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Mechanic AH

Is this hobby as exciting as it used to be?

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14 hours ago, 87lc2 said:

I was knocking Tamiya at all and when run properly they can be durable.  I run mine a lot and as long as they're used sensibly they just go and go.  My point was putting a Tamiya up against a modern TRX or Aarma is just not a fair comparison and you can't do a lot of the "cool" things that people see on the internet with a classic Tamiya.

This is exactly the point, with Tamiya durability.  Back in the early 90s, it seemed my cars were always breaking and I was always waiting for spares on the slow boat, or patching up a broken body.  But then, only one of my cars was bought new, the others were well-used before I got them.

Since I've been back in the hobby, I honestly haven't broken that much.  Even racing, it's not often I have to replace a part or come home early.  But then, I don't drive my Tamiyas like I would my E-Maxx, and I don't drive them like I did when I was 13.

The whole point about young people not liking our hobby or engineering or seeing how stuff works is, well, I guess like youngsters not liking our music.  Right now my daughter is 5, and she loves listening to Orbital, Shpongle, Badly Drawn Boy and the Britpop compilations from the late-90s / early-00s when I'm driving in the car, but once she's old enough to be listening to whatever kids listen to these days, I'm sure her interests will drop, just like I stopped listening to my dad's Billy Joel and Abba records once I started tuning my transistor radio to the BBC Radio 1 chart after school every day.

I keep saying to my daughter that if she practices with her FTX Outback or drives my trucks when we go walking in the woods, as soon as she's good enough I'll buy her a full-size car and take her to events with me.  She gets really excited by the idea, goes wild with it for 10 minutes, then gets bored.  I think the harder I try to make her like it, the less likely she will.

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16 hours ago, 87lc2 said:

My dad was very mechanical and we worked on the house, RCs, and real cars all the time when I was a kid

Same here, after working in the maintenance industry for 25yrs, he became a lecturer at a college in the City (or , ' early retirement' as he called it 😄). Our garage was /still is, equipped with a myford lathe, a bridgeport milling machine, surface grinder, pedestal drill etc, and I grew up with this being normal, and presuming everyone had these in their garage!! 

I worry that schools don't have this kind of equipment in schools anymore, so not a tool in the minds eye 'tool box' (if that makes sense ) so the first thought is off, I'll look on ebay, not , just turn that down in the lathe, and it'll fit...

I've not done a project for a while (think the last one was the 'restomod' Optima mid, back in 2018!), so are the modern cars taking away the 'excitement ' of improving their design, by being great to start with?? 🤔

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Is anything as exciting now as life was when you were 16? 

Probably not.

I find RC cars more therapeutic than exciting, for me it's a way to get creative, and uses lots of parts of my brain - electronics, mechanics and graphic design as well as some technical skills like spray painting.

Driving an actual car, to be honest I'd probably find a SMT10 or Traxxas bigfoot or something like that more exciting, but I like making things myself - and the smaller scale of the QD, MF01x and GF01 etc. series.

 

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Companies like Traxxas and arrma advertising speed and pushing it as important killed the excitement in the hobby.

It was the point where a company could sell any garbage design as long as it looked interesting and went 100mph.

You wind up with a bunch of generic and uninteresting chassis that are all the same and it sucks. You finally get a new segment and you get companies like Traxxas again just selling the same garbage with a new body flooding the market.

They have even started super-sizing that generic design so they can destroy the 1/5 scale market with a bunch of garbage.

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7 hours ago, XJman said:

Companies like Traxxas and arrma advertising speed and pushing it as important killed the excitement in the hobby.

It was the point where a company could sell any garbage design as long as it looked interesting and went 100mph.

You wind up with a bunch of generic and uninteresting chassis that are all the same and it sucks. You finally get a new segment and you get companies like Traxxas again just selling the same garbage with a new body flooding the market.

They have even started super-sizing that generic design so they can destroy the 1/5 scale market with a bunch of garbage.

Traxxas and Arrma really aren't much different than toy grade cars in reality. You buy it, toss batteries in it, show it off to your buddies and toss it on the shelf once you lose interest.

The majority of people who buy toy grade cars don't transition to the enthusiast level of the hobby.

The RTR movement probably saved the hobby as much as it pains me to admit it. It got people walking into hobby shops again. It got kids and parents to buy toy cars and play out in the neighborhood. The Slash brought a lot of people out to race again.

Really, you have to blame consumers more and companies less. A company can only provide products and marketing and hope that it takes off with consumers.

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I find it just as exciting now,  as I always have. I suppose it’s because I always have primarily raced RC’s. So even small tweaks or improvements have always been a big deal.

 

in this age of cad software and 3D printing it’s probably the most exciting it’s ever been. I can have an idea for a part, design it and manufacture it and put it on my car. 
 

 

 

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9 hours ago, Tbird232ci said:
16 hours ago, XJman said:

 

Traxxas and Arrma really aren't much different than toy grade cars in reality. You buy it, toss batteries in it, show it off to your buddies and toss it on the shelf once you lose interest.

And these are the people I count on to buy used cars off the from local classified ads to fuel my hobby. 
 

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15 hours ago, Tbird232ci said:

Traxxas and Arrma really aren't much different than toy grade cars in reality.

I don't agree with that in its entirety.

Traxxas specifically has some incredibly good vehicles for the price. I am a long fan of the simplicity and durability of the base bandit and rustler. They are mainstays of the beginner community and you would be hard pressed to recommend a better beginner vehicle.

Anything more than that is a waste. I could make arguments for the trx4 but I'm much more of an axial fan. Nothing else they sell really can handle the out of the box speed of them. They go fast and shatter. They add "adjustable" parts that are for show and eye-catching chassis designs that wind up being harder to repair than they offer benefit.

I've never seen an arrma worth more than parts. People say tamiyas are fragile, but I've never seen people who own them buy parts like they do for arrma.

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For me it is.  I still get excited about seeing a Lunchbox bounce around today as I did in the 80s.  There was a certain experience around thumbing through a Tower catalog or Radio Controlled Car Action magazine that seems lost today.  I’ve enjoyed NICD, NIMH, Nitro and now Lipos.  Rarely do I get the experience of the sounds and smells(Shoe Goo) of a hobby shop. I do miss that part.  They are still around but few and far between for me.  I like how the hobby has shifted toward realism which was what Tamiya and Kyosho were doing in the golden age.  I do get tired of seeing speed runs and sending brushless cars 50ft in the air online.  To me that’s silly , but it if it keeps people in the hobby I can’t complain too much.  For me there will never be any experience like building a Tamiya or Kyosho.  Waiting on my Re re Ultima to ship!!  I think there are many out there who still enjoy building the kits.

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I had a motor, ESC and steering servo from an ARRMA stunt buggy in one of my Javelin re res.

They were fun while they lasted.

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On 5/2/2022 at 7:50 AM, Tbird232ci said:

The RTR movement probably saved the hobby as much as it pains me to admit it. It got people walking into hobby shops again.

I think this is particularly true for scale crawling.

Crawling, more so than any other niche, I think, puts you in touch with other members of the public.  Sometimes I go out in groups of 20 or 30 people, to run the crawlers through public land.  Because we're out on the footpaths with the dog walkers and the cyclists, we're approachable.  I've never had anybody see it as antisocial or dangerous, or had any negative comments.  Often people will ask about the cars, how they work, what they can do, and more importantly, where they can buy one.  They can order a TRX-4 online and be driving it the very next day, without having to get to grips with an instruction manual, work out what combination of battery, motor, servo, charger, radio to buy, find somewhere to spray a body, go find all the rusty tools from the garden shed to build it...  Plus, being of a crawley kind of speed, it's a less intimidating thing to drive.

I get far less interest running my bashers on the beach.  Some people will say "cool car" as they pass, I even once heard someone say "I had one of those, it was [unfriendly word]" to his friend when I was running my SRB.  Very few people want to ask about the cars, how they work, or where they can get one.  The exception was the mother of an 11-year-old boy, who was forever breaking his Arrma cars in the back yard, and she wanted to know where she could get one as stable and durable as my modded G6-01.  (In that case, I advised it probably wasn't the car, but the location - it the space is too small, it'll get broken.  We were about 2 miles from the Mendip RC track, so I advised her to get in touch with the club about racing).

I think if you're running bigger-scale stuff like Traxxas or Arrma bashers, you'll seem even less approachable (mostly because people don't want to risk getting hit by a low-flying X-Maxx on short final) and it's probably more likely people will think it anti-social or dangerous.

Racing is less visible still.  Most of the tracks I go to are on private land, far away from the public, or locked away in village halls.  Someone must actively seek out the hobby and come along to a race meet to get interested.  The difference there is they'll see the cars with the lids off and the tools out, and they'll see that fettling is a huge part of racing.  It goes with the territory that you have to be handy with the tools if you want to go racing.

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21 minutes ago, Mad Ax said:

Someone must actively seek out the hobby and come along to a race meet to get interested.

Worryingly, we've had people message the club, saying they didn't know we existed, and only just found out (saying that, we've only been at the new venue maybe 2yrs, but have run at other venues for over a decade),  but I'm not sure what to do to rectify this.

You want to attract the right people, but cast the net wide enough, with very little budget for advertising.

Facebook is the cheapest form, but you're still only reaching either those looking specifically, or personal friends on your Facebook, that know you , play with toy cars, anyway.

'Have a go' days have worked well, with 5+ club cars (+ being, if more than 5 turn up, we throw our own cars in for them to use...😳)  , just to come and race for free.

Organised a few demo days, at car festivals, where you set up a track in a car park or something, and let people have a go, bit still don't get the numbers.

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@Wooders28 that's an interesting conundrum for sure.  If you're happening behind closed doors or on private land, people won't know about it.

My closest club takes place in a youth club, they have a big banner on the fence surrounding the tennis court.  That will get at least some drive-past attention.

Another takes place in a Civic Centre, it's been a while since I was there, but the Civic Centre had TV screens in the lobby showing still photos of all the stuff that happens there (dance classes, pop-up cinema, and RC racing) but only hits people already walking through the doors.

I still think having a proper website with up-to-date info and contact details is worth having.  Lots of people aren't on FB or don't want to use it.  But a lot of clubs I know have moved everything to FB, and the old websites have an out-of-date feel, no current articles, rules haven't been updated, new classes aren't listed.  Without regular updates, it might give the impression that the club is no longer running.  Also, test the contact forms work regularly (spam filters get more sensitive all the time, last thing you want is people filling in the contact form but it not getting through to whoever handles it) and make sure the person charged with answering requests is actually checking regularly, and handing over to someone else if they go on holiday.

The broader issue is more complicated: how do you appeal to people who don't know RC racing is a thing?  For that, I don't really know.  For a short while I was the "press officer" for a local club (more for reasons of politics than because anyone thought I was the right person for the job), and we tried to organise some "demo-days" at local events, but it was usually more hassle than it was worth.  If it wasn't on a regular club day then many members couldn't make it.  Those on day-release from family duties didn't want to do an away-round if it meant missing a championship round in the same month.  If we ran it on what was supposed to be a club day, people who wanted a normal club race got upset.

One thing the Bristol club did was booking a table display at the local model expo every year.  There wasn't space for a race track (arguably there was but the indoor flyers and RC balloon club got it), but they'd ask members to donate their race cars for display, they'd have photos and videos playing of the race days, details people could take with them, and - the main attraction - a laptop computer running VRC in solo mode.  Visitors could write their name down and set a laptime, with the fastest time winning a prize.  This is the kind of display that could go anywhere, from village fete to 1:1 motorsport event, provided the club can afford the cost of a display, and gets loads of exposure outside of the hobby.

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2 hours ago, Mad Ax said:

I think this is particularly true for scale crawling.

Crawling, more so than any other niche, I think, puts you in touch with other members of the public.  Sometimes I go out in groups of 20 or 30 people, to run the crawlers through public land.  Because we're out on the footpaths with the dog walkers and the cyclists, we're approachable.  I've never had anybody see it as antisocial or dangerous, or had any negative comments.  Often people will ask about the cars, how they work, what they can do, and more importantly, where they can buy one.  They can order a TRX-4 online and be driving it the very next day, without having to get to grips with an instruction manual, work out what combination of battery, motor, servo, charger, radio to buy, find somewhere to spray a body, go find all the rusty tools from the garden shed to build it...  Plus, being of a crawley kind of speed, it's a less intimidating thing to drive.

I get far less interest running my bashers on the beach.  Some people will say "cool car" as they pass, I even once heard someone say "I had one of those, it was [unfriendly word]" to his friend when I was running my SRB.  Very few people want to ask about the cars, how they work, or where they can get one.  The exception was the mother of an 11-year-old boy, who was forever breaking his Arrma cars in the back yard, and she wanted to know where she could get one as stable and durable as my modded G6-01.  (In that case, I advised it probably wasn't the car, but the location - it the space is too small, it'll get broken.  We were about 2 miles from the Mendip RC track, so I advised her to get in touch with the club about racing).

I think if you're running bigger-scale stuff like Traxxas or Arrma bashers, you'll seem even less approachable (mostly because people don't want to risk getting hit by a low-flying X-Maxx on short final) and it's probably more likely people will think it anti-social or dangerous.

Racing is less visible still.  Most of the tracks I go to are on private land, far away from the public, or locked away in village halls.  Someone must actively seek out the hobby and come along to a race meet to get interested.  The difference there is they'll see the cars with the lids off and the tools out, and they'll see that fettling is a huge part of racing.  It goes with the territory that you have to be handy with the tools if you want to go racing.

Crawling did great things for the hobby. It made a lot of things really accessible. You don't need to block off parking lots or find someone to host a dirt track. You can go with some buddies to about any park and set up a mini competition for nothing.

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On 5/3/2022 at 7:21 AM, XJman said:

Crawling did great things for the hobby. It made a lot of things really accessible. You don't need to block off parking lots or find someone to host a dirt track. You can go with some buddies to about any park and set up a mini competition for nothing.

Agreed.  The driving realism is definitely fun to watch too with cars like the CC01's.. and honestly speaking, I had to practice quite a bit to get that level of smooth throttle modulation to make the car appear realistic instead of just bouncing around like some.. well, you know.  Which reminds me.. I've yet to install that 1080 or whatever ESC it was that has drag braking.   I bought them and yet have not installed them.

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On 5/1/2022 at 11:38 PM, Nikko85 said:

Is anything as exciting now as life was when you were 16? 

Probably not.

I find RC cars more therapeutic than exciting, for me it's a way to get creative, and uses lots of parts of my brain - electronics, mechanics and graphic design as well as some technical skills like spray painting.

Driving an actual car, to be honest I'd probably find a SMT10 or Traxxas bigfoot or something like that more exciting, but I like making things myself - and the smaller scale of the QD, MF01x and GF01 etc. series.

 

I find just about every single aspect of my life more exciting now as a 41 year old, than when I was 15. Not that 15 was bad, it was a ton of fun, but now I can do pretty much what ever I want by comparison. 

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Very interesting thread (as usual from Mechanic AH) :)

 

I think definition of "excitement" with regards to our hobby has morphed over the years but (for me) has remained at the same level as it always has.  Back-in-the-day, getting a Trinity Monster Horsepower motor was tops in excitement.  I still ran a mechanical esc with that thing:o.  Bearings?  Who could afford a whole set of those?  And the pre-requisite sets of extra frequency crystals should you need to change channels to avoid a conflict or the darn things just decide on their own not to work any more.  Nah, back then.. excitement was getting 10 minutes of runtime from your 1200 mah ni-cad pack and then waiting forever to get it charged again. 

Now?  The focus is more on the builds.  Battery packs last longer than I do most times.  I usually run 6000mah 2s lipos and can't remember the last time I ran a fully charged pack until lipo cutoff kicked in.  Radio channel worry is a thing of the past.  Now the excitement is in setting up the proper steering rate and endpoints, or how much braking force to use.  Commutator cleaning and brush maintenance have taken a back seat to esc program magic... timing and boost.  Just spray out the dust from bearings and  add a drop of oil.  

Magazines are always going to be missed.. but the ease of ordering parts at the click of a button sure is nice.  Who could've imagined getting must-have battery connectors or even a new esc overnight with Amazon Prime back in the 80's???  

I'm sure our hobby is not going to be as beloved with the younger generations, just as we ourselves probably didn't appreciate slot cars and model trains as much as the generations before us.  It happens..  But I think we are fortunate enough to enjoy our hobby as technology improves and still get as much excitement as we did back when things were quite a bit different.

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It was more exciting when we drooled over the catalogs and RC Action magazines. Watching out for new releases patiently. Reading tips and tricks, IFMAR/ROAR updates. From the mid 80s and to early-mid 90s.

Most exciting part was when I was struggling to buy all the items I needed. Upgrades, newer batteries, chargers, tools but had to save up from my school allowance and bought RC stuff one a a time which took weeks/months. After acquiring those things, the feeling of fulfillment is pure happiness. 

 

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it is definitely different now than it was 40+ years ago, but i still do it now for the same reason i started doing it.  I build things. anything.  i am always building things.  unlike a lot of you that have posted here, i hardly run them, and i have never raced them.  90% of what i have has taken months if not years to build.  a few of them are entirely scratch built, i have learned dozens of manufacturing skills.  I have a lathe, a mill, and two different types of 3d printers.  I have a soldering reflow station, i write software,  i build one-off electronics devices, I have taken DXF files to the local plastics shop to have things laser cut.    I build things.  I always have, and i will as long as i am physically able to.    for me, that aspect of the hobby is just as exciting to me as it ever was.  just doing different things now than i was when i started.

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I am looking for a TC chassis for a body that I have and all I see is pages of boring TT-0X chassis with a different wrapper (body). Even worse, the first one on most listing is the rere of my first TC, the Subaru from 12 years ago. So I ended up getting a S64 instead. 

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I started with this hobby because of your Avante build video, and i can safely say that if it was a TD-4 variant i would've just disregarded the whole thing.

The only brands making cool and interesting kits are Kyosho and Tamiya, and those are 99% just their re-re's.

Also joined our local RC club and started to notice all the competition chassis are basically the same, which is why i'm selling my Xray T4 and will start using a TB Evo.

Other drivers get excited over the new X4 having 1mm lower shocks, which is quite telling where the hobby is going imho..

Each to their own though.

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On 5/5/2022 at 5:12 AM, tim.senecal said:

it is definitely different now than it was 40+ years ago, but i still do it now for the same reason i started doing it.  I build things. anything.  i am always building things.  unlike a lot of you that have posted here, i hardly run them, and i have never raced them.  90% of what i have has taken months if not years to build. 

Yup, this is me too, I've always just loved the building, the improvising, the problem solving, taking my time, finding new and different projects, anything that has more engineering and quirkiness going on, more metal, carbon and complexity, and also the challenge of finding old or obscure parts and kits. The new Tamiya stuff doesn't grab me one bit; I like older stuff!

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I think that ESCs and decent batteries/chargers have done wonders for the hobby. Back in the day we only had wimpy 1000mah nimh and timer chargers.

I do wish that kits sold more though, last time I went to the track there were a few kids playing with some admittedly durable Amazon specials, and a Traxxas Slash. The Slash isn't a bad RC but it might as well be the Camry of RC with how common they are here (and how they're driven!).

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Well, for Christmas, my little man got a Traxxas Slash kit, which he built, doing probably 90% of the work by himself. It was a legit kit, for whatever that is worth, and my son could be genuinely proud.

He loves that thing, and I have to say that it has proven to be stout, so far. The suspension works better than in his Super Sand Dragon (rebodied Hornet) and it has probably been tougher. He loves that buggy as well.

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