Novice Here - Any Beginner's Advice?

[Ocracoke]

Hey there, welcome to the forum!

After a brief bit of research I've been told that beetleweight is the best category for a beginner to get into. Supposedly antweights are too difficult to meet the low weight limit, featherweights have a really high skill ceiling, and heavyweights are just too expensive.

Beetleweights are a good class to start off in but you could argue that Featherweights are just as easy. You can easily plough in as much money into a Featherweight as into a Heavyweight depending on what you want in it. I am not sure about the skill thing though... how do you mean?

What advice would you be able to give me? I'd like to know where I can purchase parts, what sorts of tools and materials are most suitable, and so on.

I would begin by reading up on the build threads in the various weight category forums and the build diary forum itself, they are a good repository of what is being used in the various classes. For a Beetleweight, I find a good Dremel with various attachments does me fine. Companies like DirectPlastics.co.uk supply my materials for building with and Hobbyking.com is where I get most of my RC parts from these days for my Feather and Beetleweight.

I have very little experience with anything like this and in the past I've tried to learn more about the basics but find myself getting confused by speed controllers and battery ratings and so on. If possible, a simple explanation of all this would be very useful.

Do you mean things like the ratings of batteries and so on and mixing?