Originally Posted by
jcmors
This is a very good example of action by the AMA in years gone by to support the hobby of model aviation. The difference between then and now is that I believe back then the AMA considered itself to represent RC model aircraft enthusiasts in general. The frequencies they secured for the RC hobby were secured for all who enjoyed the hobby. If our current AMA leadership were fighting for frequencies I believe they would be working at obtaining, for example, 2.4 ghz for use by only AMA members and those who wanted to use an RC aircraft transmitter would need to be a member.
Actually, the AMA can't claim they did all of the work to get the radio frequencies we have now. They got a lot of help from the likes of NAMBA, IMPBA, Futaba, Airtronics, JR and many other places. Had it been only the AMA, we might have the 27MHz and 72MHz bands and that would be it, at least until 2.4GHz came along. This, however, is not the case. We have 27, 29, 49, 50, 72 and 75MHz bands(29 and 49 are only used for toys from places like Radio Shack and Walmart), with the 50MHz band requiring an FCC license and the ability to fine tune the frequency of the transmitter, showing that there had to be help from the HAM radio operators. 75MHz is used only for surface models so that had to have help from boating, cars, etc.
The difference now is that the AMA is going it alone, trying to get the federal government to do what they want, without the other organizations and industry's help. Without the "muscle" provided by the other organizations and the R/C industry to back them, the AMA has become no more than an insect to the FAA and Congress, an annoyance at best, something to be swatted away and ignored at worst.