hi all.  im not sure if this is the appropiate forum for this topic or not but after being out of the hobby for the last 15 years and recently getting back into it I have noticed that our hobby had been taken over by pre builts and foamies!  What has happened to our great hobby?  The latest issue of tower hobbies catalog is so full of arfs and rtfs that i had to seriously hunt for a kit!  what happened to the thrill of building?  has the spirit actually gone out of our hobby?  It seems to me that the pride and skill of our hobby has gone the way of commercialism and is now satisfying the gimmie generation who are only interested in the quick fix of entertainment.  there is a certain pride that comes from building something from the ground up and seeing it through to completion,  the anticipation and fear of the maiden flight,  the satisfaction of a job well done when that first flight and safe landing are behind you.  what does it say of the ingenuity and innovation of our hobby when you can go from the hobby store to the field in as little as a half hour, take off, crash and then go back to the store for another one!  where is the pride in that? 

Perhaps im behind the times and i should just shut up and take it, but it saddens me to see a hobby go from something of value, something to cherish, something to pass on to the next generation of interested and like minded individuals to something that has no emotion attached to it.  and it took only one generation to accomplish. 

i for one would like to see a rebirth of the original spirit of the hobby.  all those of us who build from kits or scratch should keep our eyes open for someone at your field or in your hobby store that shows or expresses an interest in the hobby and encourage them to pursue the hobby in the purest of ways and to offer help and advice on how to go about actually building the craft they fly.  by helping newcomers  to decide to build instead of just accept what is allready built for them we can influence the market and the manufacturers.

saddened and sickened .... am i alone on this position?

I think you are over reacting a bit.  It's cultural shock for you having been out of the hobby for 15 year and thats understandable. 

Remember Loinel and American flyer trains?  Where are those now?  They are still around but not in the numbers that existed when I was a kid. 

I've been in this hobby for about 40 years and I'vs seen lots of things come and go.  There are still plenty of scale kits if You want to build.  And there are plenty of builders as well.  Just take a look at this site as an example.

There are also LOTS more people in the hobby who don't have a passion to build and that's ok.  There never was a law that said "hey if you want to fly RC you MUST love to build too"!  It's just the way it was.

So relaxe and enjoy the hobby the way you want that's what counts.  And welcome to RCSB

 Look at it this way, ARF's and RTF's provide newbies a way to get their feet wet and learn to fly. Eventually, just maybe, a percentage of them will see that there are only 3D machines or scale subjects with the same covering job. And they'll want to create one of their own unique to them or an 'A' model instead of a 'D' and start building.

  No there isn't as many kits, but there still are lots of plans and short kits out there. Myself I'd rather have the freedom of building from plans than following instructions where part A doesn't always fit into part B!

Eric

    "YES", I agree with you, I think it's a "SAD" State when you go to the Flying field and cannot find even one Hand Built Model. The ARFS have no doubt taken over, whats even worse is they are now starting to filter into Scale Modeling. I have to Chuckle Silently to myself when at a Club meeting Show and Tell, someone is describing the problems they had fitting one wing half to the Fuselage on their ARF. What is even funnier is the person posing for a picture with their ARF in front of them; the Chinese Slave Laborer who built it should actually be in the Picture.

    Eric, there is really nothing any of us could do or say that will change things back to the way it was, when, we all took pride in our accomplishment of actually constructing a Kit or Scratch Built Airplane with our own two hands. With the exception of Builders on this site and still the few others who actually like to open a Box of Wood and construct the plane themselves, Building is rapidly becoming a lost art. When most of the older Modelers have died off, with a few exceptions, BUILDING models will eventually be gone forever.

    I personally dont believe that ARFS get more people into the hobby therefore keeping the Hobby alive. I think it gets a bunch of people in quickly because there is very little work involved, and, Its Just That Easy To Get Out Of The Hobby, because, they have no time invested in learning what the hobby is all about. Building Models teaches young people to think for themselves, ask questions and figure out problems on their own, there is not much to challenge your mind if someone else already did everything for you. 

    Something else that Cracks me up and you would NEVER have seen this on models built in the past. What Im referring to is seeing servos screwed to the outside of the wings, screwed to the outside of the fuselage or mounted on the bottom of the stabilizer, Yeah, This is really Attractive and great for Aerodynamics, but, what the heck, its an ARF!!!!

Have a Great Day

John E.

On The Bench, Curtiss JN-4D Jenny Build (Procter)