[SIZE=10.5pt]I am glad you chimed in Don. You have been one of my biggest supporters, raced my designs, Concourse-ed my designs, and also helped me design many of the kits I offer properly with your expertise. For all the effort you have put into a lot of these kits, THANK YOU. Without you, and several others, I could not have done what I have. There are so many good people that have stepped up, contacted me, and shared their secrets to building a good running hull, and asked me to share those ideas with the rest of the boating community so they could benefit as well. With that being said:[/SIZE]
[SIZE=10.5pt]This whole thread is getting laughable.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=10.5pt]Then I hear people talking about scale dying. Let me say something, and I hate to do it as it may just cost me future business, but I am tired of getting beat down over what I have tried to do for the scale hobby....[/SIZE]
[SIZE=10.5pt]If I didn't draw and make the 150+ kits I have drawn in the last 8 years...scale might well have been dead by now. [/SIZE]
[SIZE=10.5pt]The Gas scale class...well, let’s just say there would only be a small hand full of hulls even available to the builder, and even some of those glass hulls started as one of my kits, and plugs and molds were made.the 108 gas hull that RC Boatcompany sells is a direct example. The rest would have had to be done from scratch, and the interest would have dwindled due to the fact that some of the main racers in the country that make canopies probably would have never even made a wood hull, or designed and built the corresponding canopy that most people are buying from those guys to complete their own builds. I have opened up the doors for a lot of other people in the world to make new products for the scale classes due to the availability of the kits I offer. The simple fact is, today's world is so fast paced, that the average hobbyist doesn't have the time, or tools to scratch build framing, nor do they have the interest to recut and recut because their templates don't quite fit. My prices are so cheap on these kits, that you can barely go to your local hobby shop, buy enough ply to cut, and RECUT the issues you encounter hand cutting a frame. Also, just for the record, it would be very very easy to add air traps back to the 108-109 hulls. It’s only a piece of 1/8" ply strip anyways. I am confused why it is easier to hand cut a whole frame vs just adding this strip with epoxy???[/SIZE]
[SIZE=10.5pt]I have caught a LOT of crap over the years from a few out there who don't like the changes made to the bottom side of the hull. Well, guess what, the rules are written to allow those changes, so I am going to put those changes in there, so the majority of the pack will have a safe, stable running hull, that doesn't blow off with today's power,in turn, risking damage on their $3000 boat, or God forbid, the persons boat in which the blow off hull hits. These kits have also brought in a younger generation into the scale hobby, in turn bringing them to the pond, and the races, and in turn, them teaching their children how to build a wood boat.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=10.5pt]Hydro Junkie, you have slammed my kits since 2010, you know nothing about them, nor do you know ANYTHING about me as a person, hobbyist, or man. You have never once picked up the phone to see what kind of person I actually am, instead of judging me when I have to defend my products online. You would find I am actually a really nice guy, with a ton of passion for what I do. I work a day job at a Civil Engineering firm, and do ALL this rc stuff in my spare time, and try to make time for my wife, family and friends. I don't sleep, and when I do, I dream of the next kit I can come up with that will excite my customers as much as it does me.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=10.5pt]You have NEVER finished your own build, you go from forum to forum bashing kits in general, and making yourself out to be a scale God of some kind. (Yes, I have seen your threads on RC Universe...endless jabber about things that are beyond ridiculous. Telling your tales to people that probably don't even know what any of it means in an attempt to be something you are not). Even the one boat you did kind of finish was a KIT made by DUMAS. In the 8 years I have been doing this, I have designed over 200 kits, made molds for 20+ various hulls, and you have hand cut what..2 frames, neither of which are even close to be finished.Yet you want to tell me I am in the wrong for making a usable product, or my kits are not scale? By my best estimate, I have put in an average of 10 hours per kit, some kits 40-60 hours of time. That is 1500 hours of my time into just the scale sector of my offerings. Multiply that by what my day job firm bills my time out at..$90 an hour...That is $135,000 of my time spend on making these kits. And when we get really serious about it, I doubt I have sold 600 scale kits in the last 8 years, at an average profit of $30.00...That is only $18,000. So when you put in that much time, and get people interested in being a builder, hobbyist, racer and best of all, friend, come see me, and talk crap to my face instead of hiding behind your keyboard as you have done for so many years. I'm sorry if my post here pisses you off, but you have had it coming for years, and everyone here knows it. Start producing something, and quit giving out excuses to why you have not done something. It is far beyond old.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=10.5pt]Sorry to anyone I have offended in this post. I have tried my best to help out the rc boating community, and every once in a while, I see things like this, and let it go, even tho it makes me question why I even try. I try because I like my hobby friends, I like the boats, and like being a part of something that makes people happy. That is all I have to say. [/SIZE]
[SIZE=10.5pt]Mike[/SIZE]
