Hi guys,
I am 40 years old and started in this hobby when I was 13. For my birthday I was able to scrounge enough money together to get a PT 40. It was 50.00 for the kit! lol I built it. And loved building it. Then I had to save for a radio, and engine and field equipment. I tried to fly it and crashed it. Fixed it, and crashed again and again. I did not have access to a club and no one I knew was into RC. I would build a few more plans in my youth and crashed all of them. lol
I was then in high school and had other priorities.
Then went into the military and did not have room for planes. I was finally able to get back into trying to fly when I was 22, out of the military and had a really good job. I finally got over the learning to fly hump by purchasing Real Flight Deluxe! Remember that? lol
As time went on I built a few more planes, but I am a geek and love technology and RC. Helicopters became affordable and I had always wanted one since the first crude ones came out in the catalogs. I built a couple helis. A .30 glow and an electric 450 Trex. About 6 years ago I built a GP .40 cub. Lots of fun! 3 years ago I bought the kit I had wanted to build since I was 14. A .60 size corsair with retracts and flaps. It is the TF GE Corsair. I have the fuse 98% done and the wing about 75% done. This build has been a challenge not only from a time perspective, but from a father of 2 with a full time job and a 4 unit building that needs to be kept up perspective. I usually have about 3 hours at night to myself to build if I want, but I am so tired from work and kids and anything else that needs to be done I just want to relax at that point. The times I feel like building never coincide to what the family has in mind, especially on the weekend. I like to wake up and get building and can build all day if I could. Well, that does not work out to well when your kids want to see you and have your attention.
An hour here and an hour there is just enough time to get into it only to have to stop, so it becomes more frustrating then enjoyable.
3 years is a long time (for me) to be building a single airplane. I am really trying to get it done for this flying season, but time is limited. This build has kind of shown me how little time I have anymore to build and has really started to frustrate me. I will probably not build another kit until I retire and or the kids are on their own. At this point I view building a kit as being for someone who is single with no young children or for the older folk who are retired or have plenty of spare time.
I also enjoy multiple aspects of RC that keep me from wanting to spend hours, days, weeks and months building. As mentioned I have 2 helicopters, and also 3 glow planes, 2 electric foam planes, a little Blade quad mqx, a Blade msr heli, an e-Flite 4-Site, Parkzone Night Vapor and my newest addition is a Blade Nano FPV. I also would like to get a nice RC truck eventually. I purchased a FatShark Attitude v2 FPV kit to use with the Blade Nano FPV and I put the TX and camera from the FatShark kit into my Flyzone Focke Wulf 190. So all these different interests within the RC realm also contribute to limited time building. I love all things RC and especially RC things that fly.
I will always enjoy building, but the amount of time it takes at this point in my life is just not feasible for building a kit. To be honest, I am at the point where I cannot wait to be done building this corsair so that I have no building projects at all and I can just fly and maintain my current fleet. It will probably be years before I buy another kit. I would consider an ARF, but it will be a long, long time before I even think about building another kit.
I hope I did not bore anyone with this. lol. Just trying to give a real perspective on why my building kits is taking a back seat for now.
Mike