to use for communication?

  • Eachine TX805 5.8G 40CH 25/200/600/800mW FPV Transmitter TX LED Display Support OSD/Pitmode/Smart Audio - RP-SMA Female (main purpose is A/V transmission - up to 2.5km!)
  • TS832 & RC832 5,8G 48CH 600 mW (main purpose is A/V transmission)
  • LoRa Ra-02 too slow (100ms?)
  • HC-12 (do i need more than one for the amount of data? as doc says 500bps at 1000m??)
  • NRF24(more wiring, but faster than HV-12

will one esp32 be enough (might be a dumb questoin, but this will be my first arduino project)

thanks in advance!

NOTE: there will be a FPV camera on this system.

PS: i read a lot of different articles and tutorials but still do not know what to choose.
i know how to write software :wink:

2

If you really need 1000m communication then the HC12 is probably best. And at that distance quick reactions are probably not important.

How do you plan to transmit and receive the FPV video from the car?

...R

3

spitzenlumo:
PS: i read a lot of different articles and tutorials but still do not know what to choose.
i know how to write software :wink:

There will be a lot more people using this sort of stuff, the video links and so on, over in the RCGroups forum, they will likley have a lot more experience in putting such a setup together.

In addition, be careful with the FPV stuff, there are very often power limits on the transmitters etc, depending on where you are in the World.

LoRa devices are commonly used for this type of long distance RC control, there are active threads discussing the setups over in RCgroups.

4

If you want ridiculous range, you can use RFD900 radios. Expensive, but apparently you get >40Km range.

5

thanks for your replies.

Robin2:
If you really need 1000m communication then the HC12 is probably best. And at that distance quick reactions are probably not important.

it does not make a difference if the car is 10m or 1000m away. you need quick reactions to take a corner.

Robin2:
How do you plan to transmit and receive the FPV video from the car?

via a FPV transmitter/receiver (packaging says they work up to 2500m

srnet:
In addition, be careful with the FPV stuff, there are very often power limits on the transmitters etc, depending on where you are in the World.

you are right, i just checked this its 25mW at 5.8GHz (so i can drop the idea with the 600mW TX/RX, which is illegal here...)

Power_Broker:
If you want ridiculous range, you can use RFD900 radios. Expensive, but apparently you get >40Km range.

thats overkill :slight_smile: i do not want to drive a toy two cities further on the highway :slight_smile: and way too expensive!

summary,

6

spitzenlumo:
I just checked this its 25mW at 5.8GHz (so i can drop the idea with the 600mW TX/RX, which is illegal here...)

And that it the major issue with a lot of FPV type projects, they are illegal in that the power limts are exceeded many times over. The restrictions are there for very good reasons.

There are well established RC control systems that will give you long range, even those based on the SI4432 are much longer range than standard 2.4Ghz RC, and the LoRa based ones have stupid long range, but whats the point if you cannot (legally) get the video back ?

7

srnet:
but whats the point if you cannot (legally) get the video back ?

+1

It would also be an interesting challenge to catch the thief who decides to run away with the car that is 1000m away from its owner :slight_smile:

...R

8

"it does not make a difference if the car is 10m or 1000m away. you need quick reactions to take a corner."

I'd be interested in your 1000m setup. You might look at a cell phone system being the man in the middle. Is this line of sight or over hills and thru trees? You might look at using wifi routers with directional antennas in a bridged mode. Put the base station up on a mast.

9

zoomkat:
"it does not make a difference if the car is 10m or 1000m away. you need quick reactions to take a corner."

I'd be interested in your 1000m setup. You might look at a cell phone system being the man in the middle. Is this line of sight or over hills and thru trees? You might look at using wifi routers with directional antennas in a bridged mode. Put the base station up on a mast.

i live on the countryside and i own a large piece of land, so 500m is about end of my own property. 1000m to double because i not everything is line of sight (bushes, fences...)

but as transmitting the video signal will not work at this distance... i'll delay this 'idea' and test my other ideas with my rc project on wlan in the meantime...

10

spitzenlumo:
i live on the countryside and i own a large piece of land, so 500m is about end of my own property. 1000m to double because i not everything is line of sight (bushes, fences...)

2.4GHz wireless is seriously attenuated by bushes and anything else that has moisture - I doubt if your 100% margin would be sufficient.

...R