Illegal Radio Control Helicopters
Saturday, June 5th, 2010
Over the past few years there have been improvements in remote control technology which has brought about an increased availability of fly radio control toys in the UK. Unfortunately many of the UK importers and retailers are unaware of UK and European regulation which govern these toys and some manufacturers in China and India make little attempt to comply with regulation for the UK or European markets. This mean that this Christmas you may be giving your child an illegal toy!
In the UK there are five Radio frequency bands for which may be used for radio control models, of which only three permit use of flying models, of which only one is recommended. Models which fly are recommended to use the 35Mhz radio frequency range (34.945-35.305Mhz) but may also legally operate at the general 27Mhz and 459Mhz frequencies, providing no risk to health and safety exist, due to loss of control caused by radio interference.
The 35Mhz band is for sole use by flying models and the 40Mhz band is reserved for surface models, so if you buy a radio control car, boat, hovercraft etc. which has a frequency in the 35Mhz band then this model is illegal or if you have a helicopter, plane or UFO which has a frequency between 40.66 and 41.0Mhz then this is illegal. Surface models may also operate in the general frequency ranges 26.96-27.28, 458.5 - 459.5, 2400-2483.5Mhz. All other frequencies are reserved for different communication devices and must not be used for radio control models.
To read more about radio control model frequencies or to get compliant radio control helicopters visit the Ofcom or RCC web sites.