Which type off RC hobbyist are you?

[simalarion]

There are many different takes on this hobby on this forum, to take some black/white examples, you have the: Collectors, Shelf Queen maker box art, Designer (when it comes to how it looks), The Driver, The Engineer (that close to make their own kits),  usually it will be a mix off these or other takes I believe?

For my part im quite new and the learning curve is slow because i still have small kids i must attend to first a couple more years, i do try to get them hooked to the hobby so i can spend more time with it. I mainly like Tamiya because i enjoy both the build and drive part (outside & inside hobby, great combo), im not good at any aspect but i enjoy it and slowly getting better in each segment, i have that Nostalgic feel for old Tamiya kits but must say after i got Top-Force i will probably get into new models and will probably leave BlackFoot etc as found memories and look at pictures/videos.

When i can spend more time on this hobby i still not see myself going to the extremes , but rather meeting up with likeminded bringing camping chair,bbq,beer,worktable, cones for simple course and just take it casual relaxed and exchange hobby experiences…. You probably get the idea, main thing is not to be the “best” in anything but focus on having a good time.

Thats me in short, what hobbyists are you?

And please 🙏 respect each other take on the Hobby, there is no right or wrong here.

Edit: So please try to stay away from discussion or encourage to one. We all have or take on the hobby and the point is to get a overview without the discussions in this post. Its just as interesting for me to know who user had “ Nib vintage kit like Blazing Blazer” “Who was it that 3D printed his own car” “Which user had all Tamiya Rally versions on Display” - “Which users have a bunch of Wild Willys running a pretend RC Shop”. You all have different takes of it, thats what i wanted to know about, and i think its a really good thing to have a wide diversity on this forum 😊

[Twinfan]

I had a car back in the 80s and I've recently returned to the hobby, with a little more money than I had back in my teens!  I'm only into kits (no RTRs) and really enjoy the planning and building of the cars and running then in my local park.  I also like owning "things" so I guess I'm two types:

Collector: Tamiya NIB motors and select NIB kits (including bearings, Hop-Ups etc so that all they need to run is a servo and a receiver).

Basher: Mostly Tamiya but also Kyosho and Schumacher.

[Kpowell911]

Ok, So I am 36 now, and I had my first ‘proper’ RC around the age of 7. It was a second hand Tamiya Mini Coopee M-01. I then moved on to a TL-01Ford Focus. Nearly 30 yers later, Im still majorly into RC. Ive had a few breaks over the time, and sold up, and then re bought etc. But RC is my main passion. More than 1:1 cars or anything else. Ive had approximately 150 RCs over the years, probably more, but thats what I have pictures off on forums. From Micro Losi 1/32’s to 5th Scale Gassers.

Now for whatever reason. I prefer the building, and community of forums discussing and showing pictures of RCs than actually using them. I still get out and use them as often as I can, but my main passion is this sort of thing. However, at the start of the year Id built up a healthy collection of very high spec Traxxas bashers…

 

 

However, it became quite apparent I couldnt use all these, and theyre very similar. So for whatever reason a few months ago, I remembered I had a TamiyaClub Account, and set out to buy my original Focus TL-01. Eventually I tracked one down, and kinda got more into the Tamiya’s. Now the Tamiya’s are pretty much shelfers, Ive got no real intention of using them. Its just for nostalgia, but owning a few TL-01s kinda made me want to get some of the kits I lusted over in the Tamiya Catalogue. Mainly Rally Cars and mainly Cosworths. I dont think theres a reason to run the Tamiya’s in 2023, for example my Traxxas Rally its far better suited for actual use and fun. Its faster, more capable, stronger etc.

So the decision was made to sell some of my Traxxas models to fund some on Tamiya Shelfers. I sold around £1200’ worth of Traxxas (UDR, Stampede 4x4 VXL, Revo 3.3R) and started tracking down Tamiyas. I went way over budget, and went too fast but 

 

I also picked up a brand new SRX to build up:

 

I think I need to sell a few more Traxxas’ and some duplicate Tamiya’s to recover some funds, by Im happy with my collection so far  

 

 

[Kowalski86]

I used to fall into a sort of "Restorer" category, but I guess I'm more of a driver/engineer who comes up with custom jobs occasionally.

I'm a pretty poor collector, anytime I've had anything rare or collectible I've sold it on to someone who'd have more value in it than me.

I only recently dived into the hobby last year after years and years of toys. I used to be big into vintage video games but nothing on a TV screen gives the same feeling as something tangible.

[Nikko85]

I'm a designer really - with a touch of engineering. I don't have any desire to run shelf queens, nor collect cars that are rare. I remember Tamiya from my youth, but other than a few models I don't really member them exactly or hold must nostalgia.

For some reason when I got started in this hobby I started with 1/16 cars, usually "toy" grade bodies on chassis like the MF01x or GF01. I've since moved to a 1/12 collection, but now I really just look for cars that could fit that scale - if I ever actually got a  Clodbuster it would make everything look tiny, so I'm kinda stuck here.

This limits options, but means I need to get creative.

My passion comes from trying to put together bodies and chassis that look like they've come from a factory - so it's about the design. I've no real interested in craft - fine detail painting or things done by hand, I like the idea of what I make being able to be mass processed, so it's a design thing for me. I do like a drive, but only have a busy park next to me, so although there are spaces it's usually too full.

MF01x Jeep with Taiyo Body

Quick Drive Buggy with Traxxas 1/16 Slash body

 

GF01TR Beetle Body over QD buggy and Mn45 FJ45 on MF01x

And a couple of projects yet to be realised:

And CW01 modern monster truck

The main thing I like is just staying up a little bit after the toddler has gone to bed and getting lost in tinkering and taking my mind off everything else - it's therapy.

 

 

[BuggyDad]

If I may invent another category, I'm a tinkerer. From your options I guess a sort of poor man's engineer/driver. I tend to start with a kit then build-run-modify to take things in a slightly different direction. So my DT-03 is the lovechild of a buggy and a scale scaffolding yard, my B64 is a mad Beetle Truggy, my crawler has a stupid hard plastic cab that falls off all the time and my XV-01 is roadified. None is even close to scratch built and to call what I do "design" would be a disservice to others, but most are modified a bit beyond just parts choice. I think I am incapable of having a shelf car. I have no negative opinion of such matters, in fact part of me would like to preserve one or two in their best condition, but I just don't have the self-discipline in this hobby which is for me all about fun and not being very responsible. 

[alvinlwh]

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[ChrisRx718]

I identify as a long-term procrastinator and poor financial decision maker.

I spend more time on here reading others' stories than I get to spend on the hobby! My family is young and I work long hours, so I get very little hobby time. That means I hoard parts, often months before I open packages,  forgetting why I bought them in the first place 

It's probably not healthy.

[ad456]

Definitely engineer and designer with some occasional driving.
I love the R&D of getting something to work that’s not from the same kit/box etc or highly modifying what’s already there to do more. Kitbashing is where I’ve found myself spending the vast majority of my time these days.
I do enjoy a kit sometimes but don’t find they hold my attention the same anymore.

[ad456]

3 minutes ago, ChrisRx718 said:

I identify as a long-term procrastinator and poor financial decision maker.

This is definitely familiar to me too!

[skom25]

In my case it is around 50/50 with build and run. I like to build things, I like to maintain them and at the end, I like to see how they work.

Maintenance is essential for me. After each few runs, I make quick maintenance, check everything and clean if necessary. Model feels fresh after that.

I do not understand NIB and Shelf Queen. It is mechanical thing, should be run at least sometimes. I do not want to convince anybody to my perspective, it is only my opinion.

 

[Willy iine]

You guys already know where I stand..  

I just have fun with the hobby.  It's been a like a 50 year journey so I've been pretty much a bit of everything trying things out.. well, except for "engineer" as I'm too dumb for that, but I have built my own chassis in the past and raced with it.. and actually won a few parking lot events with it.  My older brother is an engineer and that is my baseline for calling someone an "engineer".. he is extremely smart and good at the craft.  Mom forgot to mix smart elements when my brother and I were conceived.. so he got all the good stuff, I got the crumbs and the short end of the stick.    So my technique is based on hope .. never know what comes out the other side until it does.. 

[markbt73]

It's probably easier to say what I'm not.

I'm not a competitive racer. Been there, tried that, found out that competition brings out a side of me I don't like, so I don't do it any more.

I'm not a box-art builder, unless the car is a replica of a famous race livery that I like. Otherwise, I do it my way.

I'm not a collector in the sense that I buy things just to own them. If I buy a kit, it's to build eventually, and if I buy a built car, it's to tear down and rebuild my own way. And I actively avoid used cars that come with the original box, because I don't understand the point of having empty boxes around.

I'm not a high-speed basher. Tried that too, lost interest in the middle of the second battery pack. But I do enjoy practicing driving to be as precise as I can be.

Anything else goes, to varying degrees.

[Nick-W]

Lovely idea for a thread.

I would self-declare as a builder/driver. I’m only just back into the hobby after more than two decades away and both aspects are equally important to me. As OP @simalarion said it is one of the few outdoor and indoor hobbies. I don’t race but have recently been looking up local race meets. I haven’t yet decided if it’s something I would like to do. 

I’m trying not to be a collector. I want to use everything I have and sell anything that doesn’t do what I need it to. This isn’t down to a dislike of collectors or collections but rather a realisation that I fall into a hoarding mindset really easily and it can lead to a kind of burnout. I’m also very limited on space. Our home was built in the 17th century and they didn’t take recreational activities into account. 

[one_hit]

I’m a little bit of everything. I like building and working on RC cars. I like both kits and RTRs. I like bashing around everything from my Hornet to my 1/5 DBXL-E. I also like to race 1/10 touring, mini and 1/8 buggy. I have NIB and shelf queens, don’t care if people don’t understand that, maybe they also want to criticize my video game backlog as well, or my firearms and ammunition too that I don’t get to use. Maybe they also want to tell me how I should cook my steak or who I should vote for 

[naturbo2000]

4 hours ago, alvinlwh said:

To me RC is a toy car that I built myself, similar to a Lego kit, but better of course. A toy that to be played with to enjoy (some more than others).

I'm somewhere like this. I'll label myself builder.

My other passion is Lego, but I don't like making anything "how it's supposed to be made". I prefer to put my own stamp on it, even if the result is materially less good than I'd get from the box.

My Lego 911 GT3 is right hand drive. My Lego Lamborghini Sian is a spider.

My Madcap is a Super Astute hybrid. My Evo is sponsored by Rockstar. My Avante Black Special is a Black Edition. My TT02S is a rally car. My TT02D is RWD. And I'm about to make a Tamtech 288 GTO from an M08.

 

I don't collect and I don't do shelf queens. They're all at least intended as runners. I've just taken up mild racing, so I'll add dabbler to the list, on the pretence that I'll ever actually take my crawler crawling (that one is actually near stock...).

[Mad Ax]

I think I identify as several things.

I'm an engineer.  Generally, my Sundays involve dressing up in old clothes, going into the workshop and tinkering with bits of aluminium, plastic and GRP until I've made something special, something that nobody else has.  Right now I'm making a custom chassis for my Hotshot in the style of the TMS Racing chassis from the 80s, last year I was making a 6x6 Element Enduro, and a working tow truck using big rig axles and an old Blackfoot body.  My real aim, besides making something unique, is improving my standards.  In the last 90s / early 00s I wanted to be great at fabrication, but I was bad at it, and too impatient, and too short on time / tools / knowledge.  Over the years, I have acquired knowledge, tools, and an appreciation of the virtues of patience.  It's great to look at what I can do now compared to what I'd have done 20 years ago, and to wonder what I'll be able to do in the next 20 years.

I'm a designer.  Like many others, I rarely go boxart.  Sometimes this bites me, because non-boxart cars are harder to sell, but I'm a hoarder and I don't sell much anyway.  My early attempts at non-boxart weren't good, they were over simple and lacked imagination.  I've taught myself a lot about design, colours, lines, and I've learned to work within strict limitations - I can only print dark colours and only stick them over light colours, and I have no patience for complex masking jobs - I'm in no way an expert (I know just enough about graphic design to fall into the Dunning-Kruger trap) but, as with my engineering skills, I'm really pleased with how much I've learned in such a short time.

I'm a racer.  But not really.  I don't race every week, I don't enjoy indoor racing much and I'm not really very good.  I can get a car around a track, and I've had some good results recently, but I'll never be quick.  For a long time I said I didn't really enjoy racing because I wasn't that good at it and couldn't be bothered to put in all the setup and prep work - but for the last year or two I've made more of an effort to socialise with other racers at events instead of hiding away on my own, and my car setup has come on a long way.  I've come to really enjoy the gradual improvement, the track walk, the intense studying of other people's lines, braking points, throttle points, input techniques - all things I thought were too much hard work before.

I'm a basher.  But again, not really.  I run my cars in my garden about once or twice a month, depending on weather, free time, and what my daughter wants to do.  Sometimes I'll take her to the woods with some crawlers, but often as not she leaves me with both cars and goes off to hunt for fairies.  For a brief time, I had a local mate who would join me on a woodland crawl of an evening, but that doesn't happen much these days.  There's really not much bashing happening at all around here now, and to be honest, I don't enjoy the turn-up-in-a-field-and-drive-for-no-reason stuff that much any more.  My absolute favourite events are the Tamiya Junkies style meets, the sort that Iconic RC and before that Tamiyaclub (unofficially) used to run, where we all descend on a proper race circuit with a vanload of cars for the sole purpose of having fun.  No formal racing, no timing systems, just plonking cars on track and driving them until we get bored, then plonking something else down and having another drive.  Because nobody is racing, nobody is tied to the clock - nobody is desperate to pull and rebuild that ball diff between rounds or replace that broken gear case, nobody is trying to wolf down a warm sandwich and sink half a can of Monster before they've got to be at the line, so we can all chill out and socialise.  I really love picking over other people's pit tables, asking what they've got, where they got it, what mods it has, how they run it, etc..., and of course I love finding the odd bargain or making a good trade here and there.

I'm a road-tripper.  This really sums me up, I think.  Sometimes I think I enjoy the journey there more than I enjoy the event.  Tell me there's a race meet just around the corner and I'll shrug my shoulders.  Tell me there's one 4 hours away and I'll start loading the van and get the hotel booked.  A lot of it is actually the freedom of a couple of nights in a hotel when I'm the chief cook at home.  For two nights, I get to eat food that tastes great and that I didn't cook, I won't get woken up by a sick child, I won't have my evening disturbed by some other piece of bad news that can't possibly wait until morning.  In fact, for the past couple of years, I've reduced the amount of RC events that I do specifically so I can do more weekends away in nice locations.  However, if I can chain up one day's RC eventing with one day's walking in the countryside and two nights in a reasonable hotel, I'm happy.

[Nicadraus]

If I were to describe myself in this hobby, I'm a combination of builder, engineer, basher, occasional racer and builder (Oops I said that already ).

I enjoy building, tinkering, modifiying and improving my kits in terms of performance and look. I'm not a fan of box-stock kits and will always do something to improve and make a difference. I'm a sucker for hop-up parts and custom fabirication of other parts if possible. Not sure if I can call my kits a "collection" since there's only a handful (7 car kits and 3 helis), but I'd prefer a few numbers in quality than quantity in box-stock. Although some of my kits have quite a number of spares that I keep for future proofing. Like my FF-03, two are built in full mod but have enough spares to build three more kits. I also have enough spares for my XV-01, that if something breaks such as suspension arms, belt, gears, shocks/dampers, and others, I have them ready. Aside from car parts, I also keep a few pieces of bnew servos, ESC, motors, wires, and other electronic necessities. Lastly, I also have lots of bnew wheels and tires in stock, many of them are pre-mounted. From slicks, semi-slicks, threaded, semi-threaded, rally blocks, rally gravel, rally tarmac, x-pattern, crawler beadlock wheel, crawler tires, buggy wheels, etc. I don't know if it's hoarding but I buy wheels and tires from time to time even if I don't need them yet. If it fancies me, I buy it. 

[Ray_ve]

Good topic.

Mostly a collector, because as my wife's nephew put it, I now have access to 'grown ups' money and can finally afford the cars I couldn't have as a kid.

And tinkering is also a good description, as the Jugger is quite modified and got an Arduino processor to switch between functions. Love the modern tinker stuff that is available these days.

Also on the list are the nitro to electric conversions for my Mugen Prime 12 chassis and the Kyosho Corvette.

Not big on driving as I don't want to damage these classic cars, but when I drive it's usually basher Big Bear, parts are cheap and plenty for that HSP Himoto chassis, and polycarbonate bodies can be replaced easily.

 

[Pylon80]

6 hours ago, BuggyDad said:

If I may invent another category, I'm a tinkerer.

Tinkerer here as well.

I only own 5 cars. 2 are in bits for full strip and cleanup, 3 are ready to run. Making bodies take me a lot of time and I'm never happy with the result.

I have designed quite a few "simple" mods and it has brought me immense satisfaction.

But I'll really be the guy building a chassis in 40+ hours, most of it spent with drill press, calipers, sanding blocks and generally trying to make it perfect, when my driving skills probably won't even allow me to appreciate that alleged "perfection" 🤣 but it's so much fun.

I also don't collect cars at all but totally understand the fun of what people like @Willy iine are doing. RC is awesome and I totally understand that there's something about a high end brand new kit, even if you haven't built it. Especially when you have spent years unable to afford them. I still buy aircraft glow engines like multi cylinders 4 stroke ones that I will NEVER run but they are just wonderful to behold and look great on my desktop. How silly is that?

[TurnipJF]

I'm a talker/typer. For every hour I spend actually working on or driving my cars, I spend at least two more taking about them or typing messages about them on this 'ere forum. 

[Saito2]

I'm a lifer.

[BuggyDad]

1 hour ago, TurnipJF said:

I'm a talker/typer. For every hour I spend actually working on or driving my cars, I spend at least two more taking about them or typing messages about them on this 'ere forum. 

You're in good company there! 

[BuggyDad]

5 hours ago, one_hit said:

I’m a little bit of everything. I like building and working on RC cars. I like both kits and RTRs. I like bashing around everything from my Hornet to my 1/5 DBXL-E. I also like to race 1/10 touring, mini and 1/8 buggy. I have NIB and shelf queens, don’t care if people don’t understand that, maybe they also want to criticize my video game backlog as well, or my firearms and ammunition too that I don’t get to use. Maybe they also want to tell me how I should cook my steak or who I should vote for 

Just on the rarer side of medium rare, quite obviously. 

[F-150]

Builder, collector and a bit of a designer. 

I prefer to build and run, but I do not mind having a few rare and collector editions sitting around to look at. They are nice to have, but I'm not one that needs to get every special one that comes out.