I have one of these (the Pacific Aeromodels TM) and she is one fine flying airplane. Mine is powered with a 1.20 four stroke and it looks absolutely gorgeous in the air at half throttle. The only probelm I have had with it is the covering is more fragile than Monokote and the fitting are all metric. I really need to go thru and do what you proposed here and change out all of the hardware but the thing flies so well I hate to mess with it. if this new ARF flies as well she will be well worth the price and should be a great seller.
Tommy