I have always liked Great Planes kits over the years and now recently owned a 1/3 scale Pitts ARF. In the past when I had a problem with building a kit or a part defective or missing from the box, after calling Great Planes they always immediately sent the part at no cost in a few days. The quality of their ARF'S and kits are always a cut above other manufactures. Their customer service department always treated me good.
Recently I was flying my Pitts. It had 10-12 successful flights. It always received a lot of attention at the field especially when I put on some flights with smoke on. The plane flew excellent .The kit is very good quality with a flawless finish right out of the box. I liked the excellent quality of fiberglass on the cowl, wheelpants and molded struts. The plane when powered and balanced properly according to specs, flew very much like the full size. Until the final flight.
But on this flight something went wrong.( For some reason I never read about a potential problem with the wing mounts.) So needless to say at full throttle I went into some snap rolls and never recovered. The plane continued 8-10 snap rolls right across the field and crashed into a canal in 3 ft of water. The plane and most of the equipment was a total loss, submerged under water for 20 minutes. I was very upset. I couldn't figure out what went wrong. Then someone told me of the wing failure problem. I looked closely at the center section and it appeared the cabane mounts pulled right out of the thin spar, which was screwed to close to the outer edge of the spar causing it to split.
Someone gave me Ann Marie's E/mail address from this website and I told her of my problem. Well she was so nice, and I was so surprized that within a week of sending her my piece of wing and damaged radio equipment I received a newer version Pitts and instead of repairing my damaged radio, Great Planes replaced everything new...I was shocked. I was hoping just to get a new plane but I received all new equipment and even better then some stuff I had. Everything was replaced...even wiring.
I would like to publicly thank Ann Marie and Great Planes for their continued super customer service department that I have experianced over the years. I have and will continue to tell everyone of their excellent company that stands behind all of their products. Keep up the good work Ann Marie you are a blessing to us and your company.
Sincerely,
Robert Alessi