Sign of the times; Video killed the Radio star

[tamiyadan]

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[SoloGraphix]

And a less heavy trigger finger could of saved them...

Just because you have all that power doesn't mean you need to be full throttle at all times.

[badattitude]

So hard.....to resist.......full throttle

But yea, you right, slower is faster

[tamiyadan]

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[SoloGraphix]

It's unfortunate that we lose so many tracks to silly circumstances. It is also unfortunate that sometimes, us as racers, are our own worst enemies.

[MelvinsArmy]

And a less heavy trigger finger could of saved them...

Just because you have all that power doesn't mean you need to be full throttle at all times.

Exactly!

Brushless isn't responsible for a thing. People who don't know how to drive are what killed it.

I'd think a hobby shop would love idiots flying their cars off the track. It means they get to sell more spare parts.

[dsmith]

i'm about to debut a brushless for myself 3300kv...we'll see what all the hype is about..

"video killed the radio star" was the first video to air on MTV.

[Coelacanth]

I was thinking of that very thing when someone commented recently in another topic that 1:8-scale offroad is the 'next big thing'. In my own mind, I doubted that very much because 1:8-scale cars with current ridiculously-powered motors & speeds require much larger tracks than the tracks used since the 80's for 1:10-scale cars with much more modest, manageable speeds. Those larger tracks obviously will require that much more maintenance and the costs to own & run such tracks are more than with smaller tracks, and ultimately those costs will be transferred to the customer memberships.

If 1:8 buggy racing becomes the norm, I believe we'll have far fewer places to race as an eventual result. The decreased demand for 1:10-scale tracks and increased costs of running 1:8-scale cars & tracks doesn't lend itself to a favorable trend, IMHO.

[Coelacanth]

And a less heavy trigger finger could of saved them...

Just because you have all that power doesn't mean you need to be full throttle at all times.

Exactly!

Brushless isn't responsible for a thing. People who don't know how to drive are what killed it.

I don't know about that...the more power you have to play with, the more skill & respect you need to control it. Imagine how the roads and highways would be if every teen bought or was given 500+ horsepower cars for their sweet-16 birthdays. That's essentially what's happening with RC and brushless: A whole lot of people out there with way too much power than they can handle. Is the fault the people who can't handle it, or the ease of access to obtain it? Interesting conundrum.

[MelvinsArmy]

Whenever I hand my controller over to someone who hasn't driven an rc car before, I always tell them not to floor it. Drive it like it was a real car. You have to walk before you run. Even with a 200 horsepower car, kids generally don't get it and floor it while driving thru a downtown neighborhood. I doubt many people get behind the wheel of a 1000hp Bugatti and just mash the throttle pedal pulling out of the driveway.

[MelvinsArmy]

And as for the 16 year olds thing, when I was 16 my parents had a 1987 Buick Grand National that they let me drive frequently. I never got a speeding ticket (not for lack of trying) and I never put anyone's life in danger, except my own. I was more careful driving that car than my 81 Regal that did 0-60 in about 3 minutes.

[SoloGraphix]

I think the 1:1 comparison may be an apples to orange comparison and the following isn't going to bode well for my initial response to the O.P.

I know for sure that I would respect the power of a 1:1 more because my ass is in the seat and the danger of injury or death is real. Mashing the throttle to an RC car and slamming a concrete wall only hurts the car, and possibly the wall...

However, I spend my hard earned money to race RC and I tend to respect those cars as well since I will be paying for repairs, a 14 year old kid who's dad just bought him a brushless RTR (insert name here) might not feel the same.

[SoloGraphix]

Let me add to my rant, and slightly curve away from the topic...

At our local track, the novice class is full of mostly slashes, the unbreakability of these things is not teaching kids how to drive, it is teaching them how hard they can hit things wide open without breaking something. It is up to us, the older more experienced racer or the club to step in and help them understand the difference between racing and destruction. I admittedly do nto do enough of this at my local track.

[MelvinsArmy]

Anyone remember back in the day there used to be a nick name for people who floored it all the way around the track, people used to call them "Hammer". I think Autographics even made a decal set about it.

[Coelacanth]

I agree that one has to have a lot more finesse driving powerful cars (full-scale or RC), but that finesse only comes with years of experience. I too grew up with a 1986 GN (I was 18 at the time) and got to drive it occasionally. (I also had my first car--my '70 Charger, rusty but no slouch with a 383 Magnum pushing 300+ hp, 350+ after the engine was rebuilt & bored 0.030 to 394 c.i.d.).

I guess the point I'm trying to make is the proliferation of extremely fast RTR cars is making the hobby much more accessible to the masses of decidely-less-experienced drivers than in the past, when very few people could afford $200 to $500 hobby-grade cars that they had to build themselves. I remember going to the track back then and the number of racers under 18 was almost none.

Put all those masses of teens on a track with today's brushless power and what you get is exactly what you'd expect--a fair amount of CARnage.