I have been trying to make a point of getting out each week to the RC field. This week I dropped off some leather pieces I made for Steve Johnson and his wife and brought my UMF Gee Bee with me to fly. It was crazy windy but I got a flight in before the wind literally blew the little Gee Bee across the runway after landing...a testament to the flying abilities of this little bird. Here are some photos....Continue Reading

Well somehow the flying season has rolled us right into winter and of course that means the holiday season is on us. This is the time for us to get our shops back together and start some builds. It also means I will probably do a Christmas song of some sort.

So without further ado welcome to my family Christmas song compete with fake snow, Malboro Lights, dogs, kids and more!

Click the link below for the song and video...

https://www.reverbnation.com/artist/video/15422377

I just got some bad news for my RC friends. Our old RC friend Azarr has passed away. He and Mike Glass were running buddies. He was the first person in the hobby I met at a show after I started working with Hobby Lobby. I didn't know him but he knew me. As I walked on to the field he shouted "BILLY HELL!!" I walked over and shook his hand and we have been friends for the last 13 years or so. I always took his photo if I saw him at an event and usually interviewed him. The RC world has lost a friend today. Maybe he's hanging with Mike Glass and they are doing a little flying. God speed Azarr and thank you for your friendship all these years!!

Who knew some paperwork in the mail could get me so amped up! I have been running an RC event for over 10 years now. It was mentioned to me by Randy Cameron that it might not be a bad idea to become a contest director with the AMA. Brilliant!! I took the test, got the required signatures and thanks to the help from my district VP Kris Dixon I'm official! Turns out Kris and his father camped next to us on the 3D line way back when at Nall. Kris's dad and I are both hair farmers and enjoy the sounds of the Allman Bros!
Thanks to Randy, Kris and the folks at the Academy of Model Aeronautics for making me official!!

I was at my yearly Nashville event that I host and a friend asked me what I had been up to RC wise lately. It occurred to me the the handy dandy article link on my member page might be an interesting way to show what has been going on.

Here are my latest RC activities:

RC Logger RC Eye One Xtreme

Bavarian Demon Cortex

Dream-Flight Libelle DLG - Discus Launch Glider

Axial SCX10 Deadbolt 4WD RTR

RCGroups.com Video Podcast No. 5 - FPV Rock Crawling!

RCGroups Video Podcast No. 4 - Carbon Z Cub Mods

Axial SCX10 Ram Power Wagon 1/10th Scale Electric 4WD - Review

Mini DVR for FPV with 2.5” TFT LCD

ReadyMadeRC FPV Camera and Pan and Tilt

The ReadyMadeRC Anaconda is Here - Unboxing Video!

Carbon Z Cub Articulated Landing Gear

The Morgan Mill Battery Cartridge System

Carbon Z Cub Upgrade - Castle Talon 90 and E-flite Power 60

Walkera QR X350 Pro FPV Quadcopter

Holy smokes what a long, cold winter. This week I finished building the Dream Flight Libelle discus launch glider. The temps were in the low 60's so Jason Cole and I headed to the field to shoot some video. It was nice to be outside throwing planes in the nice weather. Jason brought his Samurai from Hobby Express and was flying the teeth off it. He is an amazing pilot.
Keep an eye for the Libelle DLG review later this week!

My last great outdoor office was on the main line of Joe Nall.
This week my office is in Mexico.
Life is good!

RCGroups.com is proud to be the title sponsor of the ETOC this year.
Each year the shows founders and hosts, Tom and Kat from TNT Landing Gear, choose a charity to support.
This year they are supporting autism research.
This is near and dear to my heart since my 9 year old son has Asperger's Syndrome.

Please join us at the 2013 RCGroups.com Electric Tournament of Champions to have fun and help give autism the boot!!

This is great...

The Greatest R/C Car Chase Ever (2 min 28 sec)

"I think this is it."

26 Turn Flat Spin in a Tipsy Nipper (2 min 10 sec)

I just saw this in the footer of the site, "Currently Active Users (in the last 15 minutes): 5,276." One of the things I'm always watching on RCG are the stats. That was pretty close to setting an all time record for the most users ever online!

Another thing I like to watch is how many unique users we get a day. This is a mind numbing number that can sometimes be hard to believe. I use Google Analytics for my data so I know it's real. Yesterday we had over 172,000 visitors - CRAZY! It's great to think there are that many like minded RC pilots out there in the world!

Another interesting fact is that RCGroups.com gets between 1.4 to 1.7 million unique visitors a month. Wrap your head around that!

You can always check out our stats on this page:
https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/adve...tising-traffic

While I'm rattling off stats here are a few more:
Threads: 1,766,343
Posts: 23,499,123
Members: 453,440

If you want to put your finger on the pulse of the site we have an app that will let you see threads as they are created in real time on RCG. You can see the Forum Spy here:
https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/spy.php?

Finally to get an overview of where all these RC pilots are you can take a look at our user map to see the last 1,000 RCG users all over the world:
https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/usermap.php?

Interesting stuff!

new year!

There are many things which began in 1996 that changed the course of history forevermore. Dolly the sheep was born… er… cloned. Garth Brooks refused to accept his American Music Award for Best Overall Artist because he so firmly believed in the hot new group Hootie and the Blowfish. AOL was the way to access the exciting new thing they called “the internet.” You know, important stuff.

But unlike Dolly, the Blowfish or AOL, some things that began in 1996 had some real staying power, and RCGroups.com is one of them.

In 1996, Jim Bourke wrote the "Electric Flight FAQ." He was assisted by posts on rec.models.rc, in particular by Doug Ingraham and Dennis Weatherly.

After writing the FAQ, Jim decided to create a mailing list of people like himself who were interested in electric airplanes.

Once the mailing list was running, it quickly became very popular. Jim set up a website where he could keep the FAQ and the mailing list instructions.

He didn't know what to name the website and felt it probably wasn't important, so he called it "The E Zone." At the time, it was very expensive and time-consuming to get a domain name of your own, so the site was hosted at http://world.std.com/~jbourke/ezone.html. By today's standards, that was a mouthful, but in 1996 it was standard for web pages to have long URLs like that.

For a quick lesson on how to use this new technology called the "internet," check out the video below:

The Internet As It Was In 1996 (59 min 45 sec)

In a previous life I had a podcast called the "HellCast." I basically traveled around the RC circuit and recorded stories from fellow RC pilots. Today I was in a thread with Jim Smith and when I asked what he and Joe were up to he said, "Heading to Dubai in a few weeks to fly for the Prince. Joe is really excited and looking forward to meeting him and Doing Demos for the World Parachuting Competition there. Going to be an experience for both of us I'm sure.
The Prince saw one of Joe's Flying videos and contacted him about doing a show for them last Spring. Been making preparations since. We sent over a 103" 3DHS extra, DA120, And a Futaba 18mz. The plane arrived there last week."
That immediately made me think of one of the best RC stories I have ever heard...and I have heard a fair share. Bob Sadler tells a story of when he and a group of well known RC pilots were invited to fly for a sheik. The rest you have to hear!

Summer is still in full swing around here. The kids are in the pool and having fun. I have a Taboo GT that I purchased at the Bruce a few weeks ago. First I needed an rx and waited a week. Then I smoked a servo and waited a week for the new one. Then after all that I broke my cf ele rod and waited another week. The good news is she is finally ready to go! So this morning I woke up and looked outside. No rain and fluffy clouds! The only hitch in the get-a-long was that I had to mow and then we were headed to the river. So I still haven't been able to chuck the Taboo but I did get in some wake surfing!

River Surfing with my Cowboy Hat! (0 min 40 sec)

I was invited to hang out at the world's largest DLG (Discus Launch Glider) contest. I drove up to Shelbyville, KY and had a great time. The temperatures were HAWT but the amount of fun everyone was having seemed to exceed the heat so all was well. Bruce gave me a tour of the Thermal Farm and explained the rules of an F3K contest. Luckily for all of you I got it all on video, along with some hearty DLG throws so you can see how they do it. Thanks to everyone at the event for being so hospitable and we even ate dinner at Col. Sanders house!!

The Bruce - The docudrama:

The Thermal Farm - The Bruce 2012 (13 min 27 sec)

Myth of Fact:


Link to The Bruce website

Here are some direct links to the event photos:
https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/show...&postcount=250

https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/show...&postcount=251

https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/show...&postcount=265

https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/show...&postcount=266

I was able to get my DLG higher than usual at Joe Nall. Josh Price offered to throw my DLG on Friday during the afternoon. Prior to this I thought maybe I needed a lighter plane but deep down I know it was just my throwing ability. Josh proved that on the first throw. He must have put her up around 150 to 180 feet. Cruising around at that altitude really showed me what I have been missing out on with my low throws. Unfortunately he was throwing it so hard he ripped out the pegs but evidently the style of pegs on my DLG are prone to ripping off. I went to Skip Miller Models and ordered the Steigeisen Power Peg. I'll have to get the Dremel tool out and do some wing work but I'm anxious to get the plane back in the air and see if I can get better altitudes!

Here are some DLG photos from that day...

I know the weather has been warm earlier than usual but after my visit to the field yesterday I know for sure it's officially flying season! Usually when I run out to the field to get in a couple of flights no one is around. I was surprised to find the field crowded with pilots! I asked one of the guys if it was a special occasion and his reply was, "Nope, just a pretty day." Right after that they got some combat going and everyone was laughing and having a great time. It really makes you appreciate your hobby and having a field where we can all meet. I got an email today from a pilot that flew there in the 1930's. He had read my article about our field and was reminiscing. If I'm lucky he will send me some photos that I can share with the guys. I say all that to say this - have a great flying season!!

I feel lucky to live in Nashville, TN. The people are genuinely nice, it feels like a small town even though it's a big town, you can't spit without hitting a great guitar player and the weather is nice, oh yeah, it's in the South and I like that a lot too. At the club I fly at I used to do maiden flights for people. There was this one guy named Bobby. He was from Texas and always had a new plane. Doing the maiden on one of Bobby's planes was always an exciting experience. You never knew what you might be getting yourself into! I would walk up on Bobby telling stories and it became pretty clear that Bobby was in the music business. Once I walked up on him talking about how Yoko Ono couldn't stand him but he and John Lennon were good friends and how playing his sax like frog for her album won him back into her good graces. Then I found out Bobby was the sax player for the Rolling Stones. It's gets better - Bobby got his start with Buddy Holly. I thought I better interview Bobby while I had the chance. To say he has some interesting stories is an understatement. I almost got to go on tour with the Stones as Bobby's roadie. The real plan was that we would build a road case that housed all of Bobby's planes and chargers. When we got to a stadium my job would be to have everything ready so Bobby could fly whenever we wanted. Can you imagine touring the world with the Stones and being in charge of the RC planes? We thought we had the green light but Mick ultimately shot the idea...Continue Reading

As the father of a boy with autism (Aspergers) any effort to help with research is near and dear to my heart. Each year the Electric Tournament of Champions (ETOC) has a special raffle to benefit a children’s and adult organization in the area to help their cause to help find a cure. I was surprised to find out that this year's raffle is for the fight against autism with their “Give Autism the Boot” campaign. They will have a special raffle to help benefit the fight against autism and help the Great Lakes Collaborative for Autism.

Here is what Tom Kroggel the founder of the ETOC has to say about it:

Tom and Kat - thanks for all that you do and thanks for your efforts to "Give Autism the boot!"

Link to the thread:
https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/show....php?t=1614176