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Author Topic: CL officially dead in Korea  (Read 3094 times)

Offline Peter Nevai

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CL officially dead in Korea
« on: February 06, 2007, 08:10:00 AM »
Been to a few hobby shops here in South Korea, The word is that CL has been dead for about 8 to 10 years. As far as anyone knows no one paricipates in this country anymore. Currently at Osan AFB. working on various projects. RC cars are very big though, They seem to be the predominant products on the hobby shop shelves.
Words Spoken by the first human to set foot on Mars... "Now What?"

Offline Bill Little

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Re: CL officially dead in Korea
« Reply #1 on: February 06, 2007, 08:14:49 AM »
WEll, Peter, here's you chance ot he the "hero" and bring it back!  Someone will be nice enought to launch for you, I'm sure, and I'm sure you can secure an area "somewhere" to fly.  Might just spark enough curiosity to get asome others invloved.

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Offline Bill Gruby

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Re: CL officially dead in Korea
« Reply #2 on: February 06, 2007, 08:23:01 AM »
Peter;

Well said as usual Bill, I would just like to add that if you can't get it there just ask here I'm quite sure someone will help.

Bill Gruby   y1
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Offline Jim Thomerson

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Re: CL officially dead in Korea
« Reply #3 on: February 06, 2007, 08:25:34 AM »
If you could find "several" hobby shops here in Austin, I suspect you would be told something very similar. 

Offline Manuel Cortes

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Re: CL officially dead in Korea
« Reply #4 on: February 06, 2007, 09:18:46 AM »
Hello al.
Control line (and stunt) will NEVER die!!
In my country, Alicante, control line was famous in teh seventies, dissapearing in the mid 80īs.
Then a 14 years old boy (me) began flying alone using old diesels in 1986, then recovering old people to the hobby.
Stunt will never die, we are different!!
Regards from Spain.
Manuel.

Offline Peter Nevai

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Re: CL officially dead in Korea
« Reply #5 on: February 06, 2007, 09:48:39 AM »
right now I do not know what length of stay will be here in korea. I all depends what contracts the company wins here in the coming months. Right now I am due to stay in Korea until March 28th. There are prospects of staying longer. But it is still unclear. If I knew I was going to stay a while I would probably order up a Strega ARC and have it shipped over with other equipment coming over herre for various projects. But if I will be only here short term then I dread having to figure out how to pack up a fully assembled Stunter back to the states safely and at a reasonable cost.

There is a fairly large park right across the street from the Off base apartment I am staying at. Flying on base would probably be too complicated because the only open spaces on base is the golf course (not likely getting permission from the base commande to fly there) and out on the runway which happens to be a high security area. Since Osan is a very active base, flying on base is probably out of the question.

Getting someone the launch would not be an issue as there are plenty of bored enlisted kids who would come hang out on the offer of a 6 pack. With the advent of quality ARF's I can see potential interest in CL especially in a radio frequency sensitive environment like a tactical AFB, but (always a but) finding a suitable open area suitable for flying is the issue.

This brings me to a thought raised in the post about electric CL. Noise is way down on the list when it comes to loosing flying locations. Real Estate development and increasing competition for open land use by more and more people is the other. Noise most time is only an excuse. Everyone knows that a properly muffled IC model engine emits little more than a moderate buzz and much of that is propeller noise.

School facilities are worried more about liability issues, than noise, as are most other public facilities. Then of course you have to yeild the football, baseball, running track/field to the legitimate users of those facilities. Just not enough CL flyers out there to justify the dedication of land for that use only. Heck land is expensive and expensive to maintain. To dedicate a chunk of space exclusively for CL when that space remains unused except for perhaps only several hours per week is by anyones account a waste of space. And easily given away to a activity or group the would more fully utilize that space.

Model airfields do not generate revenue for a municipality, Golf Courses do. Plain and simple. Dog parks more fully utilize smaller spaces. Baseball, Football, soccer, fields are for the kids and if you are a weekday school year flyer and have proper muffler then you may be able to get in a few flights but on the week ends and in the summer those fields are pretty much booked.

I strongly feel that no matter what you fly, someone is going to resent you using up all that space just to fly your silly toy airplane. Heck they could be barbecuing, Sunning, kite flying, kicking a soccer ball around in that space right NOW. CL is dead in South Korea not for a want of space, certainly not for the noise (Osan is one noisy place especialy with the unmuffles scooters, and the F-18's and A-10's routinely flying around. It is dead because RC, PC Games and other electronic toys have created a lack of interest. Then simply it has been forgotten. No Brodack's here, no cottage industry, no exposure, a forgotten activity.
Words Spoken by the first human to set foot on Mars... "Now What?"

Offline Peter Anglberger

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Re: CL officially dead in Korea
« Reply #6 on: February 06, 2007, 06:56:36 PM »
Peter,
        Don't be to sure that CL, especially Stunt in Korea is dead.

Shortly after I retreaded into CL,  in 2003 I found myself travelling a number of times to Japan.

I looked around for hobby shops in Nagoya where I was based and found as you did mostly RC cars,
with very little in the way of even RC aircraft.

Ask a fluent Korean speaker to do a web search for Korean CL sites.

I did this in Japan and was amazed to find a lot of CL activity and would you believe an active cottage industry, Kaz Minato being the most well known. The Japanese F2B Nats gets approx 70 entries after screening out anyone who cannot score 6 out of 10 for all F2B maneouvres.

Remember East Asia is so densely populated that an incedibly low per capita participation can still result in possibly 100s of CL enthusiasts.

Keep looking. My Japanese freinds tell me that CL is strongly resurging in Taiwan mostly due to TopFlite and Brodak ARFS.

Peter

Online John Paris

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Re: CL officially dead in Korea
« Reply #7 on: February 06, 2007, 07:32:50 PM »
Peter,
What do you mean CL is dead in Korea?  I was over there in December and ran into another CL flyer at the hotel I was staying in.  Now if we had only brought airplanes with skis, we would have been golden.

I was stationed at Camp Humphreys during the late 80s and early 90s and made a number of trips up to Osan to fly RC.  We were allowed to fly on a taxiway near the aircraft jins (sp?) near the golf course.  We also flew on a taxiway down at Humphreys.  There were active RC clubs at both locations back in the day.  The Arts and Crafts shop in Osan gave up a number of Double Voodoo kits and a few 1/2a CL irplanes while I was there, but I think that I may have bought the last bit of stock they had.  The A&C shops in Humphreys provided many OS FP engines, generally of the 25 size for use.  I guess CL was popular up to the early to mid 80s then died out.  Other than the few people I taught to fly, I was the only GI that flew CL in our area.

At the Korean National Air Force Academy, they used to hold a model airplane event in June where you could see and fly anything from Free Flight to RC.  We attended for 3 of my 4 years there.  I spent time up on the track flying CL combat and watching the stunt boys. One year I was able to teach one of my coworkers how to fly and we took a third place in racing.  I did not fly stunt at the time but wish now that I had.  Was still a pretty good time.  The group of people that went with me all spoke Korean (as do I) so it was interesting for them to have us there.  I keep trying to work a business trip in around the event and trying to find information on if they are still having it or not. 

Enough of the reminicing I guess.  My wife will take a peek over on the Korean web sites and see if she can find anything.  I could do it, but it would take quite a bit longer than for her.  If we find anything, I will post back here.

John
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Offline Peter Nevai

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Re: CL officially dead in Korea
« Reply #8 on: February 06, 2007, 09:37:11 PM »
Thanks John,

Navigating ad searching Korean websites is almost impossible for me. There is a big expansion going on at camp Humphreys As they are going to pretty much phase out Youngsan. I did go to the Two hobby shops right in Songtan figuring that they would probably have the most stock, being right outside the gate.

One had only plastic models the other had a very scant supply of some RC aircraft stuff, The majority were plastic kits, RC cars, and Airsoft guns and accessories. I do not have a ration card so I can not get into the BX etc, so I can not comment on what is there.

I look forward to what ever you may dig up. I discovered that they have two baseball fields adjacent to the Golf Course, so that probably would be a prime place to fly if permission were granted. As I am an invited contractor It would be best if someone stationed there were to do the leg work on it.

For those who are curious you can use Google Earth to see the area, just find Osan and go a bit south and west from there and Songtan and the base shown. Google earth never seems to blow my mind.
Words Spoken by the first human to set foot on Mars... "Now What?"

Offline Garf

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Re: CL officially dead in Korea
« Reply #9 on: February 07, 2007, 11:49:27 AM »
Hey Pete. I wondered what became of you. I put 5 sundays in a row flying at Markham Park. My ARF Nobler was ready 2 weeks ago, and it rained both sundays. 

Offline dennis lipsett

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Re: CL officially dead in Korea
« Reply #10 on: February 08, 2007, 12:25:11 AM »
Thanks John,

Navigating ad searching Korean websites is almost impossible for me. There is a big expansion going on at camp Humphreys As they are going to pretty much phase out Youngsan. I did go to the Two hobby shops right in Songtan figuring that they would probably have the most stock, being right outside the gate.

One had only plastic models the other had a very scant supply of some RC aircraft stuff, The majority were plastic kits, RC cars, and Airsoft guns and accessories. I do not have a ration card so I can not get into the BX etc, so I can not comment on what is there.

I look forward to what ever you may dig up. I discovered that they have two baseball fields adjacent to the Golf Course, so that probably would be a prime place to fly if permission were granted. As I am an invited contractor It would be best if someone stationed there were to do the leg work on it.

For those who are curious you can use Google Earth to see the area, just find Osan and go a bit south and west from there and Songtan and the base shown. Google earth never seems to blow my mind.


Peter, Interesting your mentioning the baseball fields next to the golf course. My barracks was just below the one field, mind you this was 1966. My flying buddy lived in the next barracks over and he had a spare room that we stored our stuff. We flew on that field all the time. Strangely there wasn't much activity there on that field but for Sundays. Heck the golf course was so ratty I even flew my single channel plane right at the edge of the course.
Camp Humphry was a hotbead of modelling activity and had a well supplied shop. We used to go up there and whip the Army regularly. Air force life wasn't bad , new barracks, 2 to a room, housekeeper. free food and lodging and overseas pay to boot. Got weekends off to go fly against the army who had a fairly good special services division and had meets all over S Korea. Julian and I were the only USAF guys competing so it wasn't that popular I suppose even then. The base shop carried OS and Fugi motors . Have any idea what a Fugi 061 and 15 outboard are worth. I have both NIB and do know the value. TMHK kits and a few other Japaneese planes. You really got good at strip planking those models.
dennis

Offline Terry Bolin

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Re: CL officially dead in Korea
« Reply #11 on: February 08, 2007, 09:47:02 AM »
I didn't read all the post on this subject but I have found that most of the guys flying CL are 40's-50's and up so I believe that if we don't keep the younger (Video kids) intrested, CL may actually die out for the most part. I am putting on a Building class for beginners in Joplin the 17th to try and start some newbes. Hope this works. .......just my 2 pennys.
Terry Bolin

Online John Paris

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Re: CL officially dead in Korea
« Reply #12 on: February 08, 2007, 10:18:41 AM »
Peter,
I found some information related to a model airplane contest held at the Air Force Academy in Chungju, but I did not find the dates for this year.  I believe that it was held 21 May 06 last time around.  Perhaps you could get some information from one of the ROK AF troops.  They had a pretty decent turn out for the CL events when I attended and even if you did not fly, you could meet up with other Korean CL flyers.  Below is a link to the site.  If you go to the regular events section of the academy, then you will see the model airplane contest, but there is no additional information right now.
John
http://www.airforce.mil.kr/ENG/index.html
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Offline Dennis Pedersen

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Re: CL officially dead in Korea
« Reply #13 on: February 08, 2007, 05:47:58 PM »
If you are interested in flying and getting some others going why not just for fun and ease of packing get a few Baby Clown ARFs .That way you could let some people give it a try ect .You also do not have the worry of letting someone try the Strega and also the getting it home issue?just a thought. ;)
Dennis Pedersen
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Offline Howard Rush

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Re: CL officially dead in Korea
« Reply #14 on: February 09, 2007, 10:54:34 PM »
There were some North Koreans at the 1990 world champs in France.  I have pictures somewhere of them.  I haven't heard of any appearing in the West since then, but you could look through the recon photos for a circle and go visit. 
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