Volfy, it almost seems as if you are saying that everyone who buys an ARF should peel all the covering off to fully inspect the airframe prior to flying it. If that is the case, then why cover it to begin with? Why don't they all just come as ARC's? The whole point of the ARF is to assemble the plane with minimum work and not having to uncover the plane at all.
My point is this, if you have to go through all the work you are referring to in your post, then why not just build it from a kit to begin with? Your reference to all of the work you did on your plane only strengthens mt argument as to the safety issue with ARF's.
Yes, I whole heartedly agree that ARF's have come a long way since I was a kid. Back then, about the only ARF's were trainers. And the quality is much better than it was. Some companies are much better than others, and some are really good, to the point where quality is approaching good kit built craftsmanship. But, I must say that the overall ARF industry still has a long way to go.
A case in point is the Hangar 9 brand. I ran into a thread where a gent had a Hangar 9 Sukhoi, and after about 20 some flights, the wing was falling apart inside, and there was lots of rattling etc. Instead of just removing the covering, and fixing the wing and bolstering the hard points etc, he spent lots of money to find a big enough box to send it all the way back to the company in hopes they would replace the whole wing. Hangar 9 stood by there product and will replace the wing, but the guy has to wait months for a replacement, when he could have fixed it himself better than the original design and had it in the air within a week.
I could not help but express the possibility that the new wing may end up with the same problems as his first, or even worse, thus losing the whole model. Now, the guy does build planes, so I think it was a matter of wanting to be a satisfied customer more than anything. But my point is, if he had properly built it from a kit, then it most likely would not have had any problems to begin with, thus saving him all of his heart-ache.
With all this said, I will happily say this, the Hangar 9 Sukhoi totally ROCKS!!!!!! A worthy ARF, if there is one.
I saw a vid of one flying, "SWEET" is an understatement.

Patriot