Spektrum DX6i / BR6000s

We had a thread running on the featherweights. But thought we start a new one ! we got a 3rd DX6i this time direct from Spektrum US support.

We are still getting same issues with our 6 Br6000s and 1 AR6000 we still have..i.e we get an intermittent bind and when it eventually does bind it can take minutes to sync again on a power off / on again...but again sometimes it doesnt !

Still being investigated by Spektrum but it seems so hit or miss it cant be right ! Both our DX6i are doing the same whilst our good old DX6 bind everytime 1st time ! Spektrum says BR 6000 is fully compatable.

Just like to know who for the record has got DX6is working on Br6000s.

Thanks, Ian

Mine wont, very erratic bind, leave disconnected for couple of hours and need to bind again.

Not impressed with the DX6i


DaveMac

Seems we are not alone (see thread new comer in Feathers also).

Heres Spektrum response :

Im at a loss as to what to tell you. Ive bound the
AR6000 and BR6000 successfully with this radio without any issues.
There is no reason the receivers should not bind with this new
transmitter. There is no issue with compatibility from our standpoint,
but I am unsure where to tell you to go next in order to successfully
correct the issue. I will forward the issue to our development team for
further review.

So if we hear anymore well let you know. But sounds like we need Spektrum to hear more issues directly.

Ian

It would be interesting to find out if its a bad batch of transmitters.

Has anyone ... as Ian said ...got a DX6i that binds succesfully?..If so it would be informative to try it with bots and receivers that are having problems.

It will also be informative if no one posts that they have a DX6i that theyre happy with.

(Message edited by woody on April 09, 2008)

do they not make the DX6 anymore?

how come people are moving to the DX6i when the DX6?

i had a look at one last week and only saw the screen at the bottom and the battery pack doesnt need to be charged as you could just change them but charging isnt a problem for us all?

just wonna know why i see people buying the DX6i

also http://www.simplyt-rex.com/catalogue/accessories/radio-equipment/spm6600e-dx6i-2-4ghz-radio-set?gclid=CP6E3szOzpICFRGTMAoduiJ3Bghttp://www.simplyt-rex.com/catalogue...pm6600e-dx6i-2 -4ghz-radio-set?gclid=CP6E3szOzpICFRGTMAoduiJ3Bg

£109

i also prefer the look of the DX6

i saw the 2 gram AR Receiver and wow it is small lol

The DX6i is a replacement, and is FAR cheaper for a better transmitter. The programming features are FAR superior to the DX6 and the stick control is much more precise.
I do agree they do not look as appealing. I tested mine a while back and it worked fine and not tested it since, BUT i know some other people did that aswell but after that they had problems.

Ive been speaking to Robot Marketplace about the DX6i as they offer the DX6i with the BR6000 for roboteers. They have not seen the issue nor have any customers reported the issue with the transmitters. There is obviously something unique going on with certain scenarious and I would imagine that it is specific to a batch of receivers and possibly transmitters.

I will test mine tonight.

Well it became Sunday before I got around testing it, but here it goes.

We tested the Dx6i with one of our stock, already used BR6000 so I know it worked before. We hooked up a servo and put a 5V power to it as we didnt have a receiver batt handy.

First attempt: We put the bind plug in the receiver, gave it power, after de BR started blinking we started up the DX6i with the trainer switch towards us.

30 sec

1 minute

Nothing.

Lots of beeping, nothing happened.

2nd attempt: again lots of beeping, still no go.

3rd attempt: after 30 seconds I switched of the TX, didnt take the power of the receiver, and restarted de DX6i in bind mode, and 10 seconds later it bound.

After that no matter how many times we turned off the receiver, transmitter, or both, it stayed connected.

Next week I will check again if the bound still held.

quote:

Not impressed with the DX6i I am very impressed with the DX6i, when used for what it is intended, which is flying models. I have been in the field all sunday with it and I absolutely love it. It is so much smoother than the DX6, and much better options.

The thing is though, even though the binding did seem to work for me (we will know for sure next week), it should not be showing this irratic behaviour to bind with DSM receivers as it is doing now.

It is after all the successor to the DX6 and therefore should be able to take over the tasks the DX6 did without issues. Obviously it doesnt live up to that task.

Spoke to Tech Support at Horizon today, was told that for the moment consider the BR6000 Rx NOT to be compatable with the DX6i, Spektrum are looking into this and could have an answer shortly..

New BR series RX for the DX6i perhaps..


DaveMac

Any more news on this as I had severe problems at Burgess Hill with my DX6i?

Has anyone got any more news on this?

Emailed Spektrum several times but they are not responding to me anymore. We got another DX6 so the 2 DX6i are just gathering dust at the moment. Grant have you had any luck with your escalation ?

I tried out the DX6i and BR6000 combo over the weekend.

It took quite a while to bind initially but I seem to recall the manual saying that if a DSM2 receiver wasnt present it would search for a DSM1 so it may take a while. So that may explain it.

My old operating procedure was to turn on the tx wait for the pcm to flash and then turn on the receiver.

When I tried this with the DX6i it either took ages for it to bind or it didnt bind at all.

I then tried turning on the receiver and leaving it for about 30secs and then turning on the tx.

The receiver appeared to not have problem binding when I did this.

Ill be re-testing this later in the week and I cant really see this being the actual problem but thought Id let you know just in case.

Andy

Andy, the PCM flashes when the failsafes are transmitted, with a PCM system you need to turn on the transmitter, then the receiver and then wait for the PCM to flash. Until the reciever has received the failsafes it will default to last known position (very dangerous with a robot).

With 2.4GHz you should turn on the receiver before attempting to bind the transmitter.

First install your bind plug.
Turn on the receiver (light should be flashing).
Turn on the transmitter while holding the trainer switch to enter bind mode.
Wait until the light on the receiver goes solid.
Remove the bind plug.

The receiver will store the stick positions during binding as the pre-set positions for failsafing so make sure that when you switch the transmitter off the robot does not move (or creep). If it does you will need to redo the bind process with the sticks in the neutral positions.

Also to note, modelmatch will store seperate bind settings for each receiver. So if you change model on the transmitter, you will need to rebind the receiver.

nowt wrong with the old faithful dx6

Anyone wanna buy a DX6i? It works, honest!

missed the boat with the problems with the dx6i, im guessing there still is a problem, as i need to buy a new one for the house robot.

Im guessing I should wait a bit longer then.

If you buy a dx6i, does it come with a reciever which works, or do you have to use our old br receivers with it ?

Is it just the old br recievers which are the problem?

John

I dont think that Spektrum even knows what the problem is at the moment Jonno.

From what has been said above I think you either wait for the problems to be sorted or go with a DX6 or 7.

I think the last thing you want with that new machine of yours is radio problems!

It is the old DSM receivers, the AR6000 and BR6000 (which are basically the same receivers just different software). With my AR6200 the dx6i performs brilliantly, but those receivers havent got the programmable failsafe on all channels like the BR6000 does.

A copy and paste from the RFL Forum.

To all: I have had a DX6 for a while with multiple BR6000s and all is good.

I just got 2 DX6is with stock AR6200 RX and 2 additional BR6000s. I have encountered the DX6i binding to BR6000 problems reported here and on the UK forums. One of them will eventually bind after 30-40 seconds. The other will not bind at all to a BR6000. With the old reliable DX6 all BR6000s bound in seconds. The problem is the DX6i. Both DX6is bind to their AR6200 in seconds

We ran Hydra on the DX6i for the first fight in Stake (Didnt run it again because someone forgot to charge the batteries (Doh!!!).

It ran fine with no issues.

Andy

Seems hit and miss on the DX6i .... SOME DX6is work fine with the BR6000 others dont.

Selective purchasing of the DX6i at the local model shop might perhaps be the way to go....I.E. Take a BR6000 plus battery with you and test the binding works.

Still I have seen the same Tx work with one Br6000 and not with another.

Our BR6000 in Kronic works better than the one in Weed but both take way too long to bind. At the last event we did I nearly pulled weed out of a fight because it did not bind, luckily it just managed to bind before the fight started. Im not happy with our setup and Im considering sending it back as it does not do what it is supposed to do.

Are you having to bind each time you fight ...or are you saying that you couldnt get reception / connection between the transmitter and receiver?

Bind: Process when the receiver is associated with the transmitters unique code. Requires the bind plug.

Connect: When the receiver is powered on it scans the band for its associted transmitter. When its found the transmitter it will connect.

Once the receiver has been bound to a transmitter, the unique code is stored in memory (along with the failsafes). The receiver should connect with the transmitter within a few seconds of the transmitter being switched on.

I have noticed with my DX7 that sometimes the receiver does not connect and this appears to happen occasionally if the transmitter is turned on after the receiver.

i have had dx7 binding problems occasionally. i have to rebind it sometimes as it almosts unbinds itself.

Ok, with the 2 Rxs I have, they take a good few minites to bind and remember the failsafes. After that, Kronic can take a good minute or more to connect and weed can take up to 5 minutes to connect (sometimes it will not even connect). In one fight (last event) Kronic lost connection to the Rx and I had to reboot the Tx. This caused Kronic to loose connection for about 30 seconds. Not good in a fight when in that time youre dead!

that happened to me with a dx7,in the middle of a fight it stopped working completly, i was puzzled for ages then traced the fault to a reciever, i thought the reciever was broken, then i rebound it and it worked fine.

Still no fix for this?

No news on that front Im afraid.

Still no news on this? This is taking the p***! Surely Spektrum must be able to sort this out. At this rate I wont be able to compete in my next fight and thats in September!

I thought Id just throw in a few observations here.

I have operated Hydra successfully using the DX6i coupled with NCC-70s and a receiver battery.

At Guildford there was an issue which resulted in the relays fluttering so we didnt run it because we couldnt arm it safely.

This was originally attributed to the leads for the new Roboteq controller we have added. On further inspection, when bound with a DX6 there appears to be no problem.

This got me thinking on the differences between what we had before and what we have now and it seems to be the BEC.

James Baker pointed out to me a previous issue with the DX6 which was along the same lines and he did a product recall to upgrade the voltage regulators:

http://www.fightingrobots.co.uk/forum.htmhttp://www.fightingrobots.co.uk/forum.htm

The Spektrum manual says the voltage should be kept above 4.8V and it could well be that when the robot is operated the voltage regulation on the BEC drops down and causes the receiver to drop its bind.

This comment does not seem to appear in the manual for the DX6 (or at least I cannot find it.

The voltage range for the BR6000 is 4.8V - 6.0V.

I am not putting this forward as a definitive explanation of the problem, just an observation at this stage.

I thought I may do some testing on the feathers using a BEC from Technobots to see if theres any joy with it, but also thought Id throw it into the pot for comments.

Andy

I apprecicate your input Andy, but unfortunately that is not the solution to the problem Im afraid.

We tried it with RX battery and BEC, and even measured the current draw of the BR6000 (which is insanely high by the way, 145mA with only a standard S75 servo attached and not moving). Still binding is either working after a few minutes or after a couple of retries, or not working at all.

And still no word from Spektrum about this either?

RE:- The DX6i modelmatch feature.

I found this post whilst wandering the web...

Dated Wed Mar 26, 2008

I received an email from Spektrum support today with answers to the
question I asked

1. Is the BR6000 supported with the DX6i?
Answer - YES

2. Will the ModelMatch feature of the DX6i work with the BR6000?
Answer - NO

Interesting.

Answer 1, that is very doubtful. Too many complaints in the field tell the opposite.

Answer 2 I can understand since the receiver doesnt send an ID back like dsm2 receivers do.

Where did you find this Woody?

Our supplyers have informed us that spektrum are still working on the problem and have not found a solution yet. I believe it is to do with software on the dx6i.

Dx6 has been discontinued. dx7 is fine with the br6000 if anybody wants a solution.

we will keep you informed.