Club / Association Memberships.. Why?

I was looking at this from a HPR standpoint. With LPR there is certainly no need to join a club, it just makes things more fun.

We live on a small farm and can (and do) launch fairly regularly at our house. Across the highway we have access to about 1500 acres of farmland where we launch under FAR 101 rules. My son and I go and launch F motors once in a while when the D12s aren't cutting it.

While launching on our own is a lot of fun, launching with our school's rocket club is even better.

The 5-4-3-2-1 sounds much better being chanted by dozens of hyped-up kids. The cheers from the crowd when a parachute deploys is priceless. The parents bring lawn chairs and have a great time. Grandpas reminisce about flying rockets back in the day. It is a really good time for all.

+1 what RocketFeller and others have said.

LPR you can do on your own if you want. HPR is a different kettle of kipper. So much to learn, and often you don't know what you don't know. Usually a good social environment.

Thanks for the comment and advice. :wink:

Zeus-cat said:

At least check out a local club if you can.

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Location, location, location..... nearest local club is a 2 hour drive, one way. The field I'll use is a 10 minute drive.

The insurance angle appears to be a quagmire. Not sure how a guy launching as a "Lone Wolf" can prove NAR rules were followed? I emailed NAR for coverage clarification.

I do like Marc G's point about NAR being an advocate of the sport.

Good thread. This is a subject that I have been mulling over since I became a BAR in early 2016.
At the moment, I am perfectly happy to be flying LPR on my own or with family members at a local park.
There are 3 local clubs within easy driving distance of Castle Rock, CO, but I have yet to go fly with any of them. I probably will sometime in the near future.
I really do not wish to join a club, because I just don't have the time to commit to it. Part of the reason I quit the hobby back in 1984 was that I was deeply involved with clubs, the NAR, and contests. Each month was spent with a good chunk of nearly every weekend pursuing my hobby. Not to mention the money I was spending on rocketry stuff to keep up with contests and such. This created no small amount of friction with my spouse.
Now, in my BAR-era, I promised her that I would keep my activities much more low key. I have the freedom to pick and choose my own launch days and times based on monitoring weather and wind websites for my area, rather than being bound to a club's schedule. This way, I don't have any conflicts where I have to choose between flying rockets with a club or participating in family concerns and events.
The down-side to avoiding club activity is as mentioned in previous posts: missing the interaction with other model rocketeers and seeing other folks' rockets. This is compensated somewhat with my activities on the forums and blogs.
As for the NAR, I would love to re-join but the cost of yearly membership dues would not justify the miniscule level at which I would likely participate in NAR-sponsored events. Even though I am missing out on the insurance, the magazine, and more rocketeer interaction, I still view the $60 a year as too large of a chunk of my hobby budget that I feel could better be spent on rockets and motors. (Sorry,NAR!!)
So, for now, I am entirely content with building rockets, flying on my own, writing my blog, and hanging out here on the forums. Most importantly, my better half is actually glad I am back into rocketry, while at the same time keeping it within reasonable bounds.

My local club is small. 2 of our launches get a porta potty $130 delivered. We pay $500 to have the field brush hogged once a year. Rest is often donated time, equipment, and fuel to maintain. Dues and flier fees are close to a break even.

Going to a launch is a great way to learn. We let kids fly that are new comers with some lpr rockets members donate. Joining is for repeat visitors.

For little stuff local is fine if your living area allows. Clubs are a faster way to learn.

cavecentral said:

My local club is small. 2 of our launches get a porta potty $130 delivered. We pay $500 to have the field brush hogged once a year. Rest is often donated time, equipment, and fuel to maintain. Dues and flier fees are close to a break even.

Going to a launch is a great way to learn. We let kids fly that are new comers with some lpr rockets members donate. Joining is for repeat visitors.

For little stuff local is fine if your living area allows. Clubs are a faster way to learn.

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Same with our club, if not for the generosity of the club members we wouldn't be able to have the great launches we do. Club membership is not a requirement to fly, and we dont charge to fly, but every donation keeps the porta potty service and a little bit to continue upgrading and maintaining our GSE.

The social aspects of club launches cannot be overstated, at our launch this weekend we had some awesome times around the firepit, sharing rocketry memories and laughing at the antics of the little rocketeers, and sharing great snacks like making Woof'ems ( biscuit pocket roasted on a stick and filled with something like fruit pie filling, pudding etc). Its also great because we know each other now well enough that everyone kind of keeps an eye on all the little kids.

jlabrasca said:

Its interesting the way you frame the question. I am wondering what access to the internet has to do with your decision?

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Back in the 1970's when I first got into rocketry... there was no internet... unless you knew a rocketeer who / how would you ask somebody knowledgeable a question, who would you go to for advice? Now, that advice is a click away.

That used to be a big advantage of joining local clubs, be they car clubs, rocketry, whatever.

lakeroadster said:

Back in the 19770's when I first got into rocketry... there was no internet... unless you knew a rocketeer who / how would you ask somebody knowledgeable a question, who would you go to for advice? Now, that advice is a click away.

That used to be a big advantage of joining local clubs, be they car clubs, rocketry, whatever.

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Back in the 1970s -- when I also first got into rocketry -- the nearest thing to a club that I knew about was the Estes Aerospace Club, which I couldn't join because my parents wouldn't give me the money <smile>.

Later, I did belong to a model airplane club, run as an elective "activity period" class in my middle school. The faculty advisor was an accomplished model builder (flew RC sailplanes). I learned a lot from him.

I wasn't even thinking about a club as a source of information, but now that you mention it I will praise my fellow club members as much more reliable resources, providing much higher signal-to-noise, than this forum (or any other source on the web).

There are certainly smart and helpful people here, but it is so much more time-efficient to talk or correspond with a single knowledgeable person than it is to try to sift through the distractions and diversions that are the primary output of an internet search (the primary output of the internet, whether or not you are searching)

I think it has been mentioned many times here but I have a novel thought on the insurance issue. If you fly on your own with out insurance, it only takes on flight to put your in huge debt. Imagine a rocket going ballistic into a house or car. No injuries but thousands multiple thousands of dollars of damage. You the flier are responsible 100%. For many of us, that would be a month or more worth of paychecks.

Other benefits Include:

1. Port a potty
2. Comradery
3. Equipment use
4. Grump old guys like me give advice (wanted or not you are gonna receive it)

There are a lot of flyers who fly with clubs without a local or national membership. National membership is required to fly high power and some mid power motors. Local membership is not required for many clubs but I recommend it. For our club, we discount flight fees so if you fly 4-6 times a year, it is well worth it.

I'd get bored if I just flew by myself, this goes for my RC and rocket flying activities. The social aspects of club launches really add a lot to the hobby for me, whether it be half-day low power flying at my local club, or multi-day launches several hours away flying 1/4A through K+ flights. I do have the space to fly low power at home, for perspective.

lakeroadster said:

Back in the 19770's when I first got into rocketry... there was no internet... unless you knew a rocketeer who / how would you ask somebody knowledgeable a question, who would you go to for advice? Now, that advice is a click away.
That used to be a big advantage of joining local clubs, be they car clubs, rocketry, whatever.

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True, but I still join and participate in car and rocketry clubs precisely because running/launching with others is more fun than doing it by yourself.

The social aspect is completely missing from the internet forum discussions (if you don't count anti-social rants), and people tend to be significantly nastier to each other on the internet than in person.

This is not to suggest that one cannot learn a lot from the internet, but that you need to be careful not to get a skewed impression of the folks participating in any given hobby based on the treatment you receive from the 5% of that hobby's participants who have time to burn on the internet forums.

cwbullet said:

Other benefits Include:

1. Port a potty

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Wow, I didn't realize PaP was part of NAR/TRA benefits - where do I go to collect mine?

(we fly w/o one)

cwbullet said:

1. 
   
2. Comradery
3. Equipment use
4. Grump old guys like me give advice (wanted or not you are gonna receive it)

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True 'dat.

Our local club has one or more at every launch. As for the kit, I only wish estes would start selling the portapotty kit again.

-Watching a rocket fly on the computer screen doesn't compare to being there in person.
-Wandering up and down the flight line and seeing all sorts of rockets on display or being prepped will give you ideas for your next build.
-When I'm LCO, policy is "You wanna push the button yourself? Come on up!"
-Ever lost a rocket in the sun, or in the distance? Less likely when there are a dozen pairs of eyes watching it come down.
-If you fly anything larger than a G motor, NAR and TRA made it possible for you to do so without having a permit and without dealing with completely-unnecessary storage space and inspections. Please pay it forward.

Best -- Terry

slothead said:

I have a related question: Why join both the NAR and Tripoli? I see some folks are members of both national org's but I'm not sure I understand why (I'm just a NAR member).

Tom
NAR #105423

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Tom,

For me it is about options. I admit, the memberships fees are not a burden for me, and I certainly understand that they are for some. That being understood, I like having the freedom to go to a research launch with TRA, or NARAM or NARCON with NAR (not that I ever have; one of these days...).

Also, a big advantage of NAR is that you retain your certs even if you fall out of active status. Need to take a couple of years off? No problem with NAR -- rejoin, you get your cert level back. TRA doesn't do that, and you have to recertify.

But, NAR doesn't allow research, so TRA is a must for that.

I have kids. NAR has a junior certification program, whereas TRA has a mentoring program. For my kids, I think I would like for them to be able to fly HPR with my supervision (mentoring), then get their own junior certs when they are ready (NAR). Then when they turn 18, they can quickly certify to whatever level they want.

There are other reasons I like both.