Buying legal radio control helicopters, cars, boats and hovercraft.

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In recent years there have been vast improvements in remote control and power supply technology which has enabled an increase in the availability of flying radio control toys in the UK. Unfortunately many UK importers and retailers are unaware of UK and European regulation which govern these toys. This mean that you may be giving your child an illegal toy!

In the UK there are five radio frequency bands for which radio control models can use, however only three permit use of flying models, of which only one is recommended for airbourne models. 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 if the model loses 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 radio controlled cars, boats, hovercraft etc, which have a frequency in the 35Mhz band are illegal or if you have a helicopter, plane or UFO which has a frequency between 40.66 and 41.0Mhz then they are also 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 visit the Ofcom or RCC web sites.