I have both of these planes the Tower & the NexStar. I think they are both great flying planes. They're also both pretty durable, while I have never actually crashed either one of them I have had some pretty hard landings playing in high winds with them & they have both been blown over on the runway a number of times while trying to turn them around to taxi back after a landing instead of walking down the runway to fetch them. The Tower covering is coming off more so than the NexStar but I shredded some of the striping off of the NexStar too. Both engines have proven to be very reliable, they start right up every time with the Tower producing a little more power than the OS. I assume the OS will outlive the Tower but only time will tell if that's true.

As for the price while I bought the NexStar originally for the "gadgets" I soon found out that the AFS is just a $99 paper-weight because that is all it's good for. The sim however was helpfull for me. As for the droops & airbrakes, don't need them, this thing still slows to a crawl for a landing without them & is self-righting enough that the droops aren't neccessary either IMO.

If it was the AFS that had you looking at the NexStar let it go, it's junk. If I had it to do all over again & I wanted a NexStar it would be in the form of an ARF.

If money is an issue, & it sounds like maybe it is then you can't go wrong with Chuck's suggestion of piecing together the Tower ARF with engine & radio equipment of your choice.

In another thread BigEd put up a link for a Thunder Tiger Trainer that comes with a Thunder Tiger .42 engine for $150 wich is also their magic number for free shipping! It's a very nice looking little Trainer leaving only the radio equipment needed. So this is another good value for little money.

Good luck.


http://www.thundertiger4u.com/mark-wgp42-p-7325.html

There is the link if you'd like to take a look at the TT, courtesy of Bigedmustafa.