john2364

I am just wondering if there is anyone else who has a problem spending so much money on these tiny 1/18 scale parts? Seriously though, I can usually get parts for my 1/8 scale buggy for only 50 percent more (if that). I mean is it really worth spending 200 dollars on just a few ounces of aluminum? While I would love to deck out my RC18t, I think that I will only stick with a very select few mods.

sheograth

Yeah, its a joke. The sad thing is that the vendors actually have most the RC community convinced that CNC aluminum IS that expensive. Its such a sham its barely even funny anymore. I spec out aluminum parts (aircraft grade) for work that are the size of most of these cars, and they cost as much as a set of A arms for a mini T or something. Like I said it really is amazing how great of a job theyve done at convincing kids that aluminum is that expensive. It's not a cheap metal, but this is absurd.

The Mad Modder

Tell me about it...
I see places selling aluminum parts for as much or more than carbon fiber ones.

The Hedgehog

Yeah, I don't get it. People are also convinced it is for durabilities sake. But something always has to give (or expecially flex!).

Mr. Mugen

Well there are certain parts to any car that could use the beefiness of alum. but it is way overrated indeed. I know myself I have spent foolishly on the alum stuff. Now I just pin point the nessessities and thats it. Unless of course I am building a shelf queen...

04DarkShadowGT

It has nothing to do with how much aluminum costs. The price of parts has to do with the volume they sell and what people are willing to pay for them. Companies are going to charge as much as the market will bare.

Its the beauty of our capitalistic economy, if you dont want to pay that much, dont buy it and if other people agree with you eventually the company will charge less because they wont get any sales.

rschoi_75

This is a pretty interesting topic. I'm not sure if you guys are familiar with the term "economies of scale", but this is a classic example. 04Darkshadowgt brought up a great point about the volume of parts they sell. The reason why so rc parts are so expensive is because they are produced in small batches. These have a marginal cost far greater than a part from an automotive company like Ford, who produces millions of a single part, and may use that one part for multiple vehicles over the span of decades. Unfortunately rc car models don't last that long.... (unless its a tamiya ). You can also factor in the fact that the target demographic for rc's is pretty narrow in scope (i.e. we are a niche industry). There are just not enough customers to justify producing extremely large batches, which in turn causes the marginal cost of production to rise sharply.

john2364

I really can't speculate as to whether these companies are charging to much because I don't know what their cost of production is. I doubt that anyone except for upper level managment knows enough to make a real argument one way or the other. Regardless of whether the companies are charging an appropriate amount, I was just wondering if anyone else feels that these little parts are not worth the money.

sheograth

I buy the economies of scale argument, but at the same time I work in industries that are way smaller than RC and we get decent prices. In addition to the economies of scale issue theres also a fundamental thing about hobbies, whenever something becomes a "hobby" it somehow justifies insane prices.

Mr. Mugen

I hear that! I bought a plane with a 80 inch wing span and paid 200 for it ARF...paid 800 for a 99 inch ws plane....??? It has maybe 2x's the balsa but thats it......why? There are many possible reasons for this but I don't care to try to guess. The larger plane did not even have any hardware for the extra 600 bucks spent. The 200 dollars plane had a great hardware kit with it..........

MonkeyFist

The thing that gets me is that there is very little R&d that goes into these after market parts as well. I mean there are only so many ways to make an A arm for a specific vehicle. It's not like they have to completely redesign the parts. The only caveat to that are converion kits like the Exotek kits for the RC18 series cars. Also these aluminum parts are not made to what I'd call "tight" tolerances, I'd guess maybe +/- .005. That is a cake walk for a machinist with any kind of skills and a decent machine. I spend my days working to +/- .0002 in all kinds of materials. At my shop we don't even do that much aluminum we leave that easy stuff to other shops.

madmax22

CNC alum is very expensive and a lot of it is wasted b/c i cant be used.

sheograth

Yeah, you're spot on. A good CAD designer can make a part digitally in a couple hours, a couple rapid prototypes get made, and then its off to mass production. Most of these parts arent actually machined from billet anyway, the term is just thrown around loosely. Even so, its called CNC for a reason - its fast and automated. When I spec out a new part for a motor I'm designing, it hardly costs us anything to have the prototype made, and even if just want to order 50 or 100 of the part its cheap. And the tolerances are very, very tight.

Mini_Me

What grade of aluminum? 70705? 7076?

MonkeyFist

HUH? CNC Aluminum? CNC is not a type of Aluminum. CNC refers to the process of manufactuering with a Computer Numerically Controlled mill or lathe. The aluminum itself is of differing grades like 6061 or 7075. The differing grades each have thier own properties for which they are valued. 6061 is usually the choice for RC parts because of it abilty to be anodized, its relativly low cost, and its ease of machining. Its strength to weight ratio also make it an ideal choice for RC parts. All of the cuttting chips are recycled so a good bit of the cost of the material can be recovered.