Hobby Thread - August 22, 2026 [TRex]

Welcome hobbyists! Pull up a chair and sit a spell with the Horde in this little corner of the interweb. This is the mighty, mighty officially sanctioned Ace of Spades Hobby Thread. For this week, the Wheel of Hobbies (TM) is feeling lucky and decided on a radio control theme for this Hobby Thread.

A what? A radio control hobby theme?

Radio controlled cars, trucks, and airplanes are an ENORMOUS hobby. Lots of people have wrestled with a small hand-held controller that (in theory) makes something else go. TRex is not the most accomplished RC driver or pilot, but I appreciate people that make things and then fly or drive them remotely.

In simple terms, the hobby is building and controlling. Some people spend more time on the building and less time on the controlling. Others mostly skip the building and just want to do controlling. The prospect of damage typically ensures some ability to build and repair is necessary.

This is a hobby that can start humble but get out of hand fast. There are no rules to what you can build. Even a small budget creates opportunities. Disposable income helps buy more and more capable equipment. Racing, digging, and flying is a giggle.

There are common themes with drones in terms of the skill necessary to fly something remotely.

Are you wise in the ways of RC airplanes, cars, trucks, etc.? Do you have any? Have you built any? Do you have kids or grand-kids that are into this sort of thing?

TRex can barely reach the controls, so need help in the gray boxes for this one.

What are you hobbying?

Radio controlled cars, trucks and airplanes may not be everyone's favorite but give the content a chance before you judge. Any adjacent hobbying is in scope (such as small scale collecting or model building), so jump in with your interests, stories and questions.

In any event, the thread is not limited to to the theme. Anything (legal) you are hobbying is welcome. Even if the theme does not speak to you, you might learn something or be entertained. If not, offer something else relating to hobbying. If all of that fails, just check in and say hello.

As per usual Hobby Thread etiquette, keep this thread limited to hobbying. Leave politics and religion to threads elsewhere (unless your hobby is building or restoring churches). Pants? Nope. As always, puns are welcome and encouraged.

Play nice and do not be rude. Do not be a troll and do not feed the trolls.

The Holy Grail of collectible RC Cars? The Porsche 959!

3D printing your own working RC excavator?

If you build a radio controlled excavator in your garage for your kid, is it really for the kid??

Save this one for later and watch at 1.25x or 1.5x speed. The craftsmanship is impressive but the video is lengthy.

At some point, a large enough scale RC airplane starts to rival a real small airplane in size.

Radio control "toys" are a little different with the benefit of disposable income:

A radio controlled submarine? Ambitious!

Making an RC airplane out of cardboard and a leaf blower? Sure, why not?

Building a radio controlled airplane is no fun if you don't know how to fly it. Learn here:

Does this qualify as a real estate hobby? architecture hobby? Film location hobby? LA history hobby? Dunno, but definitely unique:

You had me at apple killer (but it is a clever and well written video showing the design and construction process):

Blame CBD for this - anyone do the homemade ice cream making thing?

Restoring an old ice cream maker (before you dismiss, know that this video has over 9.4 million views - that's MILLION):

Map quirks are fun. How about a story of a fake town that became real? Anyone ever been to Agloe, New York?

Not sure if this guy is clinically insane or just a mad scientist type (or maybe a little of both). Regardless, his narration is very clever and funny. Making a semi-automatic saw blade launcher in your garage should count as a hobby, right? By the way, this video has over 586k views which means a lot of people out there are intrigued. You'll probably see him on a Wed ONT niche YouTube channel feature at some point.

Did you miss the Hobby Thread last week? We did a fire truck theme. The comments may be closed, but you can re-live the content.

Notable comments from last week:

Words of wisdom:

"Because despite all our troubles, when things are grim out in that wide round world of ours, that's when it's really important to have a good hobby." Posted by: tankascribe at June 22, 2024 07:41 PM (HWxAD).

Reminder: if you put links in the comments, use a URL shortener and describe what you're linking to. Failing to do either or both makes you barrel-eligible. Don't make people click to find out what you're linking.

Send thoughts, suggestions and photos of your hobbying to moronhobbies at protonmail dot com. Or just email to say hello. Do mighty things.