A National Aeromodelling Centre

[Martin Harris - Moderator]

I can't really see the logic of having a "national site" - what would it actually be used for? As BEB says, it needs to be a pretty large site to hold a couple of major events each year - who would maintain it for the 50 weeks a year it wouldn't be fully utilised?

 

Use it for training courses? Well, you would only need a "club" sized field to do that but wouldn't funds be better spent in providing whatever this training might be on a visting basis by a national coach so that all areas could benefit? Helping people to progress by improving standards of instruction and basic aeronautics by more standardised training and testing would be money well spent but how many people would be prepared to travel long distances to a centralised facility and incur accomodation costs in addition in order to do so?

 

A collection of modelling artefacts would be a fine idea but not something that would attract a great deal of public interest in isolation - far better to work with an established museum to display important milestones - something attached to the aviation collection of the Science Museum for example would expose the hobby far more effectively than a dusty pile of stuff in a backroom in Leicester!

[David Ashby - Moderator]

Just on similar lines but does anyone know if the BMFA makes a regular surplus or just breaks-even perhaps and whether it has any reserves?

 

 

 

Edited By David Ashby - RCME Administrator on 15/08/2011 08:10:12

[DCW]

BMFA Surplus or break even?

 

Hi David.

 

Perhaps a check with 'Companies House' might give you the answer.

 

www.companieshouse.gov.uk

 

Best regards

David W

[Conwy Soarer]

You mean a bit like Goosedale? Really good venue, not sure why it closed, it always seemed popular.

 

If the BMFA are going to do it they need to be careful with location - it needs to be pretty central within the UK and with good access to the transport network otherwise it will be weighted to much N S E or W with people from other conrners never visiting.

[Peter Miller]

On the subject of the museum. I remember that back in the late 70s, early 80s there was going to be a big modelling museum at Brooklands. I know that a lot of stuff was collected for that.

 

What happened to that?

 

As has been said, the proposed site would not be big enough for the Nationals. That is a large amount of income lost.

 

Going and just flying there. Fine. Again, as has been said, one would have to queue for a long time even with several flight lines all using 2.4 Ghz. And who is going to drive all the way there when they can get in a lot more flying on their club patch.

 

Free Flight? After a few dozen people have been retrieving models from down wind every week end there would be objections from farmers.

 

Of course great for control line.

 

Perhaps it would work like a year round Pontins modelling week but then you need accommodation. Of course that would raise quite a bit of income.

 

AS a flying site for a club, well, hardly. IT could be a  place where lots of events would be booked, for example the Old Warden weekends might move there. It might be a venue for shows like the old Sandown. Too many lost club weekend but of course those events would make far more money and could make it viable. But you would need exhibition halls.

 

Then there is the maintenance. There is going to be an awful lot of grass to cut on a regualr basis for several months of the year.

 

Personally I don't believe that there are enough modellers in this country to make it viable

 

Now go ahead and tell me that I am wrong.

Edited By Peter Miller on 15/08/2011 09:02:22

Edited By Peter Miller on 15/08/2011 09:13:11

[FlyinBrian]

I believe the AMA site in Muncie covers a huge area and the land is leased out for farming with the proviso that model flying takes priority.

 

The AMA therefore get an income 365 days a year plus any income generated from the modelling side of things.

 

 

BMFA is still listed at Cos House as The society of model aeronautical Engineers Ltd

Co number

00457067

Edited By FlyinBrian on 15/08/2011 10:10:57

[Allan Bowker]

RAF Cosford sounds like a good venue:

 

* Large Aerospace Museum - would be enhanced by a small aeromodelling museum, I'm sure they could give us half a hangar somewhere and would attract more visitors to the existing museum.

 

* Central location, staying in the midlands, easy to get to by rail and car.

 

* Massive airfield (Tarmac & grass!) - Used by the LMA annually.

 

* Plenty of spare office space for an admin team

 

 

 

[David E]

Hmm, I need a bit of convincing that this isn't just a way of most members subsidising the internationally competative elite.

 

Co-locating with Cosford sounds like a reasonable idea though if it were to go ahead.

 

The problem with buying up sites is that they will get developed around and become unsuitable for model flying. The only way to avoid this is what the AMA have done - buy up a huge swathe of farmland around and rent it out for farming. I'm not sure the income from that would be enough to create an income after paying off the loan to buy it.

[Ben B]

It's an idea very like Goosedale isn't it? I can remember going there in the 90s. Lovely cafe, nice static display or planes, absolutely lovely fields and instructors on site. I had my first lessons up there when I was a university student. Surely we'd need to find out why that closed? I suppose BMFA subs could support the place whereas Goosedale had to fend for itself?

[David E]

A quick look at Goosdale Model Flying Club's website suggests that Goosdale's museum might have been a residential property owned by it's founder, who has since died, and the property is now owned by someone else. Some of that is conjecture though!

[Colin Bernard]

As others have said, this sounds a reincarnation of Goosedale and we need to learn from their experiences and until I know why Goosedale failed I am not sure of the viability of a national centre, but I certainly think it is worth investigating further. Are the people involved with Goosedale members of this forum do we know? Or does anyone have contact with them?

 

Allan's suggestion of Cosford is a great idea if they have space for us.

 

As to it's use outside of a museum, well I agree with others that I cannot see it being a replacement for general flying where your local club site fulfils that need, but I can see it maybe being used occasionally for club flyers - e.g. our field does not have the luxury of smooth tarmac, or even smooth grass(!), so it would be good to be able to use a decent surface to fly models that are maybe sensitive to rutted surfaces or that cannot be hand launched.

Also it could be used as central test centre, like the Old Warden test days, so that maybe you could book in advance to go and take your test. This would be useful for lone flyers, or for members of clubs where the examiners are in short supply.

 

[Edit: David, your post went in as I was typing, so at least we know Goosedale did not fail at all, which is encouraging!]

Edited By Colin Bernard on 15/08/2011 12:21:48

[TonyS]

Not really.

[kc]

There is nowhere in England that is far enough away from houses that there will be no noise complaints if there is continuous flying every day of the year. Usually the noise complaint comes from the only house in the vicinity!  Inevitably the site would be closed due to noise so making the investment nearly worthless.

Better to hire fields in every county and use until impractical.

Edited By kc on 15/08/2011 12:54:04

[Devon Flyer]

Posted by Andy Symons on 14/08/2011 22:01:25:

Posted by Devon Flyer on 14/08/2011 20:55:30:

Sounds like someone in the BMFA has delusions of grandeur and wants to start empire building.

Make looking after all of the membership, not just an elite few, the priority.

The suggestion was made from the floor at the AGM last year that it was looked at, so its being looked at!!

That's as maybe; but who made the suggestion and with what backing / vested interest?

We all know how things can be manipulated.

[Biggles' Elder Brother - Moderator]

DF I have no formal connection with the BMFA other than being a bog standard member.

 

But I believe this proposal was put forward in all sincerity by some members with no motive other than the obvious - i.e. they happen to believe the hobby would benefit from the existance of a national centre! I read no conspiracy into this.

 

BEB

[Andy Symons]

Posted by Biggles' Elder Brother - Moderator on 15/08/2011 19:52:49:

DF I have no formal connection with the BMFA other than being a bog standard member.

 

But I believe this proposal was put forward in all sincerity by some members with no motive other than the obvious - i.e. they happen to believe the hobby would benefit from the existance of a national centre! I read no conspiracy into this.

 

BEB

Thats about the size of it, sometimes there just isn't a conspiracy to find.

[flytilbroke]

1: Large areas of farmland are not owned by the people doing the farming. Renting or Leasing is very common. Very few acres would be leased if a profit could not be made.

 

2: Any large area which would make up the "National" site would mainly be farmed as are the fields surrounding "Club" flying sites.

 

3: A specified number of days or weekends could be rented out for other events during a year.

 

4: Only the regular and immediate use areas of grass need be kept mown.

 

So the cost over an extended time period should not be an issue of concern.

 

Example: The site of "T in the Park" makes more money from this one event, than the Farm does for the whole of the rest of the year yet the farm is viable as an entity on its own merit.

[flugfan]

Gosh - this is such a bad idea - it is totally symptomatic of an organisation in contraction to establish a museum of "a golden past"

 

The facts are: -

numbers of signed up BMFA flyers and Membership of BMFA is falling

The average age of membership is rising

New membership is characterised by old flyers returning to the sport

National Lottery is extremely unlikely to support capital costs of purpose built facility for an organisation whose membership is 99% white, middle aged, middle class

Income from conference trade wil be negligible (there are thousands of lovely venues vying for diminishing conference trade - I know cos I run one).

 

I suspect investment on a project like this would be the end of the BMFA which already projects a very out of touch image through the BMFA news. We all need to work very hard to get more youngsters into our fantastic hobby and that means educational tie ups, offering training facilities, club trainers, working with the aerospace industries, hands on building opportunities, a proper website, etc etc all very nice - but actually we can only raise interest at local level with voluntary effort from local club members - how can BMFA best support that?

[Piers Bowlan]

A National Site and museum sounds like a non starter to me. A tiny proportion of the BMFA membership would use it yet all members would be funding it. It would inevitably push up the membership fees which would reduce the already dwindling numbers who are members.

 

Unless it could be proved that it would serve the disabled or socially disadvantaged young it is unlikely to gain lottery funding.

 

It may sound like a nice idea to some but to make it a reality you have to ask yourself the questions, what purpose would it serve, who is going to pay for it and maintain it?

[Andy Symons]

Posted by flugfan on 15/08/2011 23:35:28:

Gosh - this is such a bad idea - it is totally symptomatic of an organisation in contraction to establish a museum of "a golden past"

 

The facts are: -

numbers of signed up BMFA flyers and Membership of BMFA is falling

The average age of membership is rising

New membership is characterised by old flyers returning to the sport

I'm wondering where you get your information from. BMFA Membership isn't falling, its fairly static at the moment which in a recession isn't too bad at all. Not too sure oter "facts" are correct either.

[Conwy Soarer]

I think a few a looking at this from the wrong angle, surely such a facility would be run more as attraction for everybody, I am sure that if you took an entry poll of people going to a show such as Cosford a large percentage of visitors are not BMFA members and also not RC flyers, surely something like this will help inject some interest in our hobby. I am worried at the age of 46 that some circles class me as a 'young man' in this hobby. I know that Goosedales main client base seemed to be tourists/vistors as well as dyed in the wool RC enthusiasts - correct me if I am wrong but that was my perception when I visited.

[A.A. Barry]

WE, in Western Australia, a state of Aus. have a state site, which, currently supports 7 clubs, for those, who don't know Aus is made up of 7 states, and every state has it's own major site, there are many clubs who have there own, but fing flying sites, close to one's home is getting hard to find, so hence the 7 clubs on one site, I find it rather strange that UK dosnt have one, UK fits 13 times into W.A

my thoughts

A.A.Barry

[kc]

A.A. Barry you just answered your own question! England is so much smaller than Australia there is nowhere that is more than a mile from someones house!

Land is very expensive too.

Noise has always been the problem and now even electric is getting noisier especially EDF.

 

[Emil Benson]

to the people who are saying they don't want to see it. I think a large portion are saying it wouldn't be possible, but the question is, would you like to have one? For me it sounds absolutely awesome, I mean fancy having somewhere where you could go and there would always be fellow aeromodellers there to talk to, a museum and loads of other thong that could encourage more people to join this hobby, why wouldn't you want that?

[PatMc]

How would a national site cater for slope soarers ?