acdii

When they have something that is good, they discontinue it.

Evolution props, of all the props I have used on an FA 100, the Evolution 15 x 6 worked best. Discontinued.

P-47 Discontinued.

Twin Otter Discontinued.

It is especially painful when the ARF are discontinued as so go the parts with it.

Now they picked up TH and gutted Top Flight. No more kits, just the ARF. Dammit I want to build not assemble! HH, sorry, but unless I need a part for my Saito that you happen to have, I'm done with you.

init4fun

I have to believe that market forces , and not any other reason , are behind the decisions RC manufacturers make WRT what products are discontinued . If HH were selling P-47s and Twin Otters like , for instance , Apple is selling I Phones , don't you think they'd still be available ? In any business , carry enough unprofitable products and your days are certainly numbered (unless of course your GM , who got billions in govt. bailout money and is now bailing out on U.S. production in favor of Mexico , thank you sir may I have another ?!?!?)

Steve Collins

My Feedback: (8)

They certainly seem to be prolific producing dinky little "toys" that many of us will never be interested in. Stuff that folks who aren't really invested in the hobby might be interested in.

ramboy

HH recently discontinued the Carbon Z Cub. Foamies are not selling well either.

Steve Collins

My Feedback: (8)

Not to mention discontinuing the hugely popular Carbon Z T-28!!

acdii

Thats my point, they come out with some good ones that people will actually fly, and break, then discontinue them completely, including spares, never to be seen again. Regardless if it's foam or wood. My P-47, dumped it after striking the edge of a roof and have to make my own cowl and dummy radial, parts not available. The Evolution prop flies my Cub with a Saito 100 so well that I want a couple more, can't find them, discontinued. I bought out my LHS when they had a few.

A lot of my wish list is gone from TH as well, which means there is nothing from TH that I want.

scottrc

I loved my Evolution props. I have completely stopped buying anything related to HH or Eflight. I've been rejected too many times to rely on them. Its better to go back to old school of scratch building and sourcing supplies and parts second hand.

SwampFlier-RCU

Ditto...
I worry if their practices will move over to TH
I have tried (unsuccessfully) to buy from HH .. but my purchase is rejected on several grounds.. the most common being ÿou're using a card that can not be verified by our team"...
Only vendor I have had this problem, TH has come trough time and time again
Now between discontinued items and card hassle I am sourcing all my supplies form other vendors

REgards,
Patrick

scottrc

TH spoiled us for so many years by being the one stop source for EVERYTHING RC. Now they have been diminished to the level of typical big box retailers that have shelves of throw away, instant gratification, "As Seen on TV" point of purchase crap. Anything that a builder or someone maintaining and older product needs is out of luck.

I do see a trend of cottage specialized shops coming back, which is a good thing, many of these will channel through Amazon so I can purchase from several vendors and still get free shipping. This tactic may be a big threat to HH/TH.

acdii

This pretty much summed it up. The only thing I ever went to HH for were Saito parts. I do have 3 of their ARF, but two were given to me, the third I bought from someone else because I liked how it looked, and of course none of them have any parts available. My wish list from TH is now empty, so long TH, been nice knowing you.

acdii

It's official, last two items on my list are now gone.

the following item can no longer be purchased from Tower Hobbies, therefore it has been removed from your Wish List:Bulk Program Silicone Fuel Tubing Standard (50' Roll)

the following item can no longer be purchased from Tower Hobbies, therefore it has been removed from your Wish List:Bulk Program Silicone Fuel Tubing Large (30' Roll)

scottrc

TH was my source for bulk tubing, now it has to be sourced directly from DuBro.

TH will soon be joining Sears and Kmart.

oviedoed

I got the same message. I ordered it back in mid Aug. it was out of stock at that time and backordered. I received the following message in mid Nov. I did send an inquiry in Oct. to them just trying to fine out WHEN I might expect it...birthday 11/07 or Christmas 12/25? short answer was they could not tell me. I sent another inquiry beginning of Nov. and I got a curt reply...I decided at that time I will not spend any more of my money with them (after of course I get my Sig) a week later I got the message below.
the following item can no longer be purchased from Tower Hobbies, therefore it has been removed from your Wish List: Sig Senior Sport ARF

I am done with Tower and except for receivers (Spektrum) I am done with Horizon. I will shop elsewhere.

acdii

I get my SIG direct from SIG. They ship fast and usually have what I am looking for in stock so it is shipped the day I order if during the week. I found OrangeRX work as well as the Branded Spektrum RX, so get those from HK instead. Except for Saito, there is nothing TH or HH can do for me anymore. Hope they realize this and change, otherwise they may become just like the others, gone.

oviedoed

At the time, tower had the Senior for 249.99 with a coupon...Sig wanted 279.99 + S/H...over 300.00. Sorry but tower wins the price war. I am no longer in the market for a Sig as I have found a replacement to toy around with when I don't want to take the trailer out.
I have nothing to say about H/K receivers except that I will never ever use one in any of my planes...I have to much money riding in my planes to not put the best I can afford into them. I am sure they are the cream of the crop but just not for me.
I find that I am shopping at a lot of other hobby shops now, Taildragger, PAU, Pilot, VVRC, Hangtime hobbies, SWB Manufacturing, Extreme flight etc. as I fly mostly large scale stuff now and these folks treat me right so I keep coming back. I also have access to Graves hobby shop for the little odds and ends I always need at the last minute during a build. Horizon/Tower, it was fun while it lasted but you closed the door on my wallet.

acdii

A simple call in to SIG and you would have got it for the same price, but too late now. I hear ya on the RX. Felt the same way until I tested one in a cheap swap meet steal. Worked great, so now between the Orange and FrySky, I can outfit several planes for the cost of one branded RX.

When it comes to my big planes that I put a lot of time into though, then I only use Futaba.

nomis38

Awe, sorry they keep doing that to models you have.

They are a love hate relationship with me as well.

378

My Feedback: (4)

I still buy from Tower on the regular and see no real reason not to. Perhaps it's my perspective, though. Start looking at car stuff and suddenly Tower's inventory gets much MUCH better. And I'm primarily a ground pounder...I have a small indoor 6ch heli off Banggood and a NexSTAR 46 but most of my fleet only flies if it hits a ramp first...so Tower's still perfectly fine.

If anything, for me, Tower's better now than it was before Horizon bought them. Wasn't too long ago when I would have sung the same tune you lot are, shifting over to AMain Hobbies and eBay, but the HH acquisition seems to have done wonders for it on the car side.


I do miss the days where I could lose an entire afternoon perusing Tower's engine selection, though. I'd never consider buying 90% of it, but it was fascinating to see the various engines available for land, sea, air use. Today there's less engine selection in total than there was in just the 0.18-up car engine selection. Back in the day they had OS wankels, OS car four strokes, steam engines for boats, Novarossis for making SRBMs out of touring cars, Saitos and Zenoahs for aircaft, all manner of really cool -beep- that makes a gearhead like me grin. Nowadays it's....pathetic. I honestly don't know what I'm going to do when the AE 18X in my SC10GT craps out. And I get wish list deletion emails on the regular, too, mostly from aircraft I'd thrown in there because I'd like to fly them someday and from odds'n'ends that I could repurpose. Had my eyes on that Sullivan alternator thing for the longest time, as it'd be a godsend on the cars(I'd basically be able to never worry about the receiver battery if I adapted it to a car engine!), on-board glow shenanigans, and small 1oz header tanks to keep cars running when they're on their lids(Most glow cars don't have a clunk in their fuel tank so they'll die in a few seconds if they roll over, which prompts many people who don't race them to put a 1oz aircraft tank between the car's main tank and the carb to change that to a minute or two). But some stuff's been on my wish list since the early 2000s, like Tamiya's Globe Liner and Futaba's 4YF(Which I need to remember to delete, my 6J is worlds better than the 4YF lol).

Stickslammer

I agree. I just ordered a new piston and cylinder for my old Duratrax ThunderQuake truck from Tower.

rustyrivet

My Feedback: (6)

When I think of Horizon, I think of an over abundance of small but overpriced cheezy little toy planes. I also dread the obnoxious "can I help you face" popping up and staring at me the whole time that I'm on their website (which is very rare that I visit). If somebody followed me around a store like that, I'd tell them "Thanks, but why don't you f**k off already."