I think the outflux of the nouveau-Cox engines (or whatever the collective name is for them) and once-again parts availability may have resulted in a bit of a surge of casual 1/2A activity, but how sustainable can that be? For now though it is kind of cool, in fact only yesterday.. I just went online and cherry picked Cox parts like a kid in a candy store.. "ooh, better get one of those, no wait, two! And and what else, oh yeah a couple of those cool spinners, and lookit the cute three blade props, and I wonder if they have.. and so on... and boy did CI ship it fast.
My slightly elder brother had a cool idea 3-4 years ago and built a toy store window façade in his den, with all kinds ofhis old collectible neat stuff to look at. It's a real neat little cornucopia of, well, old cool stuff.
Anyhow, on a similar but less dramatic note I decided that, since I had a bunch of pegboard behind the bench that was supposed to be for a visual extravaganza of tools, but instead is buried in dumb crap, I would instead make my own little hobby shop. Why not hang up all the stuff - engine parts, spare glow plugs, DuBro/Sullivan/whoever bits and pieces still in the bag, etc. - in other words all the bits I have rat-holed in my workshop that have any kind of visual interest. I suppose that is not a new idea but it beats rooting through drawers and bins to find treasures all the time, and I have all the common bench tools in a small bin anyway, so there is no point fantasizing about the tool emporium. Use a toolbox like everyone else I guess.
And I just ordered three 1/2A CL kits from Brodak - a 1/2A Twin Mustang, L'il Jumping Bean, and L'il Satan. Never had a twin, and the other two are nostalgic for me. I am probably going to do horrible things to them that are dumb ideas but at least they are repro kits, right? But at the least the Satan will be built as-is. I just haven't flown one in so long I couldn't resist. Now, for a while I've had this dumb idea that I can fly a Jumping Bean on micro RC and a Golden Bee or Black Widow up front. Tinkering with some micro gear recently reminded me again of that little fantasy, so I'll give it a whirl! I'll modify as necessary but as little as possible. Hmm, VA MKII and 4 channel with bladder tank?
So I'll try to contribute some activity when I get to one of those by posting a build thread.