ORIGINAL: Mode One
ARFs do not directly compete against kit/scratch built models in any contest I am aware of. It's my understanding at TOP GUN, ARFs/ARCs are not allowed to compete what-so-ever. However, I also understand there are ARF/ARC divisions in Scale Masters and at AMA scale contests. If I have any of this wrong, I apologize for not having done all the homework needed.
However, how do you feel about this?
My personal opinon is there should be one venue where the ARF/ARC simply is not welcome and where personal pride, craftsmenship and artistry should take precedence! We are such a Must-Have-It-Now society that I would like to see the other spectrum rewarded for their hard work, so I don't think there should even be divisions allowing them to compete. Yes, ARFs/ARCs can be modifide (bashed) into something far beyond the everyday. However, they still were not framed up by the competitor!
That is the main reason that I only Participate at Top Gun. Not as a competitor, but as a Judge. It torques me off to no end to see someone taking credit for the work that was done by others. You will have a fight on your hands here, and you will get all the, "You didn't make your engine, and you didn't make your own glue, and your didn't grow your own Balsa tree, you didn't build your house, and you didn't make your car, motorcycle, boat", ad nauseum, but these are the lame arguments that are put forth by those who either can't or won't build.
ARF's have a definite place within our hobby, but a scale model contest is not (in my opinion) one of them. The scale contests should still be for the modellers who have paid their dues, and have expended the time to make a model airplane with their own hands. I have mixed emotions concerning the Composite models. While it's true that a lot of work is done for you, there is still more than fastening some sub-assemblies together. It is not like taking a pile of planks and sticks and winding up with a scale model airplane.
If I were training someone to fly for the first time, I would advise them to get an ARF trainer, since the level of experience is not there to enable them to end up with a straight and true model. You can get that in an ARF.
I have the same feelings about someone buying a finished model from another builder and trying to pass it off as his own. Several years ago, I built, detailed and trim flew an exact scale model. I let a man that I met at a fly-in, talk me into selling the plane to him. A couple of years later, I ran into him at another contest in another state, where he had scored very high in the static portion of the competition.....with the model that I had sold him. This event did require the entrant to sign the Builder of the Model declaration. Several people were in his tent, asking questions about the model, and he was holding forth with all kinds of answers (mostly wrong). When I asked him how the plane that I had built was holding up for him, he turned several shades of red, and the next thing that I knew, he had his tent down, the plane in the trailer, and was gone. As far as I am concerned, that is thievery. plain and simple. Taking someone elses work, and claiming it as your own is wrong, and illegal (look up the definition of plagerism).
As I said, I hope you can dodge all the slings and arrows that will be thrown here, because the ARF Brigade will hit as hard and heavy as the builders.
Bill, AMA 4720
WACO Brotherhood #1