ORIGINAL: w8ye
Being in the Glow Engine Forum a lot, one would get the idea that Saito is number one?
So I was nosing around in the market places and taking counts of engines for sale to confirm my suspicion.
There were almost four times as many Saito four strokes as there were OS four strokes
There are still twice as many OS two strokes out there as Saito four strokes
Also from my visits to several model flying sites in the Eastern US, everything may be (In what I would call extremes), almost exclusive OS and others Saito.
I didn't look into the ASP/Magnum/SC situation nor did I look at Thunder Tiger.
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Thunder Tiger was doing well until they left Horizon Hobby Distributors. You are lucky to hear from them any longer.
The 3D kick is what made Saito popular. Personally, I liked Saito much better before they went to the one piece head and high nitro philosophy. But I'm just an old fart. I do have most of their single cylinder engines, all acquired in the last two years, so I'm not completely dissatisfied with them.
The OS FX dibacle really hurt their popularity and with good reason. I have a feeling that this episode isn't over yet (declining quality/dishonest service). I hope OS survives. Before anyone thinks that I am anti OS, two of my last five engine purchases were an unpumped OS FS-91 and a pumped OS FS-91.
Lately I have acquired three new YS engines. For the particular application that I have in mind (3D), you're wasting your time with anything else. Just my opinion. Otherwise, I wouldn't put up with their fussiness for just ordinary sport flying.
After this is all settled out and the models are flying, I'm going for a radial model engine. Never had one before. Gotta have at least five cylinders. <G>