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I picked up some old Tamiya stuff and cant seem to get the Tx hooking up with the Rx. Have tried a few variations. The one common is the same set of crystals.

Do they fail after some time?

They can be damaged and not function.

Considering that Tamiya mostly used 27mhz am stuff, they are easy to find. Everybody's 27mhz am stuff interchanges.

I have seen some fm stuff as well but they seem to be much less common.

Yes they can, if dropped they can break.

You can shake them and listen if you hear what sounds like broken glass inside. Not always can you hear a bad crystal so don't take it as a sure fire way to tell, but can sometimes help quickly diagnose a bad crystal.

I think they mean do crystals stop working with age. As-in do they have an expiration date. I don't know the answer as It's not something that's ever crossed my mind, but I'd say they do not.

I have some that are over 30 years old and still working. I have another one that has submerged in salt water in a hurricane and still works (receiver does too).

Yeah, I don't think there's anything to them that could go bad. Speaking of hurricanes, I hope we don't lose power with the approaching one.

I picked up a "lot" of four Slashes awhile back, and all had AM TQ3s. Of the whole group, I could only get one set of crystals to communicate. I think it is all about how they are treated over the years.

Very old thread, I know, but I am new to the site and reading up on old stuff when I should be working Yes, crystals can go bad. A crystal is just a wafter that vibrates at the frequency indicated when electricity is applied. They don't expire or "wear out", but the wafer can break. The shake test described earlier works because the wafer itself breaks and rattles around inside the housing.