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NZJohn

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I’m pretty new to this RC hobby having just gotten back into it 6 months ago. But something struck me today that I wanted to share. 

I painstakingly built a Hornet after never having done an RC car. We just didn’t have the money growing up. But this time I cherished the build. My son and I took our time, built it slowly. And then painted it to our best ability to box art. We loved it. The YouTubers were a massive help. My building skills were terrible. A particular shout out to Tamiya Legends and RC Kicks. And RC action Australia


I then got a Frog and built that up so we could race. Today was the first time racing. We went down to the astroturf at the local school and blasted around laughing until the 5000mAh battery ran out.
At home we’re about 1/4 the way through a rere Top Force Evo. 
 

My takeaway looking at our kitchen table covered in parts and tools just now was ‘what a great alternative to an iPhone or iPad. For me and my kids. I love the hobby. And it’s a great escape. And healthy too

Im sure at some point it’ll take a bit of a back seat as the initial fun wears off, but it’s building great memories, and my kids and their friends are getting into it. So maybe it’s got more longevity. I hope so  

 

That’s all. Cheers for reading. And for providing a great online forum and resource 

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Great introductory post, and welcome to the club :) 

Building RC kits will develop a great set of practical skills, getting out in the fresh air is always good and if you have a racing club nearby that's brilliant - a competitive spirit keeps the interest going after the initial excitement wears off.

If you add some scale crawlers to your fleet you can also add "healthy walks in natural surroundings" and "a keen interesting in getting outdoors in all weathers" to your list of benefits :) 

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Hey we all gotta start somewhere and better late than never! Hornet is a great start, and a TFE is a great step up. Good to see you getting the kids involved too, mine are too young to build but they sure love a play now and again! 

Where abouts in Aotearoa are you from, John? There's a few Kiwis on here, most of the regulars are from the NI but there's some Southerners too 👍

I am sure we can offer a bit of homely advice if needed 🙂

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A big welcome NZ John from another kiwi! :)...great to have you on board. This is such a fantastic hobby to be involved in, I hope you stick around discover all the fun that is to be had. Sounds like you are already off to a great start! Enjoy!

Cheers

Kurt

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The build is Indeed rather fun but it's a BIG can of worms on the wallet. I started plastic cement models way back then got into Gundam plastic robot models. These were snap fit parts and 2 kits ballooned to 27. Now the latest is RC, currently 3/6 kits built and easily the most $$$ of the 3 hobby options... just try and keep the fleet to a sensible amount before you get too many kits. I'm at sensible limits already..

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12 hours ago, berman said:

Hey we all gotta start somewhere and better late than never! Hornet is a great start, and a TFE is a great step up. Good to see you getting the kids involved too, mine are too young to build but they sure love a play now and again! 

Where abouts in Aotearoa are you from, John? There's a few Kiwis on here, most of the regulars are from the NI but there's some Southerners too 👍

I am sure we can offer a bit of homely advice if needed 🙂

Thanks for the welcome.
We’re in Orewa. Just north of Auckland. We’re going to take a car to the next indoor racing session at Auckland Indoor RC Club. It’d be great to see what cars people are racing. And I’m keen to try out a proper track too

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@NZJohn Welcome and thanks for sharing the wonderful story.  It's great to hear you and kids are sharing a fun hobby.  That alone is priceless.

Enjoy your builds and driving.  :D

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2 hours ago, NZJohn said:

Thanks for the welcome.
We’re in Orewa. Just north of Auckland. We’re going to take a car to the next indoor racing session at Auckland Indoor RC Club. It’d be great to see what cars people are racing. And I’m keen to try out a proper track too

Do you mean AIRCCC indoor offroad? Of NHRCCC which is outdoors but covered onroad? I'll be at NHRCCC this Sunday

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4 hours ago, Jonathon Gillham said:

Do you mean AIRCCC indoor offroad? Of NHRCCC which is outdoors but covered onroad? I'll be at NHRCCC this Sunday

I did mean AIRCCC, but you’ve reminded me, I want to check out the NHRCCC too. We’re away this weekend in Tauranga though. When is the next NHRCCC meet?

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43 minutes ago, NZJohn said:

I did mean AIRCCC, but you’ve reminded me, I want to check out the NHRCCC too. We’re away this weekend in Tauranga though. When is the next NHRCCC meet?

Its sunday 12th September, which is a great result for me as i thought it was the weekend before and i can't make that but can make the 12th

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3 hours ago, Jonathon Gillham said:

Its sunday 12th September, which is a great result for me as i thought it was the weekend before and i can't make that but can make the 12th

Awesome. I’ll head down with my boy to check it out. Might try and enter the ‘all comers’ class with the frog or TFE for a laugh. 

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4 hours ago, NZJohn said:

We’re away this weekend in Tauranga though.

Ahhh you mean South East Auckland 😄

This is where I am, Hope you have a nice stay down here 🙂

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9 hours ago, NZJohn said:

Awesome. I’ll head down with my boy to check it out. Might try and enter the ‘all comers’ class with the frog or TFE for a laugh. 

Your boy can enter stars of tomorrow too with anything. The TFE could be interesting in allcomers, that class has everything from kids in TT02 to Pro10, just depends who brings what on the day

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On 8/3/2021 at 1:13 AM, nel33 said:

I'm at sensible limits already..

Sensible limits... sensible limits.... hmmm.... no... not ringing a bell for me.

NZJohn welcome to the club! For something to do with your cars, check out the monthly Postal Racing link in the main forum. All the fun of club racing, but in your own back yard!

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On 8/4/2021 at 7:16 AM, Jonathon Gillham said:

Your boy can enter stars of tomorrow too with anything. The TFE could be interesting in allcomers, that class has everything from kids in TT02 to Pro10, just depends who brings what on the day

That’s good to know. I think Matt (my son) would be right into that. He can run the Hornet or Frog. I’ll take the TFE for a bit of retro fun in all comers. I’m not even remotely close to being good. But I love the build and the fun of racing too. So can’t wait…

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1 hour ago, c64orinoco said:

Sensible limits... sensible limits.... hmmm.... no... not ringing a bell for me.

NZJohn welcome to the club! For something to do with your cars, check out the monthly Postal Racing link in the main forum. All the fun of club racing, but in your own back yard!

We pretty lucky in NZ to not have a lock down. This looks like so much fun. We’ll give the postal racing round a go.
 

But my lord we have this grass here by the sea in our backyard. It’s called Kikuyu. And it forms a 1-2 inch sponge, thick and bouncy as badword ans it catches and grabs at the car. It’s murder on lap times. Last weekend a Hornet was wheel spinning going no where! Either way it’ll be fun!

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On 8/3/2021 at 10:36 AM, NZJohn said:

Awesome. I’ll head down with my boy to check it out. Might try and enter the ‘all comers’ class with the frog or TFE for a laugh. 

I was going to suggest joining a club, but it sounds like you're already on the way, and know people there too! 👍

Racing or at least running at a club, brings a whole different level of RC enjoyment, if you think you didn't need Ipads when building, you may aswell sell them, as there's not only repairs and regular maintenance, but once you get a̶d̶d̶i̶c̶t̶e̶d̶ the enjoyment out of running around a track, and start chasing lap times, there's set ups, shock oil weights/springs ,tyres etc etc. It's brilliant!! 😁

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5 hours ago, c64orinoco said:

Sensible limits... sensible limits.... hmmm.... no... not ringing a bell for me.

NZJohn welcome to the club! For something to do with your cars, check out the monthly Postal Racing link in the main forum. All the fun of club racing, but in your own back yard!

Yeah, that is a fluid definition at the best of times. Storage, budget and time to use each differs with individuals...

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On 8/5/2021 at 9:14 PM, NZJohn said:

We pretty lucky in NZ to not have a lock down. This looks like so much fun. We’ll give the postal racing round a go.
 

But my lord we have this grass here by the sea in our backyard. It’s called Kikuyu. And it forms a 1-2 inch sponge, thick and bouncy as badword ans it catches and grabs at the car. It’s murder on lap times. Last weekend a Hornet was wheel spinning going no where! Either way it’ll be fun!

My entire back yard is Kikuyu. I hate it, but we rent, so I can't dig the whole lot up and replace it with an awesome dirt / crawler track.

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