I either don't know anybody like that or everyone I know is like that....I can't decide.

?..."checkbook modeler" is a derogatory term, as most use it on the net."..."I thought Kevin did a pretty decent job of describing him."?????

BasinBum

The checkbook modeler is a PITA from the time he first shows up at the field with his first ARF trainer. He demands that someone teach him to fly, and generally he wants it done on his schedule. He is not open to having the plane looked at to make sure it is flyable and protests loudly if he is told he needs to make adjustments to his pride and joy. He complains loudly when his instructor will not put him up, flight after flight. He has no patience with the instructor that wants to fly the instructor's own plane on occasion. His favorite phrase is "I want".

We have one in our club. He decided on his second trip to the field that he could fly. He refused to use a buddy box. He re-kitted the trainer on the first flight. After an absence of 2 weeks, he shows up with a H9 Sukoi with a Zenoah on it. That lasted half a flight. This all started 2 years ago. He has now gone though more planes than anyone can remember, and at his own count, about $30,000 worth of planes. He is a capable pilot for a low wing trainer at this point. A week ago his H9 P 51 with a Siato 200 twin went in. Once again, he is without a flyable plane. He went through 3 Sig Rascals, the first with an OS 160, the last with a Moki 2.1. Everyone loves this guy. He is fun to be around, but, NO ONE turns their back on him when he is in the air. He has been known to give away the engines and radios from his crashes. He has occasionally bought some else a new plane, just because they mentioned they wanted one. Virtually everyone would help him, if only he would accept the help. He pays good money to have his planes assembeled for him. He is now in the process of trying to buy a turnkey turbine. He is a checkbook modeler.

JR

Look guys if you feel better by labeling people go right ahead...but I will refrain.

The term has been around for several years. It is not new, and was not invented on RCU. The only reason to discuss the term is so that those that are not familiar with it may understand it's most common meaning, as used on the net.

Hmmm... He must be of French descent...Just kidding around a bit… but I hope you get the point. Not all French people are arrogant, obstinate, ignorant arses Or are they?.... LOL

just because it has been around for decades or often used doesn't make it anymore right!

trying to have it both ways again?

Kinda off topic, but.. in my opinion, most of the French are arrogant and obstinate, ignorant arses, judging from what little time I spent in France. I am a fourth generation Californian who had a father that was an artist. He thought the French first name was cute. I go by John in real life. Before that, the family was from IN. Darn, I wonder if I have roots in Muncie

troll

It ain't my defintion. If the shoe fits, wear it, if it don't fine. If you don't care what the definition is, stick your head back in your cave. (thats what trolls do, huh?)

I don't know... but It seems you guys are doing a pretty good job making it up as you go along.

The first time I saw it used was several years ago on the usergroup rec.models.rc.air.. and I am not sure that it was first used there. It's just another definition, no different than the word Blue. It's hard to describe if you don't know what it means.

Some of this stuff is pretty funny!!! I guess that some of us just differ on the definition of a checkbook modeler. I believe some are good and some are bad....Simple as that.

I did think that the credit card modelers line was funny as well as tar and feathering those that don't build their own planes....And, LOL, Basin Bum---just how long have you owned your Hummer????

Kevin

I don't think a "checkbook modeler" is always a PITA. The guy basinbum describes sounds like a borderline case. I think the safty officer at Basinbum's club should request him to have some buddy cord time with one of the instructors and figure out why he is crashing so often. Is he hotdogging? If he is really bad he may just crash into someone some day. If he is taking huge risks by flying extremly close to the ground or pullin off extreamly violent and trickey manuvers at a safe distance then I see no problem.

ROFLMAO

Yeah, BasinBum, tell us about your Field Safety Officer!

Sport_Pilot, you might want to go to the Clubhouse forum and read a few pages of the "Sepulveda Basin" thread. Although there may be more than one field like the Basin, I sure don't know where it is.

I guess I still consider myself a check book modeler. I spent my money to by a ARF then I spent my money to by all the stuff to put in it (new) I then spent my money to buy gas and I have flown 10 times in 4 days, and I will continue to by gas spending my money to get where I feel proficient in flying my purchased ARF.

Who cares about who put it together ??? What matters most if that we all get together in this hobby to have fun and enjoy our precious time, either in this forum or out there crashing and laughing !!!

Thaere ain't no such thing as a "checkbook Modeler"---or rather, we are all such.
I use the checkbook to buy kits/balsa/supplies, and even an occasional "ARF" (why do I always thing "dog" at that term?)
We have a lot of "Checkbook "fliers"" and checkbook wannabes who are true PITA--and many of whom are both stupid and arrogant (Ignorance is cureable, stupid isn't)
Plenty of room for "modelers" and "fliers" inthis hobby/sport.....

I'm above all this. I use a CREDIT CARD to buy my contest balsa and Ambroid. Actually, I'm for whatever gives people pleasure so long as long as the danger level is reasonable and they are friendly about it.

Jim

Ambroid? They still make that stuff? I haven't seen any for years

JR,
We have a field safety officer! I think he's buried out at the end of the run way. The main club has a safety officer but he has better sense than to actually try and tell people what to do.

OK, how about Johnny. He has a hanger full of planes, literally a hanger at the airport. He has a full time builder that puts his planes together and when he want to fly his builder brings out a few of the planes and sets them up. By the way, he has some really, really nice planes. The builder is also a pretty good pilot so he takes the plane up and trims it before giving the TX to Johnny. Johnny flies around for a while and than gives the Tx back to his builder who then lands the plane.

Is he a checkbook modeler? Anybody have a problem with this guy?

Hey BasinBum

Don't cop out. Tell 'em about the Basin. How many planes have you seen in the air at once? What do the Ranger's do? How many TKO's last weekend. Come on, these guys have no idea. ROFLMAO

JR

Nope !!! What makes me happy is not what makes Johnny happy, the truth is that somehow we are both happy !!!

Nope---No problems with this guy!!! Knows his limitations, seems to have a guardian angel by his side if needed, sounds like a nice guy!!!

The Basin sounds like an awfull place. We used to have a similar place in Memphis called "Goin' to Market". It was a large empty parking lot that was used at times for flea markets. There were no rules, no manners....No kidding!!! Guys would take off and land in any direction they pleased. Your head had better be on a swivel. There were as manny planes in the air as the frequencies would allow. (This was before we had our current frequencies....Remember the colored frequencies?!?!?!) Guys that were pissed off at each other would shoot each other down. PITTYFUL!!! What finally stopped the flying there was due to a couple of guys putting planes through a few roofs as commercial and residential development took place. Man, the carnage there was unbelievable!!! I never flew there but watched in utter amazement how these guys didn't kill each other.....

Kevin

I just have to put my 2cents in here because what I have read in this post is exactly why I don't join a club. Lots of people just saying BLABLABLA plain and simple
Everybody comes from different walks of life and in general no 2 people are the same.
I am not an expert buy any means, I got in to this hobby about 4yrs ago and was never interested in it before. My wifes cousin was into it and the rest is well history. My first purchase was a TT raptor 60 with the best of everything and I will state I am from small town Canada, anyway I had in all around $5000.00ca into it took it home read everything and put it together properly I might add, found it a challenge and got hooked didn't know anybody around for help and didn't really need it, just did everthing to a tee made sure everything was neat and tidy, in a nut shell what turned me off was the morrons at the shop I bought it at turned out they forgot or what ever the case was but I couldn't even get ball links blades or anything else for that fact, dumped them and went to a new shop that bought up a bunch of other shops that were probably going under or what ever the case, they had alot of neat stuff in there and at first had product support until I bought up all their product support, I'm the kind of guy that just hates to wait, for anything, I did get an excuse that TT had just moved and their warehouse was in array[:'(] when I phoned GP which was the distributor to Canada they asked me who I was going though for parts, anyway I end up stripping the heli and selling and trading to get my money back or as much as I possibly could come out pretty good I might add.[8D] Anyway by that time I had enough of most hobby shops I had dealt with for the fact nobody seem to be of much help on heli's so I ended up with a 1\3 Byron pitts and a 1\4 scale 300xtra this story can go on and on but I'm trying to make it short, I was to scared to fly these planes because they were really nice and common sence told me don't even. So I go buy a Seagull Cessna 40 take it home and build it over nite, talk it to the field the next day with wifes cousin in tow and I tell him he can try it first, so he gets it up and after a bit gives it to me, well it really moves and before long I let it get to far away and can't really see it can't tell if its upside down right side up or what ever, Splat we walk over there and yup its splinters like 100 pieces or so, I put every piece I could find in a bag and spend the whole nite gluing and epoxy scrounged some covering and was ready to go again in the morning, didn't hve the time to drive the 200mile round trip to the store for one and had to show I could fix it and fly it, you know it was ulgy heavy but flew well and even fast got bored with it and bought an old pattern plane off a guy bearing in mind this is all with-in a week, flew the wings off the pattern plane ya it had a few hard landings nothing a bit of glue and epoxy wouldn't fix and yes it started to get quite colorful through time, about a week or so tell it to got to far away it got to the point where it wasn't worth the time to fix so I go buy another used plane an old Apache v2 for 50 buck fly it once and well but second time lost battery power in a turn and stood there for about 5-6mins watching it go around and around tell it hits the ground lesson #3 learned so now I have 3 planes in parts, pieces rather, so I put it all in a garbage bag give it 3 shakes and out pops a Patchy plane thats what my wife called it, 1part apache fuse 1part pattern wing 2parts epoxy everthing but duct tape but it flew rather well and did surprise a few people, it was all a challenge and experience to say the least this is all with-in about 3weeks there was no club in town and only a very few that flew and where we did fly was at a barley field the town owned, a small strip in the middle was our field had lots of fun and there was nobody with the attitude they were king everthing was cool until we started to venture out to your fields then we met some of the most errogant guys I have ever met. Once the challenge was over and I got hooked on E-Bay it wasn't long and I had enough Arf's and parts to out do some smaller hobby shops, yes I was an addict from the first day and still am going strong, I will add that I do have insurance and do fly safe but do enjoy flying by myself just for the fact its less B.S I've been around the so called instructers that when you tell t6hem when they ask for about a month or so they tend to back-up when I flash up, show them how I fly and then watch them crash and burn,why, well it was a glitch they say, well its going pretty straight for a glitch looks more like you lost your power. Then theres the guy that owns the hobby shop, he can go on for hours about all the planes he's built and designed from scratch of all the ones hanging from his ceiling theyv'e all come down, and he's the guy that runs over buddies plane and flight box at the field, and it goes on an on, so who is better, nobody. All the people that read everything they can about this hobby still aren't any better, sure they know lots of info on the latest gadgets and crap, they get more wrapped up in things you don't really need and lack the true knowledge of going out and learning buy your mistakes and the diffrent experiences you've had and just having fun. Who cares what Joe-blow has and how much money he or she has or wiether they have a trailer full of planes or a stable full who cares, they must be having fun or they wouldn't be out. I think it all comes down to the jealousy thing, same old same old BLABLABLA

As far as the new people that just won't listen or heed advise they soon will come to a point where they figure it out or fall out
As far as the safety is concerned you will never get rid of the guy that has more money than brains well they to are here for a short time they soon will get tired and move on, lets face it it's only the die-hard addicts that will survive, scratch kit or arf its all the same, what goes up is going to come down sooner or later.
Where is everybodies 1st 2nd 3rd------- planes???
Where all lucky no one was hurt!!
Fail safe? and all the other gadgets? waste of money and dangerous, I would sooner have a plane go down in a field rather than off on a collision course with what or whoever

I still class myself as a beginner and always will because I'm always trying something new
mostly with big power in little things
hell I've even went to the hardware store and bought abs downspout tubing and built a plane out of scraps and flew the wings off.
I don't know the stats but who has caused more accidents??
newbies or seasoned vets??


Have A Happy New Year
Always keep safety in mind and most of all have fun and get along with your fellow man, even when it is trying and frutrating at times

This is only my 2cents Have FUN!!!