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Please add a hyperlink to AirplanesAndRockets.com
Thank-you! | Hobby Shops & Flying Fields in/near Erie, Pennsylvania |
|  | Do a Google or Bing search on hobby shops or flying fields in and near the Erie, PA, area, and you won't find much. If you're lucky, you'll find a reference to the Thermal-G radio control club, but that's about it.
Melanie and I moved here in May of 2008, and since then I have made an attempt to identify where the hobby shops are located, and where the various model flying groups meet. It has not been easy. It's almost as if nobody wants you to know where they hide out, but that's not the case - it's just that no one has bothered to promote the venues on the Internet.
So, this web page is an effort to fix that. Here are the places featured:
Maxwell's Hobby Shop
5014 Station Road
Erie, PA 16510
(814) 899-1821
Maxwell's Hobby Shop is owned and run by Joe Maxwell. The 600 sq. ft. shop is stuffed to the gills with kits and equipment for all types of aeromodeling, including free flight, control line, and radio control. There are some supplies for boats and cars as well, but the focus is airplanes and helicopters. I keep calling to try to get permission to photograph the inside, but he never calls back for some reason. Below is a video I found for them on YouTube.
Directions:
Take exit 32 off of I-90 heading north on the Bayfront Connector (Rt. 430). Keep in the right-hand lane while going about 0.6 mile. Make a right onto Station Road, at the traffic light in front of the Penn State Erie (Behrend) complex. Go about 500 feet, and on the right, just past Colt Road, you will see a mailbox with "Maxwell" on it. The hobby shop is in the building just beyond the house.
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 Thermal-G R/C Club
Contact: Dale Edinger (President)
Field Location: Gehrlein Gliderport
Hamot Road
Waterford (Erie), PA
AMA Chartered Club #1211
3-D, Control Line, Electric, Fixed Wing, Free Flight, Fuel/Gas, Helicopters, Park Flyers, Pattern, Pylon Racing, Radio Control
Directions:
From I-90, take exit 24 south onto Peach Street (Rt. 19), then go a few hundred feet and take the first right onto Oliver Road. At about a mile, you will see the Five Points intersection, with Erie Tech Center complex ahead on the right. Turn left (south) onto Hamot Road. Continue past the couple housing complexes and then after a mile, keep watch to the left, where you'll see a sign next to a cleverly hidden gravel road. If you get to the driveway for the glider port hangars, you've gone too far. Turn around, go back 200 feet and make a right onto the dirt road. The parking lot for the field is separated from the flying area by about 500 feet.
 Note also that the good people at Gehrlein Products who allow the club to fly there also run a hobby shop on the site.
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Erie Model Aircraft Association
Free Flight
Contact: Ross P. Mayo (Flying Aces Club, FAC)
2874 Willowood Dr.
Erie, PA 16506
Phone: 814-836-1299
AMA Chartered Club #545
Directions:
From I-90, take the 26th Street (Rt. 20) exit heading west. Go about 1 mile and turn right onto Caughey Road. McDowell High School is on the right after about a half mile. Turn in and go to the gymnasium entrance.
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 CW Action Hobbies
509 West 3rd Street
Jamestown, NY 14701
(716) 484-1780
Toll Free (800) 737-1180
Hours: Mon-Thur 9:30 - 6 pm
Friday 9:30 - 8 pm
Saturday 9:30 - 4 pm
Sunday Closed
Wow, what a great hobby shop! Admittedly, I don't get around too much, but this ranks in the top two or three best hobby shops I have ever had the pleasure of visiting. You walk through the front door of Action Hobbies and see shelves and walls full of hobby and craft supplies, but then you walk up the stairs and are greeted with an unbelievable amount of aircraft and rocketry modeling gear. It would be hard to stuff any more stuff into the available space. Action Hobbies also does a big online business, so they probably more a lot of inventory through there. The prices are absolutely on par with what you would pay from an online seller, so that really works in their favor. Unfortunately, they have to charge New York state sales tax to in-state purchasers (online or walk-in), so the mail order deals sale a little if shipping is free (which Action Hobbies offers on order over $100).
Webmaster: Kirt Blattenberger, BSEE, UVM 1989 | |
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