CL lost to the flash of cheap RC. But in an ever shrinking and litigious world where people are not apt to put up with a remotly controlled cruise missle, CL has started a come back. Park flying is fine, but I only need a 200 foot circle which is still pretty tight for most RC ships that can handle a breeze more than 5 mph. Also, you don't have to worry about the occasional glitch that can send your darling little model off to a point of destination unkown.

Going away, no more than any other aspect of the hobby, in fact our portion of the hobby has been growing for the last 10 years. Of course, at our numbers adding 1 or 2 hear or there is a markable increase!

Lord knows what the future brings, but I usually chalk this discussion up with the 'Where are all the young people' which of course if you've ever looked at an old magazine circa 40's and 50's was the lament back then as well. Along with, 'where are the true craftsman now that CL is so readily available' really cracks me up.

I fly RC and FF as well, though not as much FF thanks to this being a part of Kansas/Missouri where there is too much wind and too many trees! As for RC, I'm headed out to the Midwest Slope Challenge tomorrow for some slope soaring competition so I hope the wind actually DOES blow. Hadn't flown RC since New Years day otherwise, but that's due to the CL field being 5 minutes away and not 20 minutes away. Gotta have open spaces with those RC planes. And don't get me started with those behemoth IMAC planes who seemed damned and determined to get us ALL banned. Whoevers idea it was to have an airplane with half a Volkswagon engine in it for power and then to fly it in what must be viewed by the general public, (and most of the sane RC public) as out of control needs to be shot. Impressive, yes, but Holy Jesus would you guys get a grip! And where oh WHERE are the AMA DB restrictions when it comes to those things. You cannot planly port the exhaust of one of those things and expect it to be quite. The prop noise alone carrys more than a mile! Keep it up, and then CL WILL be making quite a large comeback. If townships will actually make the deferation between RC and CL when they go about banning.

And I always thought that winding in/out Control and stooge lines was always more than made up for never having to charge your transmitter, receiver and flight packs. AMA LI/ION emergency notice? Who cares, I'm thinking about going a step further and just flying diesels. Then I won't even need that Ni-starter.