Every modeler knows that good remote control cost a decent amount of money. Cheap ones may not have enough channels or other features. So the only way is to build your own that would suit your needs. Jad Berro has developed a pretty simple but effective 17 channel remote controller that is more than enough to control simple robotic platforms and seems to be suitable for RC airplane control.

It consists of self made Arduino board, two Playstation joysticks and several buttons. Commands are encoded and sent via 434MHz wireless transmitter module. Remote controller has also a LCD screen where some user information can be seen. As this remote controller is Arduino based, it makes it attractive to expand it with custom programming.