Hi, new to the forum but old in the hobby. I have one rock crawler, RC10T truck, Air planes, float plane, several helicopters, several boats and now into Drones. I started out with the first real RC cars that were Tamya with the little sealed body. Now I have several quadcopters to play with. Hope to find someone close to me were we can meet up and fly. Helmar
Hi Helmar! Welcome to the forums. I also started out with RC cars and trucks then got some crawlers then helicopters and quadcopters and hexacopter. My first RC car was a kit back in the early 1980s when the speed controller was a servo moving a wiper over a resistor. I think I got one of the first "electronic" speed controllers when they came out back then. We used to have a blast racing those things around a airport in SoCal. Even though we still have a bunch of cars and trucks we mostly like to fly quads nowadays. I'm in Grants Pass. John
Yeah, I remember those wiper speed controllers. The came with a Balloon to put them into My crawler pretty much just sits until my Son comes down from Sandy Oregon, then we play with them. He is not into drones as of yet but I keep sending him little videos of my learning. I had a good life long friend of mine that I lost to that agent orange before his 50th birthday that I we would go down to Garibalde Oregon to whatever that parks county parks name is, forget, old.....Anyway, we always took the kids down and would play the cars. Got my kids some of them, I think the grasshopper, then I had or still have the big ford truck from back then. Anyway, my youngest Son said he was going down to the coast and asked if I could meet him as he had the grand kids (boys) with him. So, I rode up with the wife and he played this game with the boys and so when we got there, he let the boys spot the Granpa. Then he broke out the Rock crawlers he got for the boys and we had a Blast. That is when I got my crawler. Made me feel pretty good that he was bringing up his boys like he grew up.. Now they are into the Monster trucks The drones I have are the Aosenma CG035 that is just Packed with features but the most fun I have is with that little Hubsan H107C+ it seems. Almost afraid of the CG035 due to issues it has. Hard to believe that I am still playing with this stuff as my next birthday I will be 70....... Helmar
I agree, a lot of great memories attached to RC hobbies. It's a good hobby for the whole family and as far as I can see there is no age limit, at least on the upper end. If you can move some sticks or turn a steering knob you are good to go and have fun. When we got our first crawlers it was winter and the weather was miserable so my girlfriend setup a "track" in the living room made up from some pillows and some wire shelves we had taken down. We drove up the shelves to the sofa across to another shelf to the coffee table across that to the other sofa then down a shelf and under the coffee table back to the start. We drove around that for hours and hours. It's not the great outdoors but we had fun and laughed the entire time. A few years ago I got her a Blade MQX quadcopter and she's learned to fly pretty well with that. Great first quad and durable as heck. Even after all the crashing I only replaced two parts that cost less that $20 all together. Usually in a crash the props pop off but they just push back on. John
I like that John, Improvise . We setup a track in the shop after I first got mine. Its the Axial AX10 deadbolt. All I did to it was change the wheels and tires to alloy and steering servo. Oh, made a Frame for it to use bumpers. Might have some pictures of it. Nope must be on my phone. So fare most of my Quad learning has been that little Hubsan H107C+ which is a tad bigger than the D series. Got a cheap little camera in it and just fun as all get out to play with. Thinking I need time learning before I try the Aosenma CG035 to how crappy designed it is. Glad you have a lady friend that is interested..That, is Important !! Helmar
I changed a few things to my Axial AX10 also. I went with a brushless sensored Novak system, changed the shocks to Axial aluminum ones and put on a cage body that was made by Proline. There are a few Vanquish Products parts on there as well. I tool a few new photos this morning. I posted them in my AX10 thread so not to hijack your topic here. The quads are getting better and better all the time and have sure come a long way since I started flying. We can buy flight controllers for $30 that do more than the ones that cost $400 when I started. The Quadcopter industry today reminds me of the computer industry in the 1980s-1990s in that anything you buy today is all but obsolete in a few weeks. Crazy. Helmar, You might consider building your own quad from parts instead of buying one off the shelf. If I was going to build a new one I think I would get one of those racing quad frames + a motor and speed controller set and a CleanFllight / BetaFlight / RaceFlight compatible flight controller (most of them are). The reason I would get a racing quad frame is even if you are not going to race the frames are tough as nails. Many have 3mm-4mm carbon fiber main plates or arms that can take a pretty hard crash. The CleanFlight controllers can be programmed to be as aggressive or docile as you want so you can start out with stable settings and crank it up as you go. A couple of good sources for parts and frames that I like are GetFPV and HeliDirect. My lady is great. I know I am lucky that she loves RC stuff also. She used to love tearing up the dirt with her Traxxas Summit. It got pretty beat up and was probably a little too fragile with all the linkages and shifting transmission so I got her a Traxxas E-Maxx and so far that one has been more reliable. I should have gotten her that one in the first place but she really liked the lights on the Summit. Hmmm, just thinking about your friend with 70 quadcopters.... How many models do we have anyway? Maybe better not to know. John
Seems as I have Way too many things of interest or going on. I need to get my 1957 Uniflite boat back ready for the season for one. The drones, well, dead calm today so took the CG035 up for a battery. The camera on that thing is garbage. Way too much jello even after I tried the ol rubber band trick. I have been horsing around just trying to get some ariel shots of our place. The most of the day was spent on customers 1957 Bell Boy 21 foot boat. Building my own was in my head but wanting all kinds of things added to it, return home, GPS, follow me to name a few. I do want a Good camera and something that will last at least 20 minutes so, will be looking and asking questions. Going to go look at your Axial thread. Never did like the corn binder body that came on mine. Helmar
Too many projects and too little time. I think we are all guilty of that. I have kits and kits of unbuilt and partially built models waiting in line. On top of that, priorities change so what can you do? I think it's common for RC hobbyists to put the hobby on hold for a bit. RC will always be there for you when you're ready. You can build your own and still save money and get return to home and GPS features you want. You can start by picking a good frame and flight controller. Even some of the $40 flight controllers have GPS available as a add-on option that you can get when you're ready. Or you could spend a few more bucks and get a DJI Naza (older model) which is pretty established and has good support and software. You can also add the GPS to the DJI Naza flight controller later since it's plug and play. You just need to run their software and turn it on and set a few variables in the software which guides you through the steps. For motors and ESCs you can start with inexpensive stuff and upgrade later to higher performance parts if you want to. One good thing about building your own is that you will be more familiar with it's workings and that helps you tune it to behave the way you want. John
