Originally Posted by
carlgrover
Now don't panic. Glow planes are still out there. You can buy a traditional kit, build it and fly it, right there at the same flying field as the little foamy foo foo mobiles. Everything is still available., engines, radio, the whole deal. It's not one stop shopping at Tower Hobbies anymore but if you poke around, there are quite a few smaller manufacturers very busy making kits.
I went to a fly in in Birmingham last week. There was a little bit of everything there. Mostly electric, but still some gas and glo. Everyone had a great time. All you need to do is look for these events and start attending them.
carl
Originally Posted by
Stikum
Not in a historical context. Twenty years ago, there would have been dozens, maybe hundreds. Not seven.
The severe decline of participation in the hobby has taken much of the fun out of it for me. The social interaction with people of common interest was very rewarding. I've built many kits, ARFs, kit-bashed, built from plans, designed and built from scratch, and taught dozens of people to fly R/C. I don't find that in my area any more.
This was my favorite hobby for over two decades. Those days are gone, but I have other hobbies that meet my needs. To each his/her own.
Not a trace of panic in my posts - just sadness that the social part of the hobby has declined so much. In the 1970's, as a teenager, I worked Turn 1 at the Formula1 races at Famoso. They had around 300 entries from all over the world. In the late '70s, there was an accident, costing the worker on turn 3 a kidney, and that ended that event forever, and our monthly Q500 races dwindled away. I left the hobby for a few years, finished school, got married, and decided to return. My first meeting back, there were lots of new faces in the club. It happened to be election time, and I was nominated for President - I declined the nomination. A very active year later, I accepted the nomination.
That club had over 100 members, and many of the special interests split off from it over the years to form special interest clubs: helicopters, gliders, and pattern clubs locally all grew from that club. Even the Anti-club renegades formed a club, and eventually became actively friendly with the original club - many of us were members of both, and I was president of both for several years.
All of these clubs have suffered similar declines in both membership and participation in recent years. Typical turnout on a Saturday or Sunday to fly is in single digits, a rarity fifteen years ago. Very few newbies to the hobby, and the old guys are fading away.
I saw my first R/C plane at a 4th of July fireworks show at a stadium in Eugene, Oregon in about 1966. I was six or seven at the time, and I was fascinated. It was exciting, unusual, and very attractive to me. It doesn't hold the same fascination for today's youth.