About SwellRC

Kyle Hilson, author of SwellRC — Kyle Hilson

SwellRC is a guide site about radio-controlled models: cars, airplanes, helicopters, drones and boats. It is written by Kyle Hilson, a hobbyist with about 20 years in RC, for anyone from a curious 14-year-old with their first car to a builder who has been at it for decades.

Who writes SwellRC

I’m Kyle Hilson. Most of my hobby time is spent on the water: I run boats in the NAVIGA Mini Eco Expert class, and I make many of the parts for my boats myself. Over the years I have owned a bit of almost everything the hobby offers:

Boats: my main interest, including building and modifying parts.
Cars: a King Motor Baja 5B, a 1/5 scale petrol buggy.
Airplanes: a home-built electric plane, and home-built nitro planes I have flown.
Helicopters: an RC helicopter.
Drones: none. I don’t fly drones, so the drone articles are based on documentation and official sources only.

How the guides are written

Experience is labelled. When a guide draws on my own models and building, it says so, usually in a “From the workbench” box.
No invented tests. If I haven’t owned or run a product, I don’t pretend I have. Articles about such products describe specifications, what to look for and how they compare, not a made-up test drive.
Rules and figures are checked. Drone and model aircraft rules change; guides that mention them carry an “Updated” date and link to the official authority.
Older articles are being rebuilt. SwellRC has published hundreds of articles over the years. I’m rewriting them one by one in the format of the guides, merging duplicates and removing what wasn’t useful.

How the site is organised

Everything starts at the guides overview. There is one main guide per type of model plus one on the electronics they all share, and each guide links to every detailed article on its topic:

Corrections and contact

Found a mistake, or have a question an article doesn’t answer? Please write through the contact page. Corrections are welcome and get fixed.