I personally view F1D specifically, and indoor free flight in general, as
completely unique within the hobby of flying model airplanes. If you walk
into a hobby shop these days you're surrounded by a bunch of cheap Chinese
EPS pieces of crap that require no time, intelligence, or skill to build.
A lot of guys in the local outdoor scene still build their own models, but
at the world level everything is dominated by expensive ARF and RTF models
built somewhere in eastern Europe. Indoor is the last bastion of flyer
built models.
All of that brings me to my point which is this; we live in a microwave
society. The vast majority of people have no interest in spending the time
required to build an F1D. People that fly F1D are a rare breed and I don't
think it's possible to make it appealing to the masses. It will always be
a tiny niche group that enjoy it, and that's fine with me.
Jake
On Fri, Apr 20, 2012 at 12:46 PM, Bill <wdgowen_at_gmail.com> wrote:
> **
>
>
>
> Another side of this issue is what does flying F1D have to do with indoor
> flying in general? I have what I consider valid reasons for not flying F1D
> but I don't think the sport is going to die if I don't personally aspire to
> that level.
>
> I actually think that F1D is doing very well in the USA. There were a
> number of qualified people who wanted to be on the team who didn't make it.
> There are at least 3 others I know of who will probably be trying during
> the next cycle. I think it's a case where quality is more important than
> quantity and we have a very high quality team.
>
>
> --- In Indoor_Construction_at_yahoogroups.com, Benjamin Saks <bensaks_at_...>
> wrote:
> >
> > Don, why are you not flying F1Ds? Maybe if you explain what your barriers
> > to entry are, we would have a better idea.
> >
> > There are also two teams, Argentina and Australia competing at the wc
> this
> > year, that have not sent teams in over 20 years. I think there are
> actually
> > more people flying them now than when I started in 2002.
> >
> > Lastly, cost is not an issue, access to flying sites remains the issue.
> > Outdoor sites are essentially infinite for practice and competing.
> > There is no money for the Ama, suppliers, sponsors, spectators to be
> > generated by indoor. The money comes from the other segments of the
> hobby,
> > which explains the support they get.
> >
> > Indoor is a passion, not a business.
> >
> > On Apr 19, 2012 10:20 PM, "Don DeLoach" <ddeloach_at_...> wrote:
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > Interesting points Jimmy.
> > >
> > > Bottom line though: why aren't more people flying F1D?
> > >
> > > Don DeLoach
> > >
> > > Sent from my iPhone
> > >
> > > On Apr 19, 2012, at 6:36 PM, "jim" <glider902003_at_...> wrote:
> > >
> > >>
> > >>
> > >> Don to Brett:
> > >> "Economical? How many hours have you spent to become proficient at the
> > WC level in F1D?"
> > >>
> > >> True, but lets face it most of us have more time then dollars...or
> will
> > at some point in our life unless we are lucky enough to be very
> successful
> > at our day job. If that were the case for me I'd be joyously wasting that
> > money racing *inside* of something!
> > >>
> > >> I consider a hobby as simply something to occupy my "free time" as I
> > find it (which is not often at the current stage of life). There are
> times
> > that I evaluate my many hobbies for the best value in the class of
> dollars
> > spent/hour of enjoyment. Indoor flying is practically untouchable in this
> > category, which is one reason I stay involved.
> > >>
> > >> (I think about this at times because I actually work with people near
> > retirement age who are financially able to retire, but complain that they
> > have no idea how they will occupy their time so they are afraid to
> retire.
> > We have regular debates regarding this and it irritates the heck out of
> > me!!!)
> > >>
> > >> Sure the members of the current F1D have copious amounts of time
> > invested in learning their craft, but is it really any more than the
> > members of the current F1 outdoor team? To fly at that level is a huge
> > investment of time no matter what the discipline. Indoor however does
> have
> > a very attractive jumping in price, and a heck of allot less support
> > equipment.
> > >>
> > >> Now if only I could learn how to steer overnight...
> > >> ~Jim
> > >>
> > >
> >
>
>
>
Received on Fri Apr 20 2012 - 13:16:58 CEST
This archive was generated by Yannick on Sat Dec 14 2019 - 19:13:47 CET