Carisma GT14 Shell Off (image:gamepeople.co.uk)
As many of you will know, GeekDad style fun is usually much better when it’s shared. I started a Remote Control car club last year with a few friends, and I have found fresh enthusiasm for the project by all the new people who have joined since.
We meet every other week in a local hall to race our 1/14th Carisma GT14 cars. They work well for us not only because of their diminutive size, but because the polished surface of the hall and their overpowered 4WD transmission means that it take both skill and restrained to win a race. A big help was finding a friendly local sponsor (Eclipse Hobbies) who helped some members get setup with cars and provided excellent advice.
Another good move for us was when we got some of the members to start blogging about their experience to help explain what we do for new comers. As you can read, some of them (like Simon) are new to R/C cars whilst others (like James) have been tinkering away with remote controlled vehicles their whole life. By these members simply talking about their experience online we made connections with other people who wanted to hear more about the club and ultimatley join.
Most exciting though has been how each new person to join the club has brought a fresh set of skills. Some are experts at tracking down Carisma GT14 related deals on Ebay while other have even started fabricating their own replacement Carisma GT14 parts out of aluminum.
As the club grows in numbers I’m also glad that we chose the GT14 cars with their 2.4 Mhz controllers. Rather than the old crystal style radios these sync with your car and enable you to run many more cars at once without having to worry about interference. As I mentioned in my original Carisma GT14 review:
The radio gear is of the newer 2.4ghz type that eliminates the need for old style crystals. This is more expensive that the crystal based kits but by using digital coded transmissions it enables multiple cars to be run at the same time without any worry of interference from other driver’s radio systems. Each car is effectively bound to a particular controller.
With around 9 cars regularly turning up to our meetings now, and more ordered, this feature has become invaluable.
If you have tinkered with R/C cars in the past, I’d encourage you to find or start a club in your area. It’s great fun, and you will meet some fantastic people.
